The Blue Baller is back, and I haven't been this frustrated since I tried to dry-hump a Shania Twain CD cover. My rant this week focuses on the feeling of impending doom that I have regarding the new GM. I fear he will ultimately screw the Raps by following one of the 4 most popular paths to rebuilding an NBA roster (and yes, I realize that being furious at a GM that hasn't been hired yet officially qualifies me as disturbed). So what follows are words of caution: the 4 most common NBA fixes and why they won't work in Toronto...
1. 'Making the Band': Get young and build through draft
Drafting a whole whack of teenagers hoping they gel might be painful, but it is extremely entertaining to watch. On the surface, this may seem like a decent option for the Raptors, but think again.
First you need to have the perfect supporting environment in place to develop these young players. If NBA vets Payton and Cassell can't behave themselves in a Canadian strip-club, I'd love to see what happens when Sebastian Telfair and his crew hit For Your Eyes Only for the first time. What kills me are the teams that think they can handle this adjustment period properly by pairing a new player up with an old scrub. Look at poor Kwame Brown, I'm convinced he's a bust because he was Christian Laettner's Padawan Learner. Just because a guy turns 30 doesn't mean that he has ceased to be an a$$h@le (and I am speaking from personal experience here). Why didn't the Wiz just send KB down to Tijuana for a mentorship weekend with Roy Tarpley?
Secondly, something that Raptor fans know all too well, is that there's no guarantee that after you cultivate a young prospect into an emerging star that he's not going to leave or get plucked away by some hell-spawn GM from Orlando.
2. 'The Enema': Clearing Cap Space the Kiki-Way
Jalen at $15M, Alvin at $6M, Lamond at $5M...uhhh, you think the new GM won't consider this option? Purging the roster of fat contracts and clearing the way to sign free agents may seem like a smart move, but deconstruction and reconstruction are going to be tough in Toronto.
Deconstruction. While this seems easy, it's not. Pitching a package of Jalen and Lamond contracts is as easy as selling homemade Alaa Abdenaby bobble-head dolls--and you're not in Egypt. Plus, everyone in the league knows what the desperate GM is up to, removing any leverage he may have. Negotiating with a fellow GM becomes like an agent trying to get top dollar for Calvin Murphy to star in a Trojan commercial.
Reconstruction. The real problem is here is that there's no guarantee that a team (particularly Toronto) can sign top talent when they want to. Look at what happened to Jerry Krause in 2000 when he had to settle for E-Rob after T-Mac, Duncan, and Grant Hill signed elsewhere. It's like Johnny Depp passing on Pirates of the Caribbean and Jerry Bruckheimer being forced to pay top-dollar for Richard Grieco.
3. 'All-In': Win now, mortgage the future
Like a Kevin Kostner epic, this has to be the most overused and costly formula that never works. However it continues to suck in GMs with decent teams who prefer a sweaty three-pump hump to Championship ecstasy over the tantric build of long-term franchise success. Here are two reasons why Toronto makes this bad idea even worse. 
The first is that we're not that good. The Raptors are not 1 player away, we're about 3-and they better be damn good. Let's not kid ourselves, Nicole Eggert may have been a boob-job away from stardom, but the Raptors are the NBA equivalent of Mindy Kohn. We need a visit to The Swan for an extreme makeover if we want to seriously challenge for the Championship.
Secondly, Raptor fans are not Leaf fans. We’re not haunted by a humiliating history of futility, desperate as Vin Baker at last call for a championship. There’s no need for a GM to do this and have us suffer through a 4-year hangover.
4. 'The Cornerstone': Build around a player
Now I can see some new GM trying to fool himself that this is the way to go. Bad Idea Jeans. There are maybe 5 players in the league that you can build a Championship-calibre roster around, and two of them are on the same team. It's easy to plug holes when you've got a team starring Kobe as Flava Flav to Shaq's Chuck D, but the Raptors are in no such position.
Q: "But Blue Baller, what about Vince?"
A: Did you enjoy Bob Patterson? Remember that sitcom starring Emmy winning actor Jason Alexander? It was on for 2 weeks and made viewer's eyes bleed. Some TV producer made the same misstep that I fear the new GM will: mistaking a great sidekick for a star. Now don't get me wrong, physically Vince has got the entire package, but mentally he's not made of the stuff that makes him a Championship cornerstone. Face it, VC has Robert DeNiro's skills but wants Jeff Goldbloom's parts.
So if the GM takes my advice and avoids these pitfalls, what should he do? Well I've got my own opinions on that (see my letter to Chuck), but my only other tip is for this guy to take his time and understand the unique set of challenges and opportunities that come with managing the Raptors, and tailor an appropriate course of action--and it better be damn good. If not, he'll be the Shania Twain CD cover.
- The Blue Baller
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