3 In the Key – Toronto Raptors Game-Day Preview vs. Jazz

Franchise,

I don't want to speak ill of others, but this article demonstrates a couple of the things that set RaptorsHQ apart in the NBA blogosphere: writing ability, and analysis.

The Jazz guest's answers to the 3 questions are poorly-written with run-on sentences and confused thoughts. Meanwhile, the analysis is so basic as to be meaningless:

"...keep up the high scoring, especially against inferior, low-level NBA teams"? No, really, I thought the goal was to beat the good teams and play down to the level of the bad ones!

"...hold Bosh to limited points and rebounds, they should come away with the win"? Isn't basketball still a team game? Aren't the Raptors widely regarded as dangerous because we're a deep team, and not a one-man show? That's fantasy pool analysis, not game analysis.

I don't mean to be disparaging, I admire anyone willing to commit the time and effort to maintaining a blog on their favourite team, but to me this demonstrates again the quality of RaptorsHQ, especially among team-based (rather than league-wide) fan blogs.

Keep up the great work!

Great reading positive comments about Coach Mitchell. I for one, love the way he interacts(?)with the media.
With so many capable bodies on this roster, Sam has his work cut out for him in finding the best combinations. So far his decisions have impressed me.

Millsap will not have another game like he did last year...I think the Jazz are overated but Boozer is underrated, he is a very dangerous player and to quote Zach he unconciously was speaking of what the Raps need to do to Boozer in order for us to win..When he was speaking of what the Jazz need to do to Bosh to win the game...so take Bosh's name out of this comment and input Boozer and the Raps will come away with a win tonight...
Zach: "The biggest key for a Jazz(Lets make that Raps) victory coming up in tomorrow's game at Toronto is to limit the performance of Chris Bosh(lets make that Carlos Boozer). Therefore, the key is defense. I think the Jazz(lets make that Raptors) can score enough against the Raptors(lets make that Jazz)to win so as long as they play tough defense and hold Bosh(Boozer) to limited points and rebounds, they should come away with the win...
What's that biblical quote by Moses to Pharoah..."Out of your own mouth cometh your judgement....Raps4life...NO Fear.

Can't wait to see if Moon starts again tonight. He'll add solid defence and rebounding for the Raps. His atheleticism will help counter some of Utah's strengths. I am hoping he starts again to get us off to a great start.

Kind words from the SportsGuy on ESPN( NEAR THE END)

5. TORONTO RAPTORS
Preseason prediction: 39 wins (ninth)
Revised prediction: 43 wins

Toronto swingman Jamario Moon has been one of this season's early surprises.
The crazed Raptors fans might be the single craziest group of fanatics on the Web other than the 9/11 Truthers. You should have seen my e-mail inbox after I had the gall to pick Toronto to miss the playoffs for some very sane reasons -- namely, that Chris Bosh was having knee problems, they have four key guys who are below-average defenders (Andrea Bargnani, Ford, Jason Kapono and Jose Calderon), and they overachieved in a weaker conference last season. Of course, I wasn't counting on Carlos Delfino and Jamario Moon emerging from nowhere to give them defense and athleticism from the swingman spots. Carlos Delfino and Jamario Moon??? Really? I was supposed to see that one coming? I didn't see how they could match up against the LeBrons, Wades and Pierce/Allen combos, but Delfino's emergence alone has been intriguing enough that I had to bump them up four wins.

Reason No. 12,360 why I love the NBA: When he's not sending Christmas gifts to the Paxson family, Dumars is watching Delfino thrive in Toronto and Darko thrive in Memphis with the same look on his face that Norv Turner had during the second half of the Chargers-Colts game.

Reason No. 12,361 why I love the NBA: The Raptors fans are like overbearing Little League parents, only in this case, they're passionate about an NBA team instead of a Little League son. What do you mean my kid isn't good enough??? He's one of the best hitters on this team! You just don't like him, that's the real problem here! And by the way, that's not a knock. If every city cared about its team as much as the Toronto cares about the Raps, the NBA would be a much better place.

Tinman - great post ha ha...hadn't got to S.G.'s new column yet so that made me laugh. Love how he feels the wrath of the fans whenever he puts the team down and he's right about Raptors' fans passion for the game...no way we'd let our club head to Oklahoma if we were in Seattle's shoes...

MattK - thanks for the props...neither snow, nor rain, nor heat can keep the HQ away from Raps' analysis...

