The Blue Baller :: Home of the Frustrated Basketball Fan

KO's Shit Sandwich

The Blue Baller here—the frustrated basketball fan that’s ready to blow! What’s chafing my balls today is the news that KO finally got the boot. While I’ll grant you he didn’t do himself any favours griping over the last few days, I still think he got a raw deal. Pinning the blame for another brutal season on this guy was a cheap cop-out. He got served a sh#t sandwich when he agreed to take this job, and now it’s finally been digested.

For starters, KO arrived as advertised. This time last year, we’d had enough of watching Lenny sleep through timeouts resting his clipboard against his cashmere sweater-covered man-breasts. We wanted a sh#t-kicking-tell-it-like-it-is-workaholic, and that’s what we got. So it boggled my mind when I read that MLSE executives were disappointed with KO’s ‘behaviour’. Yelling on the sidelines, cursing at players, smashing stuff—that’s what you paid for! If I invite Mickey Rourke over for a dinner party and he has a couple of speedballs and tries to nail my girl, I’ve got no right to act surprised. I think the real issue here was that MLSE underestimated how much of a culture shock that a reckless desire to win would be for the franchise.

Secondly, it turns out this guy could actually coach. I can argue about the increase in wins, the vastly improved defence, and the team’s strong performance in close games, but what convinces me is what I saw on Wednesday: last year’s team does not beat Milwaukee. They lie down and Dan Gadzuric gets a triple-double. Now there are definitely areas where he could have improved, but it seems that the majority of criticism about his actual coaching was focused on how he handled players 7-10, nothing about his regular rotation. How dare he not maximize the boundless talents of Murray and Moiso! Listen, if I’m Tarantino on the set of Pulp Fiction, I’m worrying about Travolta and Jackson, I’m not sweating Frank Whaley in the Kahuna Burger scene. KO played his best players the most minutes and got the ball to his best scorers.

Finally, KO was dealt a losing hand. He had a desperate lame-duck GM that traded away his starting front line, then wasn’t able to get an even halfway serviceable big man to fill the hole. In fact I’m convinced that Yinka Dare died of a heart attack training for a 10-day contract that Grunwald offered him.

Add to that the perfect storm of injuries KO had to deal with in March. (That said, I do have to come clean about the sick-pleasure I got from those three weeks where the Raptors were like a Make-A-Wish Foundation for underprivileged 2-guards. Hey Janerro, Roger, Dion—ever dream about starring for an actual NBA team?). Seriously, how much better could any coach be expected to do in this situation, particularly one in his first year? Would an ’01 Carlisle or an ’02 Bzdelik have been able to get this team over 40 wins? I’m afraid we bailed on a guy who had the potential to be a very good coach next season. I look at KO like a cross between Gene Hackman and Jeff Van Gundy, only meaner—this guy would grab Mourning by his balls rather than his ankle.

At the end of the day I understand that there are major changes that need to be made for this franchise to ever be successful, and if that meant cleaning house and getting rid of a coach that I happened to like, so be it. I just hope that this enema goes straight through to the intestines of MLSE. Nothing would make me happier than to see Slick Rick Peddie get a message on his Blackberry telling him that Larry Tannenbaum has got a special sandwich ready for him too. Hey Peddie, hope your hungry.

- The Blue Baller

Building The Ultimate Raptor

So I was at the Scarborough Town Centre last night, the only place where you can see a white guy with cornrows and an old Sri Lanken dude wearing the same Tupac tracksuit, and saw the trailer for Van Helsing. The shot of Frankenstein got me thinking—if I were to build the best player from different parts of current and former Raptors, what would this fabulous beast look like? So here’s my crack at constructing the Ultimate Raptor…

Legs
I’ll start with the easy one first. Vince’s legs make him the Tina Turner of the NBA, let alone the Raptors. The guy is a freak. VC_Dunk_Sydney2000.mpg might be the only clip that I’ve viewed more times on my PC than Paris Hilton. [Note: Aside from better lighting, what that Hilton clip really needed was some Brian Williams colour commentary: “That my fellow Canadians is a spectacular reverse cowgirl!”]. A dark horse here might be McGrady, but I’m building my Ultimate Raptor without an as$#*le.

Hands
I was tempted to pencil in Doug Christie here, but after learning about how his constant in-game hand gestures are actually signs of love to his wife I lost all respect for him. And all this time I was thinking that Christie was some kind Tourette’s-stricken gangster flashing signs to his boyz at Pepperdine. Me…I’m a Dell Curry fan. I loved seeing The Skunk come in and score 9 points in 4 possessions. He had that that deadly shot that required nothing more than a simple flick of his wrists. It was the NBA equivalent of Bruce Lee’s 1-inch punch—but thankfully for Bruce, his defense was better than Dell’s. My monster has Curry’s hands.

Eyes
While I should technically give this to Mark Jackson, I’m going to resist. Action Jackson’s milkshake had turned to yogurt long before he landed in Toronto, so I’m going with Damon. Now I realize he’s a shoot-first point guard, but he was able to average close to 10 assists a game as a rookie. Sure, he had the good fortune of playing with such potent scoring threats as Zan Tabak, Vinnie Esposito, and Acie Earl (yes, I know about that frigging single game scoring record), but he also had to overcome a couple of serious vision-related challenges. First he has the sightline of a pervert in a Brass Rail wet seat. Second, given his recent legal troubles, the poor guy is obviously suffering from Glaucoma.

