Missing Araujo

by RaptorsHQ - Archives on Jul 17, 2006 11:40 AM EDT

Don't you still wish we had Hoffa?

No?

Ok...well how about just for Summer League?

Draftexpress on Saturday provided a humourous tale about Toronto's former first-round pick which went something like this:

In Utah's game against the Atlanta Hawks, Hoffa became "involved" with Hawk's sophomore sensation Marvin Williams on a couple of occasions, eventually leading to Araujo being ejected.

The first incident occured when Williams attempted to go in for what seemed like an open dunk off a steal. However, Williams, unlike Raptor fans, evidently wasn't used to the sheer speed and agility of Hoffa, who hustling back on the play, wrapped Williams up in a quasi-bear hug, causing him to flip-over, falling on his side!

Oh the shame for Marvin.

In any event, Araujo was assessed a flagrant foul due to the dangerous nature of the play. But from the sounds of things, the fireworks really went off in the third quarter.

It seems that Hoffa made a nice cut to the basket on a play, but since it was the first successful one he's ever made, he surprised even himself and when going up with the ball to finish, simply lost control and missed the attempt...

(Well...it also could have been that Araujo had the ball stripped from him, but I digress.)

On the way down from his finishing attempt, Hoffa reportedly swiped his arms in a downward motion and in the process, viciously shoved Marvin Williams to the floor. Williams then jumped back up to go after Araujo however at this point the refs had seen enough, and Hoffa was given the boot.

Now, I think as Raptor fans, we need to give the casual "summer league viewer," who may have witnessed this scene some background information to explain these events.

1) Hoffa's vertical is 53 inches. In fact in workouts he reportedly "lept over tall buildings," which evidently was one of the reasons he was the eighth pick overall in 2004 draft. So one can only imagine the momentum generated while Hoffa was decelerating on the way down from his "finishing attempt" when he hacked Marvin Williams. Even Shaquille O'Neal would have been thrown to the ground due to the force of such a "downward hand swipe!"

2) Hoffa's arms are the size of tree trunks. Getting shoved by Hoffa is akin to a giant redwood falling and hitting you full force in the chest! People just don't realize the immense stature of Araujo! During pre-draft workouts in 2004, RaptorsHQ discovered that Jack McLoskey had Hoffa lay his arms down near Toronto's harbourfront area so McLoskey could walk over to Toronto Island thereby avoiding ferry costs. That size factor basically sealed the deal for Jack in terms of drafting the former BYU product. Unfortunately McLoskey would not confirm or deny for us the account of Hoffa having a pet blue ox...

3) Hoffa gets angry. Many a time Raptor fans have seen how intense Hoffa can be, so if Hoffa felt that the first flagrant against him shouldn't have been assessed, Marvin would have been a marked man. In fact, knowing what we know about Araujo, why would Marvin even have dared to stay in the game?

In any event, if you add these three factors together, it's obvious that Hoffa should not have been tossed. I mean, how can you blame someone for being simply overpowering for the average NBA'er!? No Marvin should have just taken the hits and moved on...

...especially since the fans were there to see Hoffa! In jersey sales Hoffa trails only Dwyane Wade, Lebron James and Loren Woods and therefore once the local fan favourite was ejected thanks to Marvin, the crowd got nasty booing Williams everytime he touched the ball and heckling him whenever play stopped. Interestingly, Raptor fans always had similar reactions...but these occurred whenever Hoffa entered the game or touched the ball while a Raptor...

So do I really miss Hoffa? Well Loren Woods is gone, Matt Bonner's quirkiness now resides in San Antonio, and Mike James and his pitbulls have been reunited with Rob Babcock in Minny...who's left? Here's hoping that some of the new Raptors provide some moments of unintentional comedy throughout the upcoming season...and until then, I'm setting my VCR (yes, still stuck in 80's in terms of recording technology) for the rest of Utah's summer league games in case they air on RaptorsTV.

See Swirsk, Summer League isn't all that bad!

