The BC Autopsy: 09-10 - Draft, extend, repeat

The Raptors’ struggle to slip into the 2008 playoffs, followed by a 33 win season, readjusted the expectations of the trajectory supposedly set by 2007. By June of 2009, Bryan Colangelo was in full damage control. While some GMs take these opportunities to pare down costs, load up on draft picks and bide their time until the conditions for success reveal themselves, Colangelo took the other approach--tape over the holes and sneak back into the playoffs so that his reputation would remain intact.

Okay, maybe that is over-editorializing . What I must concede is that if the roster quality was as good (but maybe unlucky or dragged down by the turmoil of the Ford/O’Neal/Marion transition) then perfunctory hole-filling is perfectly reasonable, even responsible. I truly believe you can improve rosters to contenting status with small adjustments and not just be beaming in “superstars” as per conventional wisdom. But this is activity saved for a manager who has an honest assessment of his assets and Colangelo’s track record, three years in, did not induce enough confidence in such skills.

June 9 2009
Traded forward Jason Kapono to the Philadelphia 76ers for forward Reggie Evans.
Colangelo begins his summer agenda with another bafflingly productive transaction. Like the Hoffa-for-Hump trade of years back, the GM dumps a no-longer-NBA talent with a heavy contract in Kapono for rebounding specialist in Evans. Evans sat out most of that season with an injury but played significant minutes the following season. It is hard to think of a player who came more “as advertised” than Reggie Evans. He was (and still is) an instinctive rebounder who uses his body to take board positions as opposed to using athleticism (to which he has zero). This skill, honed by the best rebounders of all time (Dennis Rodman, Ben Wallace, Charles Barkley) allows a player to eat up rebounds well into their mid-30s. His defence (when on display in 10-11) was not elegant but he showed a willingness to put his body in front of a post player and refuse to move in way not performed by a Raptor since Charles Oakley. In short, Reggies Evans was a lot better at rebounding than Jason Kapono was (at that point) at shooting threes. Everyone, pull a pin out of your Colangelo voodoo bobblehead.

Draft 2009
Selected guard DeMar DeRozan (9th overall pick).

I still haven’t quite figured out if the NBA triumvirate of front offices/media/fans collectively place too much value on draft picks or not enough.

Arguments that draft picks are the better than chocolate and sex and chocolate sex:

• The opportunity to draft the next “superstar” for wildly too little money for many years (with even tighter, team-friendly restrictions in every new CBA): remember that in 2007, when LeBron James put that straggly team of Ira Newbles on his back and took the Cavs to the NBA Finals, with a 27/7/6 season slashline, he earned less than $6 million

• Over and above the muted salaries, each team gets a “fair” opportunity to acquire a player who otherwise might not want to sign with a team for whatever reason. Take Kyrie Irving: What are the chances, if rookies entered the league as free agents, that the Cavs could have signed him?

• Future draft picks can be traded with no mind to salary implications which allow teams to construct fairer (or executable) trades in the face of very restrictive salary-swapping rules

Arguments for the opposite, vanilla celibacy:

• There are no fewer guaranteed contracts handed out in bad draft years

• Empirically, the triumvirate seem to project 30+ draftees as significant contributors when that simply has never played out. Don’t believe me? Go look up draft briefs and comparables of a dude named Reece Gaines. I’ll wait

• GMs suffer from various cognitive biases that can result in overvaluing their own draft picks (once drafted). See: Bargnani, Andrea

• Though I believe there is skill involved in assessing players to draft or at least the relative value of the draft pick, many GMs seem incapable of extracting value. I suppose this is an advantage for some and disadvantage for other

There’s a growing, decent body of research around the NBA draft that you should for sure go Google. Also, read the first heading in this.

Digressions abounding, what does this mean for DeMar DeRozan? I’ve tried as best I could to curb incredulous bashing of Colangelo’s draft picking. I believe he is a poor drafter but that his draft picks (considered in a vacuum from his overall decision making) is not a serious enough drag on the team’s performance. Even the loss to world happiness that was the Andrea Bargnani pick was recoverable (and if you believe that is the end of that, don’t read on).

So, perhaps it is more significant that the Raptors only came back to first round of the draft for the second time (functionally) in Colangelo’s tenure, here. And perhaps there was some old rule-of-thumb about how late first round picks were a soupy puddle of crap and that Colangelo’s intentions were always to participate only in the lottery. Perhaps.