PS - I just went for lunch and before purchasing my meal I was told that Interac was down across Canada. I naturally started wondering if there was any possible connection between this and the alleged fist fight the Knicks had IN MID-AIR YESTERDAY. MID-AIR?? AT WHAT POINT IS DAVID STERN GOING TO STEP IN AND STOP THE MADNESS? CAN YOU EVEN IMAGINE BEING THE PILOT OF THAT PLANE AND HAVING EDDY CURRY AND JEROME JAMES THROWING BOWS NEARBY???

Yeh ..you have to be careful about what you say about our Raptors..but we appreciate your class in revising your win total for the Raptors, however you are off by 10 wins. Raps will finish with 53 wins this year...and will either finish 1st or 2nd in our division and no less that 3 place in the Eastern Conference.

I picked 53 as well.

I really think Bargnani should be starting tonight as he would be the perfect defender on Okur. They both have the same athleticism and size, so instead of Rasho covering Okur at the 3 point line wouldnt it make more sense to have Bargs up on Okur? Maybe Bargs and Bosh can mesh together for this game because I am hoping for them to be the best 4-5 tandem in the league.

Uhm, ok 53 wins may be a little much at the current juncture. Based on their play so far 43 wins and 2nd place in the division (5th) in the conference seems reasonable. My main concern with the Raps is their penchant from falling back on jumpers at inopportune times. IF they can avoid that trend the rest of the way then maybe they can win 53 but until they show that they wont fall back to being the Bucks/Bulls (live by the jumper die by the jumper) then you really cant give them over 50 wins. Sorry, that is just the way it is.

On the subject of Mr Moon starting I think he has earned it. His stats are impressive so far if you average them out over a full game, but what impressed me most was one play that will never show up in the stat sheet.
I believe Calderon (it could have been any of our white boys, they all look the same) put in a fairly standard layup. But before the ball could go down Moon's grinning mug appears on the screen above the rim looking for the put back if it doesn't go. Its been a long time since the Raptors have had that kind of hustle on the glass.

Franchise,
Great post and great recognition of the "good" problems Mitchel has to deal with regarding working on the best possible rotation for this team to be successful. It is indeed an embarasment of riches of sorts and will take time. I truly don't think that Sam gets enough credit for this team's succes. I think this is due at least in part to the fact that he has a "unique" style when dealing with the media (which I for one can't get enough of, hilarious). BTW can we get more info on the Knicks "Rumble at 30K feet"!? I can't believe this! This has turned into a absolute joke! As Simons would say, the nicks have entered the "Tyson Zone"! Too bad for a once storied franchise! It's just bad for the league in general...

what did TJ ford just do???? 16 seconds left down by 3 and he dribbles down and tries to jack a three, 3 times until he actually shoots a fading one off balance....that was one of the worst plays i have seen him make yet, there was more then enough time for him to set something up for them to get a good look at a 3, even for him...that was absolutely ridiculous im sorry.

on a lighter note, loved moon again tonight...im telling you he is gonna continue to start if he plays like this every night. I find it funny that the guy we paid big bucks for in the off season is playin behind the guy that is making the minimum in the NBA

Poor execution at shooting throughout. Why not 20-sec timeout when at 17 seconds? Why TJ takes TWO three-point shots, the lowest 3-point shooter on the floor, when compared to Kapono and AP? He looked like he was going to take the shot from the beginning of the possession. As the announcers said, it works best when you work it inside and then back out to shoot the open 3. Perimeter passing does not set it up as well.

Dribble down, take the 3. How many times has TJ done that? How many times do we have to complain about this? And 17 shots? Seventeen? What the &*^*(&??

Should have been feeding AP, who seemed to be on a roll.

Ugghh. Not a good game. One more stinker.

They were scrambling at the end, but they threw the game away from the start. Bosh and Bargs were horrible, until Bosh woke up in the 4rth.

This looked like the Boston game all over again. And they had a lot of time to practice.

What happened to Bargs? Man, did he look bad.

i couldnt agree more with you gerry, even jack was saying it, tj was taking the battle between him and williams personally and tj wanted to one up williams right after deron made tj look stupid on that inbounds play...toronto needs him to be a distributor not a perimter shooter, in order for them to be successful

Do you think TJ wanted that last shot? The only players I can think of that would attempt that series of plays to end the game are Kobe and T-mac.
TJ's a player but when he starts playing like Ricky Davis on crack we will have problems!

Please explain THAT!!!!
All of the TJ backers have to explain why every time he has to be the guy to take the final shot! WTF.
That was embarassing. Two man ball between Kris Humphries and TJ. That's the best we could come up with.
Unbelievable.

Yeah- we saw him do that a lot last year.He's done it only once before this season but we didn't mind because he kept us in the game against the Celtics.
Our PG's, Bosh, and Bargnani played horrible. Wont go into details.
Positives - as bad as above played we kept it close. AP, Humphries, and Delfino played well and Moon continues to impress in stretches.