FRANCHISE

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Comments

Not much to write about eh that's a nice little sarcastic column about Hoffa. He's a beast alright. Another Artest incident waiting to happen? Imagine the skulls that would be getting cracked if he just lost it, the saddest part would be he hadn't played a single minute in the game. Keep the Hoffa watch going through the season, he's a complete and total accident.

by Blaker on Jul 17, 2006 12:46 PM EDT reply actions

LOL that was great, he difintely fooled me at times that I thought he would or could become better than he is. But the man's basketball iq is just as good as knowing that scoring more than the opponent wins games. However, hoffa will remain in the nba for a long while due to his size so hes doin his thing no matter what... getting paid.

by Brian on Jul 17, 2006 9:53 PM EDT reply actions

Coming down from the basket, Hoffa would be accelerating, not decelerating. Decelerating is reducing velocity, not moving downwards.

As for how you can sit in your leather chair and crack jokes about a poor shmuck like Hoffa...have you no heart, man? Got anti-freeze running through your veins? You make the Tin Man look all warm and squishy.

Hoffa is sweating blood trying to play out his last hand. The guy is just a couple months away from selling banged up '87 Corollas at some dusty ol' run down OK Motors in the shadow of a Mormon Temple, and here you are, kicking him while he's (on his way) down. For shame. As if the world weren't cold enough already, the temperature just dropped another couple degrees.

by SR on Jul 18, 2006 1:03 AM EDT reply actions

Franchise... BRAP! BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRAP!

by Tipz on Jul 18, 2006 9:54 AM EDT reply actions

By all the speculation I've red our finalized roster should look like this...

PG - T.J Ford
SG - Anthony Parker
SF - Moe Peterson
PF - Chris Bosh
C - Rasho Nesterovic

Bench

PG - Jose Calderon
SG - John Salmons
SF - Joey Graham
PF - Kris Humphries
C - Andrea Bargnani

11. Jorge Garbajosa
12.Pape Sow
13.P.J Tucker
14.Uros Slokar
15.Alvin Williams

Those are all the player who will aparently be on the roster next season. don't know about Darrick Martin's status. I'm jsut throwing that out there because I was trying to figure out what the roster would look like.

by !~LIL Scrappy~! on Jul 18, 2006 12:05 PM EDT reply actions

What is the point of this; the guy has left town and you are still ragging on him. Give him a break.

by Poppa Vlazo on Jul 18, 2006 1:22 PM EDT reply actions

Hoffa may not be the best raptor but he was a rock. he was tough . alozo mourning knows this. the new line up might be excellent offensively but I see no enforcer . no mike james and rafael araujo . let's wait and see.

by nike on Jul 18, 2006 3:27 PM EDT reply actions

Hoffa was the man don't disrespect the franchise player

by truballa on Jul 18, 2006 3:59 PM EDT reply actions

I miss Joe Piscopo.

by tim on Jul 18, 2006 4:12 PM EDT reply actions

Let Araujo R.I.U. (Rest in Utah).

The guy was a Babcock mistake that was ladened with too many expectations. Should have probably been a late-1st/early 2nd round pick that was used to commit fouls on Shaq and taken lower in the draft that would have been a fine expectation.

At least he's hearing some cheers in summer league, must be a bit of a shock for him.

Though somewhat mean-spirited, I did find the article funny.

by Dave on Jul 18, 2006 5:16 PM EDT reply actions

Why hate on Hoffa? He did what he could but the Toronto media stirred up the negative vibes on this kid before he ever saw the floor. An atheletic giant, he still has upside. Drafting for need, they took him way too high but still, I think its a disgrace how Raptor fans treated him. Thank David Feschuck at the Toronto Star for leading the charge and assasinating Hoffa's future in T.O.
just like Perkins' baseless hate for Tony Fernandez back in the day or the media fury vs Larry Murphy (HALL OF FAME!!!!), media seems to almost run the franchises in this city. Meanwhile a crook like Domi, who helped his brother and gang fleece our city of millions of dollars (computer leasing scandal) is treated like some kind of hero. Why not write about that? Feschuck's spitefull articles about this kid have given me a hate on for the man (Feschuck) and be warned Feschuck, if I ever run into you, Im gonna bust your nose up for being a coward and a sheersucker.
ps. Hoffa did stink it up but at least give the kid a couple of years before you $hit all over him.
pps. Hoffa will never need to sell corollas, he's a frikkin multi millionaire.

by Giant Killa on Jul 27, 2006 9:40 AM EDT reply actions