2009 turned out to be a deep draft, with interesting players up and down, including a pile in the second round (DeJuan Blair, Chase Budinger, Danny Green). I remember wanting to draft Ty Lawson as the Raps had lived through a season where Will Solomon and Roko Ukic played backup point guard. But I never claimed to have much drafting skill. If I was drafting for an NBA team, I’d probably grab the best rebounding percentage player in Division 1 year after year. So, if it was DeMar, then it was DeMar. The Raptors surely needed help at shooting guard after the demise of Anthony Parker.

As a rookie, DeRozan liked to dunk and showed promising rebounding ability. His shot selection worsened as the years went on and he’s devoid of respectable defence or passing skills. He can get to the line with reasonable reliability. Was taking him with the 9th pick super destructive? No because I think the actual picks are less important with how you treat the player when their rookie contract comes up. Speaking of which...

July 8 2009
Signed forward Andrea Bargnani to a contract extension.

THIS! This is the thing. After three seasons, Bargnani had hit the magic 17 points-per-game line that Colangelo obviously bases all his eight figure salary decisions. He could have said “this is a very flawed player with a questionable future in the NBA as anything other than a Vladamir Radmanovic-like 12th man” and either offered a contract for less than half the dollars and years or sign-and-traded him to some other, enamoured team.

But instead, bidding against no one but his own demons, Colangelo offered No Mago a five year/$50 million extension to which the Raptors are not even halfway through (accounting for backloading). I mean, hot damn, this was destructive. If the trade for O’Neal was supposed to incentive Chris Bosh to stay in Toronto, this extension lubricated to slide all the way down to South Beach. In a salary cap environment, this move was inconceivably destructive, seeming to do nothing but justify Colangelo’s investment in Andrea by tripling down.
To put this in perspective, at the time this extension was signed, Boston had yet to tender an offer to Rajon Rondo. Yes, Andrea Bargnani created the comparables market for Rajon friggin’ Rondo! If Colangelo had merely allowed Bargnani to become a restricted free agent and waited for him to sign an offer sheet, he could have kept his little pet for a fraction. Or, you know, let him walk, take the cap space.

If the Raptors amnesty Andrea Bargnani (a decision I have been debating with myself for more than a year) and he never plays another NBA minute for another team (certainly possible) he will have made $70 million from this franchise. Now, imagine the team had instead donated all that money to the TTC. I’d be riding the 510 hovercraft home from work.


July 9 2009 Traded forwards Shawn Marion and Kris Humphries, center Nathan Jawai and cash to the Dallas Mavericks for guard Antoine Wright and forward Devean George; traded cash to the Orlando Magic for forward Hidayet Turkoglu.

When was the last time you heard someone call him “Hidayet?” Colangelo’s July wheel-and-deal fun time kept rolling with this tasty piece of self-satisfaction.

Now, this was recorded as a trade but it was really a sign-and-trade to get free agents to their final destinations for prices above the mid-level exception. If you’ll recall, Hedo Turkoglu forsake a handshake deal with the Trailblazers because his wife and he fell in love with the quiet, clean avenues of the Big Smoke and its Little Istanbul neighbourhoods, *swoon*.

Revisionists will tell you that Turkoglu was coming off a career season in Orlando but that’s not quite true. Hedo’s career season was actually in 07-08, where he broke out as the legitimate second option to an emerging Dwight Howard who initiated an offense of pick-and-rolls and passes out to Rashard Lewis in the corner. Turkoglu faded to the background in the 08-09 edition of the Magic, the 59-win team that surprised the defending Celtics and Lebroning Cavs to face the Lakers in the NBA Finals. Turkoglu was at his best when he focused on playmaking and shot from catch-and-shoot or kick-outs but he insisted on pursuing his own iso agenda, possibly believing that would be the key to getting paid. But he made a few big shots in the playoffs and hit the free agent market with plenty of suitors.