True story, the other night my team was down three in my Co-ed under 40 rec league with ten seconds to go,and guess who showed up... TJ Ford!
He subbed in before anyone could stop him and started whipping three pointers of the backboard. He missed four in a row but kept demanding the ball! We lost the game but he kept heaving them up after the whistle until he got one in! Then he walked of the court snarling. All I could say was, "That's OK get it all out of your system big man. Get it all out of your system."

There's good TJ and bad TJ. The good TJ is a distributor and makes stuff happen. The bad TJ has a loud Mike James voice in his head that he can't ignore. Honestly, TJ has the skills, but sometimes he just doesn't have the smarts out there.

I couldn't see the game because for some reason RSN was showing the Celtics game again. Why is it that when our defence is going well, we shut down our offence?

Sorry Tinman, Carlos was horrible as well. Only good players out there tonight were AP, Humphries and Moon.

I hated the last play aswell, but why is everyone on Ford. Was Ford the one who decided not to take the TO to sub in more shooters instead of Hump? If you see the replay, you see he had no one to pass to. The penetration and kick out, or "the Brokeback mountain" play as Phil Jackson likes to call it, only works if they defend the two point shot which they were clearly not going to do.

I was screaming at the TV when I saw Bargnani in there to start the 4th. How much punishment can we take?

Calderon doesn't get off either. He was stinking up the floor with the rest of them.

I think Sam should have gone back to AP earlier.

I know Howland's going to talk about this tomorrow but I admittedly had to mix myself a few drinks after that last set of plays. I've praised TJ for the way he's handled the point so far this year but man...what a let down tonight.

Yes TJ, you bailed the team out on that huge three with the clock dying down. THAT DOESN'T MEAN YOU HAVE THE GREEN LIGHT TO KEEP FIRING OUT OF A TIME-OUT!

Especially because the team didn't need a three - a quick two and a foul to extend the game as Jack said...

I just don't get it, there's no way Sam drew that up although he'll probably be too professional to point the finger tomorrow. It wasn't even the attempted three that really irked me, like others have said, it was the fact that he tried about 18 times to get it off without even considering his other teammates!

Raps offense was woeful all night until CB4 started attacking the rim again. Great to see Moon and the defence hold them in the game, but talk about some bad decisions resulting in turnovers and not just from TJ...although his at the end was the most eggregious...

"why blame TJ if he does not have anyone to pass to?"

Why is this a problem for TJ? Every team in the NBA has five players, one of whom is a point guard. The other team on the court only has five players too. And they seem to pick up assists from time to time.

Why would your 4 teammates be unable to get open?

Hmmm...(1) they don't know what they are doing period;
(2) they don't know how to break the defensive coverage;
(3) they are too tired or apathetic to get open or keep up;
(4) they are willfully (a) trying to screw TJ, (b) trying to screw Sam, (c) trying to lose games.

I think 1 or 2 are the only realistic options here. Now, how would you address those problems? How do players find out what their role is? How do players learn to break coverage? And, whose job is that? Sigh...

And THAT guy always says "they have to work it out on the court for themselves."

BTW, the Bulls were the same when we played them. And, IMO, you have to consider options 3 and 4 at least a little to explain their meltdowns.

Sorry, maybe a 5 option: the other team is simply, overwhelmingly better. Nothing you can do.

That was NOT Utah tonite. TO could have blown them out by 20 points if they shot like they had in Chicago. Heck, even if they shot their average they would have beaten Utah by ten. Utah stunk too.

Toronto should have won this game, the game with Orlando, the game versus Boston. Shoulda shoulda shoulda.

Is it a lack of maturity/experience we are dealing with here? Kids in their early twenties playing against men (Boozer is a monster), and they get intimidated? NJ last year, Garnett, Boozer...

These guys need to start believing in themselves. No, TJ "believes" in himself too much. How about ... knowing themselves, what they can do (confidence), what they can't (not overconfidence), and based on that knowledge, DO (consistency). The difference between men and boys.

So, here's hoping the Raps start growing up.

Is that the problem that Sam is dealing with? And why BC believes that Sam is the one best able to relate to these kids and help them mature, because of his motivational strengths?

For God sakes Gerry, everything falls on Sam right?
The reason we did not win was we shot 39%. The defence was there. We missed open shots. Our stars played like chumps. No coaching breakdown, our stars stunk!
You are a freaking broken record always attempting to justify your obvious contempt of Mitchell. Add something else to these discussions. You have nothing positive to say and after every loss you whine(unjustifiably)blaming Sam for our players missing open looks.