Masai Ujiri at the end: “After that performance, we need a culture reset here”

The Raptors had one of the more bizarre (cursed?) seasons of recent memory. They weathered injuries to players both big and small, roster turnover with exciting trades, and all the ups and downs that come in a typical NBA season, only to find themselves in the same place: killed by LeBron and the Cavaliers.

As is tradition, team president Masai Ujiri always has the last word. He addressed the media today, thus closing the book on the 2016-17 season. While Ujiri is usually tight-lipped and vague about what his plans for the Raptors could be, he did let fly a few nuggets of information to get the Toronto hive buzzing.

Here are the best bits rolling out from Twitter and Toronto’s Raptors beat writers.

First, we’ll go with the headline:

Er, wait... not that. Here we are:

But what could that mean in the context of losing to the Cavs again, and having an existential crisis in the process? More questions.

This certainly sounds like Masai will give a thought to Dwane Casey’s status with the Raptors. He’s been with the team for six years, and may have hit his ceiling with where he can take the Raptors. Thoughts?

And how’s Casey doing with Kyle Lowry?

Speaking of which, what is Masai’s stance on Lowry? Much of the Raptors’ success is because of him, so surely there’s a take.

Ujiri also noted a few other things. One, that the injury to Lowry down the stretch made it hard to evaluate all of the players on hand. That he has commitment from ownership to either go into the tax, or head in a rebuilding direction.

Finally, Masai confirmed something else that somehow always appears to be true:

Like, for example...

Get ready for an interesting summer.

(Thanks to Eric, Blake, Josh, Michael, and the rest of the reporters on the scene tweeting this stuff out. We’ll have the video up once it becomes available.)