When Hedo showed up to training camp fat and extemporaneously slogged through the early part of the season, the Internet quickly turned on him. I could argue that the signing was boneheaded, expensive (5 years, $53 million) and mistimed (committing all this money to a team that was more than likely losing its biggest asset at the end of the year) and I’d be exactly right. But I’ll maintain that Turkoglu was only mildly disappointing. Yes he was flabby and cranky and committed to defence with all the enthusiasm of Andy cleaning the dining hall but he was also very much the same player he had been the year before (and three and four seasons before that) with a lot less shot opportunities. I mean, the guy bitched that he wasn’t being used correctly because he was not initiating the pick-and-rolls and moving the ball laterally in half court sets--and he was exactly right! It turned out that the Raptors did not need all that playmaking in their offence but then why get Turkoglu? He’s a decent three point shooter but for that price, you expect to pair him with some out-of-control combo guard for balance. A recurring theme in this Colangelo saga: a lack of ‘why?’ to back up the ‘what?’

At this point the Raptors could have had TJ Ford playing backup point guard, a handful of draft picks plus heaps of salary cap space but instead Colangelo chose to pay Marcus Banks $4.5 million to eat Doritos on the bench. #justsayin’

July 21 2009
Signed guard Jarrett Jack.
July 13 2009
Signed guard Jarrett Jack to an offer sheet.

I’ve waited until now to talk about the Jose Calderon extension, which was signed a year earlier. The assholes and idiots who talk about this team enjoy bringing up this 5 year/$45 million contract as the prototype symbol of the Raptors’ futility. They are wrong and should be punished. Calderon has earned every cent of this contract and continues to earn it on the Pistons. One of the greater passers of all time (with no hyperbole) and a terrific shooter, Jose was derided for his shotty defence (fairly) and some type of shortcoming of instinct that was believed to keep up these ridiculous “point guard controversies.” Let’s remember that:

• The first “controversy” surrounded Calderon taking minutes away from the perceived top guard, TJ Ford

• The second one, Jarrett Jack, lasted half a season, was tied to an injury and guess what? Calderon’s play barely dropped off. He brought scoring to the so-called second unit and provided an interesting small-ball lineup to use when he played alongside Jack and mercifully sit some dude you don’t remember named Antoine Wright

• The third was this season, when Kyle Lowry was brought in with the explicit plan to trade Calderon

I truly believe Calderon would have got the same contract on the open market. I believe that after every season, he was still worth whatever was left and would make the same on the open market. I believe that you cannot honestly look at the (larger) contracts handed out to Bargnani and Turkoglu or the fact that Rudy Gay is owed more money by the Raptors for the next two-and-a-half years than Jose Calderon has made in his career and deride his contract. He was/is a tier-two point guard and that’s what tier-two point guards get paid. Ty Lawson will make $12 million a year when his extension kicks in. I GOT YOUR BACK, JOSE! ESSSSSSPPAAAAANNNNNOOOLLLLLAAAA!!!!

Jarrett Jack? It was somewhat surprising that Colangelo opted to use the mid-level exception on a second point guard and not on a centre who was capable of shivving Bargnani in the shower but Jack’s “aiight.” After the dismal backup play from the season previously, it was imperative to buy some competency in the backcourt. It’s a-okay to spend money on a second point guard, really it is, unless you are lucky enough to employ a Chris Paul/Tony Parker/Westbrook/Derrick Rose/Rajon Rondo (then again...) type who can play 4o-a-game. Jack, a friend of Chris Bosh’s for whatever that was worth, made poor shooting decisions but was willing to drive the basketball, could run plays effectively and allowed Calderon to play catch-and-shooter in Bosh post-up plays. Though he’s been up-and-down, Jack is still getting paid from this contract as the super sixth man on a playoff-bound Warriors team. Mark Jackson uses Steph Curry in the Calderon roll as Jack feeds David Lee/Andrew Bogut. He’s still earning his money.

I chalk much of the Raptors’ improvement from 08-09 to 09-10 to Jarrett Jack replacing Solomon/Ukic, with the rest of the praise landing on an inspired season from Chris. But, of course, Colangelo had no intention of keeping Jack (or Turkoglu). The Raptors barely missed the playoffs and Chris Bosh prepared to trade in his maple syrup for Coppertone.

The BC Autopsy: 08-09: Got these contracts hangin' round our necks

Draft 2008
Selected center Roy Hibbert (17th overall pick).

July 9 2008
Traded guard TJ Ford, forward Maceo Baston, center Radoslav Nesterovic and the draft rights to center Roy Hibbert to the Indiana Pacers for forward Jermaine O'Neal and the draft rights to center Nathan Jawai; signed guard Jose Manuel Calderon to a contract extension.