Head
Bosh. I know it’s early, but this guy has shown all of the signs of a great player, teammate, and person. Check out one of his recent quotes “I'm not perfect. I went out before a game before. My performance wasn't that good the next day. I had to learn. And I know better now. And I haven't been out since." Do you think Kemp had a similar epiphany one morning in Cleveland after he spent the night snorting rails with the mother of Sean Jr IX? Only in the NBA does a quote like this make a guy look like some wise shaman. CB4 may be only 19, but I’m sold.

Mouth “He’s like a ghetto Octopus with 8 testicles, he may milk a tailpipe, but no pimp’s gonna eat his chicken. You know what I’m sayin’?” And you thought picking VC for legs was easy? Nobody out-quotes Oak. I used to scan Raptor articles for Oakley quotes like I scan my Fast Times at Ridgemount High DVD for the Phoebe Cates pool scene. Now I may not have understood a single word out of that crazy bastard’s mouth, but it was always music to my ears.

Well I think that’s it. I’m finally satisfied with my Ultimate Raptor. Now If I could just top him off with T-Mac’s lazy eye, Kevin Willis’ hairline, and Gar-Jo’s smile, I’d have a real monster on my hands. Bring it Van Helsing.

- The Blue Baller

Letter to Chuck: Euro-Raptors

Chuck, I've done it. After suffering through another season of watching a Raptors team without any direction. I have come up with a plan for re-building the franchise. On the surface this plan may seem too simple, too obvious...but the brilliant ones always do. You want a team with an identity? Well try this on for size: from now on the Raptors will only sign European players. Now hear me out! I'm not some racist crackpot, I have 6 solid reasons why this plan simply cannot fail.

1. American players do not want to come to Toronto. Let's face it. Whether its Canadian customs, the metric system, or lack of ESPN, they just don't dig it here. Well I don't care. With my plan we can stop wasting precious time appeasing current malcontents and chasing second-rate talent. How many times did we have to get Mo Taylor laid over Caribana weekend just to have him almost play here? No more.

2. Young European players don't know what they're "missing". Are you telling me that if Darko Milicic arrived at Pearson Airport instead of the Auburn Hills last June he'd have any idea he wasn't in Detroit? Hell, I could drive him out to Markham and Eglington and tell him we've crossed 8 Mile. These guys are happy and appreciative to be playing in the NBA. Period.

3. Toronto is the best place for Europeans to play. Vlade basking in the glow of waving Serbian flags, the Greek National team getting more fan support than the Canadians during their World Basketball Championship match-up, hundreds of Asians showing up at an autograph signing for.... Mengke Bateer? Are you kidding me Chuck? I'm surprised some crazy Scot doesn't throw a haggis out at half-court when Robert Archibald draws iron on a free throw. The point is that Toronto is a city where people embrace their heritage and celebrate it through basketball. It also offers European ex-pats a true taste of home-do you think Hedu Turkoglu would rather be on the Danforth or in San Antonio when he's jonesing for a kebab at 2am?

4. These guys are good...over the long term. The fact that these guys can play is obviously no secret with the emergence of All-Star caliber international NBA talent like Nowitzki and Peja. However I think a key point is missed when it comes to European players, they get better with age. It's like Kirsty Alley versus Sophia Lauren. These guys complement great fundamentals with experience, rather than relying solely on athletic prowess that fades. I may like Ricky Davis, Speedy Claxton, and Darius Miles today at Rucker Park, but I'm giving out long-term contracts to Jiri Welsch, Marko Jaric, and Manu Ginobili.

5. European players fit better with a basketball system. Teams that are successful over the long term have a system, identity, produce a 'brand' of basketball that wins games. It is first built by identifying the right type of players to fit the system. But once successful, that system then becomes attractive to the right types of players. Look at Utah: great system, terrible roster...but looks who's got the 8th seed out West. Would you like to deliver the news to Jerry Sloan that Kirilenko and Giricek have been traded for Iverson and Glen Robinson? European players have been playing professionally for a longer time and are better suited for more structured team-oriented basketball.

6. Make the Raptors a true reflection of the city. I'll make this simple: Who would you rather cheer for-a team of American players two years removed from high-school, or a racial mongrel of a roster that looks like it was plucked from the Scarborough Town Centre food court. I thought so. A team like this would be more meaningful to the city. Book it.

So other than simply purging the Raptor roster of all its current players (save Chris Bosh-there are exceptions to every rule) and replacing them with Europeans, here are a two more suggestions to make the transition a bit easier:

First, hire Wayne Cooper. He's the junior architect of the system that is closest to what I'm suggesting. Now keep in mind the new Euro-Raptors will make the Sacramento Kings look like the Harlem Globetrotters, but I presume we'll need someone who knows something about players and contracts.

Second, if Grunwald wants a new job, he's got one-making friends and passing out old JYD jerseys to tall kids in Belgrade. We (Me, you, Glen, and Herbie Kuhn) are going over to Europe to spread the news about the new Toronto Raptors-I'll pass out the brochures and you and Herbie can work the crowd. I've got a good feeling about this Chuck. Now that we've got the plan, the Raptors just need the onions to put it into action. Email me back soon so we can get started.

- The Blue Baller