Time it was, and what a time it was! Evaluating traded draft picks is a tricky proposition as we assume it was the trade partner who made the draft decision. But taking only public information, we can drive down Speculation Lane with the following:

• Both Ford and Nesterovic had peaked at the time of this trade. Though, with Ford, his value is tied to his contract, which Colangelo was responsible for

• It’s a reasonable argument to say that concentrating too much value (or salary) on one position (point guard) is not the best use of resources. But this argument carries only if you are able to spread this value to these other positions. BC’s (lack of) talent for managing this aspect of teamcraft has been the second contributing factor to the shitty messes

• Colangelo claimed the acquisition of O’Neal was a basketball position but he clearly moved around like he was ten years older than he was. But, if committing to the eventual cap relief O’Neal’s contract would provide was the goal--okay--maybe the townspeople could get behind that. Yet, half way through the season, Colangelo does an abrupt about-face (coming up soon).

• The loss of Ford subjected fans to a point guard bench of Will Solomon and Roko Ukic which was both cruel and unusual

• He ain’t my favourite seven footer on my block (I live in a neighbourhood of giants) but if you wanted to plug in a gigantic dude next to Bosh, why not draft Roy Hibbert for 1/6th the cost and a rookie-controlled salary + whatever Rasho had left.

• Also, why did he have to give up a draft pick in this deal? It was a pure and simple salary dump, right? Does every other GM realize Colangelo will sweeten any deal if you compliment his french cuffs?

December 3 2008
Fired head coach Sam Mitchell and named Jay Triano interim head coach.

I have neither praise nor scorn for this move. Mitchell seemed overmatched, intellectually, for the task of coaching. He showed virtually zero ability to make strategic decisions with respect to rotations, playing style or coach-heavy play calls like inbounds, zone offence and two-for-ones/end of quarter stuff. His best skill appeared to be physically confronting players which may have signalled his deserving of the intercontinental belt over basketball accolades. His coach-of-the-year award was heavily based on the team’s apparent momentum.

But, it’s fairly impossible to justify that, with a 8-9 record, December 3 was the boiling point that discounted Mitchell’s participation with whatever Colangelo assumed was the Raptors’ destiny that season. Yet, despite his worse (in that season, and overall) winning percentage, Jay Triano showed elements of innovation in the areas Mitchell lacked. To sum, Sam Mitchell was a shit coach and if it took four years for Colangelo to realize this, in addition to deflecting the poop stains away from himself, BC again showed garishly underdeveloped judgement.

February 13 2009
Traded center Jermaine O’Neal, forward Jamario Moon and a future first-round pick to the Miami Heat for forward Shawn Marion, guard Marcus Banks and cash.

Wait, what? Wasn’t O’Neal supposed to slide Bosh into his natural position and rekindle his all-star ways? Didn’t Colangelo collect an expiring (in a year-and-a-half) contract with enough weight to sign ALL THE FREE AGENTS?! (see Miami, summer 2010).

Changing course for reasons only Bryan knows and recounts late at night while curled up in his panic room, he sends Contractus Maximus to the Heat with mildly useful forward, Moon and another... first round... pick..., for Marion, an albatross in Marcus Banks (signed, originally by none other than...) and cash I assume was delivered in small bills directly into Colangelo’s jacket pocket.
Now, I have no idea why he traded for O’Neal (as my bullets of speculation proved). But I do know that if one were to think there was a legitimate, strategic reason to make that move, then the same person could not want to make this move. Which leads me to believe that Colangelo is actually played by evil twins. Not that one twin is evil--both twins are evil. And stupid. Sorry, that was a cheap shot (stupid).

Essentially, a serviceable yet somewhat overpaid TJ Ford plus two first round picks were dispatched for two months of Shawn Marion (granted, the best small forward to play for the Raptors since the last year of McGrady even though The Matrix was mailing it in worse than Leo DiCaprio selling whiskey to the Japanese) and deadweight contract. Marion would bolt (via sign-and-trade) at the end of the season for Dallas, and Colangelo would spin yet another puzzling wheel in the game show of lowered expectations.

In doing so, the GM ignited a dynasty and sketched out the path of exit for his biggest star (see Miami, summer 2010) and robbed the team of the opportunity to use attrition to gain financial freedom and draft picks that could have restarted the franchise. Finishing with 33 wins, this team, instead, missed their beat as they headed into another summer with no clear direction and little hope for improvement. Cue a chubby Marcus Banks nodding knowingly.

The BC Autopsy: Mike James Interlude

Backing up all the way to the beginning, one of the greatest moves Colangelo ever made was convincing the world he didn’t exists... I mean, not re-signing Mike James. If you remember, James, an NBA journeyman, put himself in position to go after a multi-year contract after making a considerable impression with a 27-win Raptors team in 05-06.

Now, collective memory has settled on a myth that James was some awful chucker, taking advantage of a piss-poor team to showcase individual skills and call in radio talk shows, perhaps intoxicated. While true his shot selection and playmaking abilities would ebb and flow and that he played typical Toronto point guard defence (none) but James was a highly effective offensive player on a fifth rank offense (and a 29th ranked defence. We all love to pontificate on players who can “create their own shot” and for that entire season, Mike James was that player. He regularly faced double teams as a result and, while not a gifted passer, was able to feed Bosh in the post and find a suite of shooters that included Charlie Villaneuva, Mo Peterson and Matt Bonner.

The key issue was, this breakout season happened to James at age 30 and with a rare opportunity to dominate the ball (25% usage rate) and eschew defence (and mental health._ All reasonable signs pointed to an unrepeatable performance and so by allowing James to take his talents to St. Paul, Colangelo signalled a possible savvy edge. James didn’t disappoint by disappointing and faded to obscurity as he continued to bounce around the league.

As an epilogue, Mike James is currently coming off the bench for the Dallas Mavericks at age 37. Guards not currently in the NBA include: Tracy McGrady (33), Baron Davis (33) and Gilbert Arenas (31).

The BC Autopsy: 07-08. Sh*t'll be comin' round the mountain

And... we’re back. After a tumble up the relevancy ladder and a flourish of accolades, Mr. Colangelo armed himself with a mandate to splurge. The core, set with Bosh, Bargnani, Nesterovic, Ford and Calderon, needed a complement of role players if they were to parlay regular season success into playoff wins.

May 22 2007
Signed head coach Sam Mitchell to a contract extension.

Naturally, co-credit for super season goes to COY, Sam Mitchell. A timeless, flawless coaching performance that enshrines Mitchell a place in the NBA coaching pantheon for ever and ever and ever and ever and...

June 15 2007
Traded two future second-round picks to the Detroit Pistons for forward Carlos Delfino.

The draft picks turned out to be Jonas Jerebko and Kyle Singler. I have no analysis -- I just felt like sharing. My memory of Delfino is fairly fuzzy which usually signals benign uselessness. His shot choices were awful but he was able to shoulder defensive assignments and play a little point guard in a pinch. I’ve watched him more recently driving to the basket, perhaps picking up a thing or two from Jeremy Lin. A great big shoulder shrug. Here, watch this.

July 11 2007
Signed forward Jason Kapono and signed forward Maceo Baston to an offer sheet.
July 10 2007
Signed forward Jamario Moon.

I’ll get to Moon at his exit interview...

Before the saga of Hedo Turkoglu, Jason Kapono was the free agent whipping boy that began to turn attentive minds against the consensus sanctity of Colangelo’s genius. Kapono, you may remember, was the sharpshooting specialist coming off a big season with the Heat, where he had averaged 11-a-game on better than 50% three-point shooting. Everyone needs one of those, right? Colangelo agreed, buying high with a four year, $24 million contract.

Pundits will remind you, with little prompting, not to overpay for role players if you want to do fun things like raise banners in an NBA arena. Beyond the truism, the real question was, could a season of receiving passes out of double teams and knocking down a historical clip of threes be considered a rising trend? With no apparent market to bid against (the first tragic flaw of Colangelo’s teamcraft philosophy) the Raptors made their first big splash in the free agent market since Hakeem Olajuwon and announced to the world... that they had signed a shooter.

Upon closer inspection, Kapono’s shooting ability was real but his deftness at any and every other aspect of the NBA game quickly raised all of the red flags. Literally, every single flag. For a team already struggling to play NBA defence (“J’accuse!” Mnsrs. Calderon, Ford, Bargnani, Bosh) Kapono’s still smooth shot was drowned out by the deficits in the rest of his game. Kapono seemed to develop a case of the yips as he was much more reluctant to even take the shots he was being paid to take. He course corrected, somewhat, the following season with more attempts, but when his clip fell back down to earth and it became clear he was just too unreliable to keep on the floor, BC was left with two years and $14 million owed to what was increasingly looking like a very good NBDL player.  Oops.

July 30 2007
Named Masai Ujiri director of global scouting.

I miss that guy.

February 21 2008
Traded guard Juan Dixon to the Detroit Pistons for center Primoz Brezec.

I really miss that guy (Brezec, not Dixon)

This was a boring season, transactionally. Injuries to Ford and Bosh exacerbated a regression towards the mean (a fringe playoff team) and the onslaught of the new-look Celtics to the emerging Magic, still alive Pistons and the elevation of LeBron James from good to “holy shit” marked a turning point: the Raptors were about to slide down a great big hill of poop with Bryan Colangelo holding the poop-sled reins.

The BC Autopsy: 2007 Interlude -- Do you remember this NBA?

It’s important to remember what the league was like in 2007 if we are to properly put the record-tying win total and divisional title in perspective--and move on in our retrospective. Of course, you have to suspend your disbelief that a six-game-over-.500 division title and subsequent disposal from the playoffs is the second-most exalted feat in franchise history (after that other one that ended with a *clank*)

Pre-season favourites in the Eastern Conference were, by consensus, the defending Heat and the perennially-contending Pistons. The Heat, having staved off the Dallas Mavericks with a start-turning performance by Dwyane Wade and a healthy dose of referee interference, limped into the ‘07 playoffs, barely, thanks to injuries to Wade and O’Neal (and the empirical evidence that Shaq was no longer Shaq -- he would be traded to the Suns for an unhappy Shawn Marion part way into the next season).

Detroit’s descent was more interesting if you prefer narratives about motivation and intangible intangibles. After a half decade of no-star, all chemistry “team” teams, peaking with the ‘04 championship, that nucleus was, evidently, slipping. The acquisition of Chris Webber, (and to a much lesser extent, Nazr Mohammad) was supposed to fill the void left by the cash-chasing departure Ben Wallace, and allow this Pistons incarnation to continue to contend. Detroit grinded out a mediocre (by their standards) 53 win season amid calls of complacency or in-fighting or chemistry issues. There was an assumption that the core veterans (Billups, Hamilton, Prince, RWallace, McDyess, Webber) would turn it on for the playoffs but a streaking Cavs team, led by an emergent LeBron James (and significant contributions by future Hall-of-Famers Larry Hughes, Drew Gooden and Sasha Pavlovic) plus a dose of whatever deity commissioned this, contributed to a downright dominant, if unimpressive, NBA Finals that saw the been-there-done-this Spurs barely break a sweat against Cleveland.

The rest of the East? An in-their-own-way intimidating Arenas/Butler/Jaimeson-era Wizards team; a lifeless Nets team that “upset” Toronto with a little veteran savvy from an otherwise disinterested Jason Kidd; a still-recovering-from-the-Malice Pacers; Isaiah-infected Knicks and the rest of the league (like, the Celtics and Sixers) putting on their best Tank Face for the Oden/Durant draft sweepstakes.

Within a year, Jason Kidd and Pau Gasol would be on new teams and pundits would declare the NBA dark days to be over.

So let’s remember, collectively, that in 2007, the Toronto Raptors exploited a power vacuum to temporarily rise from mediocrity to baseline competency. Pinning your wistful nostalgia on an award winning executive (and coach) only exacerbates our current pain. Free yourself from such shackles of the mind. Let us heal.

(The Autopsy to continue...)

The BC Autopsy: (05-06 &) 06-07

I thought it’d be different. Bryan Colangelo would have been run out of town for Isiah Thomas-level incompetence leading him to quickly sign as General Manager for EA7 Emporio Armani Olimpia Milano. But, it hasn’t happened yet. Instead, our fearless leader, president and svengali has been endowed, somehow, with more lives than cat jumping a green mushroom. So, somewhat disruptively, taking this trip down memory lane may be a little premature. But, here you have it: what we’re calling the BC Autopsy: a bitter review of all major transactions overseen by our namesake, Mr. Colangelo. We’ll go season-by-season and hope to finish this retrospective within seven years, or so. You know, about the time that Colangelo is named Chairman of Maple Leafs Sports, Entertainment and Sadistic Torture (MLSEST).

A word of warning... please don’t read this series of posts. Go outside and play with your kids. Bake a cake. Pick up an oil-of-deer-antler habit. Do something productive. This has been constructed purely for the cynical, the maniacal and the pathetic. This is a virus that I genuinely hope you don’t catch. For the rest of you lowlifes, on to the Autopsy...


June 8 2006
Traded center Rafael Araujo to the Utah Jazz for forwards Kris Humphries and Robert Whaley.
June 21 2006
Traded forwards Matt Bonner and Eric Williams and a 2009 second-round draft pick to the San Antonio Spurs for center Radoslav Nesterovic and cash; waived forward Robert Whaley.

And with Robert Whaley, we're off! Trading Hoffa, the original draft sin and a small-handed, slow-footed stiff famously picked one spot ahead of Andre Iguodala, for useful rebounder and meathead Kris Humphries, endeared Colangelo to Toronto fans and media--a halo that still seems to affect impressions of his teamcraft skills. Was his first significant move at the Raptors’ helm his best? Would the answers to that question make you and I cry a little?

We hardly knew ya’, Robert Whaley. BC’s next move is more interesting, in retrospect. He ships out Vince trade stuffing Eric Williams (who cares?) and fan favourite/shooting savant, Matt Bonner for Rasho Nesterovic. Yes, Bonner has gone on to reinvent his game as a specialist stretch four on a perennial contender (and won a ring which I’m sure he’s pawned for sandwiches) yet it’s difficult to deny Nesterovic’s contributions to the last two playoff runs, mostly by allowing Bosh to play the four for 20 minutes a night. Rasho fossilized soon after while Bonner remains a top three point shooter but for what was needed at the time--an average centre--I’ll call this transaction a draw.

Draft 2006 Selected forwards Andrea Bargnani (1st overall pick), PJ Tucker (35th overall pick) and Edin Bavcic (56th overall pick).
Traded the draft rights to forward Edin Bavcic to the Philadelphia 76ers for cash.

How greatly does this little factoid fill your schadenfreude hearts to realize that the Raptors’ second round pick in 2006 has much more trade value than its first. (Thought experiment: would you rather pay for nine years of Andrea Bargnani or nine years of Brandon Roy who would play for only five of those years? I know my answer)

June 30 2006
Traded forward Charlie Villanueva to the Milwaukee Bucks for TJ Ford and cash.

This, arguably, outshone the offboarding of Hoffa. A rare example of BC selling high on Charlie V’s intriguing rookie deal for a point guard with an injury history. It’s been nice to watch Villanueva establish no real NBA skill (besides, I suppose, decent three point shooting) and get paid like an all-star, all on other team’s dime. In return, TJ Ford brought the yin to Jose Calderon’s yang to form one of the more productive (offensive) point guard rotations for the next two seasons. BC went ahead and bid against no one in extending Ford but the transaction was a definite win for Toronto.

Also, somewhere around here, BC decided not to re-sign chuck city, Mike James. It shouldn't be understated how amazing this was. Maybe this was Colangelo's best move. James would never parlay his (truly) remarkable 05-06 into basketball success but did get hilariously paid by the TWolves. Fun fact: At age 37, Mike James is playing for the Dallas Mavericks. MIKE JAMES!


July 24 2006
Signed forward Jorge Garbajosa.
July 14 2006
Signed forward Chris Bosh to a contract extension.
July 13 2006
Signed guard Anthony Parker

Garbajosa should be best remembered for looking like he smoked a pack a day but Raptors fans have, as they are wont to do, mythologized his short stint with the team with some sort of gritty intangible tough dude thing. He was a marginal NBA player. Anthony Parker, on the other hand, earned almost all of his contract as he played multiple positions (even starting point guard for a stretch) and brought steady shooting from the corners and a deft ability to move the ball. Though his defence was overrated, it was probably just age that lessened Parker’s effectiveness.

I suppose the extension for Bosh might have brought some sort of steadying influence on the direction of the team, though to give BC any credit here, shouldn’t he have negotiated for the full length of contract? I guess that’s asking too much so I’ll relent.

October 31 2006
Signed guard TJ Ford to a contract extension and exercised the contract option on forward Kris Humphries through 2007-08.

We touched on the Ford extention. Four for $33 seemed high at the time, considering the shooting problems, the injury concerns and the emerging realization that Calederon was the better player. Still, TJ Ford > Charlie V.

Division title! Playoffs! Coach/Executive of the Year! All is right with the world and this middling version of success will spur decades of dominance! I can't wait.