Sweet Revenge

So the Raptors finally beat the Mavs and I don't just mean the first half of the game and then blow a huge lead and eventually lose. You see, that's what they did against the mavs twice last season. Earlier this season, they just flat out got their asses kicked. Tonight they did the opposite and beat the Mavs in convincing fashion and satisfied their fan's blood thirst for revenge. Too long have the Mavs embarassed Toronto, too long has Dirk Nowitzki strutted his stuff on the court at the expense of the Raps. Now only if they could do it against the Craptics then the world would be right.

Everyone seemed to play well tonight. Not only from an offense standpoint but on defense as well. Well duh, you can't win without having to play hard defense you must be thinking. But that's the thing that was their Achilles heel all this time and somehow they have suddenly managed to look like they're a good defensive team. They all seem to be playing very hard, getting into opponent's space and forcing them to pass or put up a bad shot. This has been the biggest change lately in their successes. A key part of this is Andrea Bargnani's improved defense. Since he is not leaving his man wide open anymore during switches, hedges and help defense, he's not allowing the opponent the chance to swing the ball around to the open man or just drive right into the lane. This in turn allows the Raptors to not look like total jackasses. But their defense wasn't entirely AB7's fault earlier this season. Every Raptor fan out their knew they had a problem with the other team's guards and wings just blowing by their defender and helping themselves to an endless buffet of jam, slams, layups and whatever they their hearts desired. They seemed to have developed this ingenious trick where they slide over and deny a slashing opponent a clear path. Groundbreaking strategy, I know. Nonetheless, these tweaks to the defense seemed to have stabilized them and allowed them to build confidence which as well all know is super duper important to success.

So to sing the praises of my favourite player even though I like to be fair and point out his shortcomings, Bargnani has been the difference to the team with their recent success. No matter how much defense you play you still have to score to win and the extra points we're getting from our new Madman AB7 is the difference. He's not only scoring, he's doing it efficiently, playing defense, rebounding, and showing some real fire and emotion. This seems to pump up his teammates and becomes contagious. Well to everyone except Hidayet Turkoglu. Yes that's his real name. Hidayet, (Rhymes with idiot) seems to be in a real slump. Bargnani on the other hand is on fire and here's hoping he stays this way and doesn't relapse back into the shadow of the player he's become.

When the Raptors signed him to a 5 year $50million deal I knew it was a great deal even though everyone else cried foul. Even without his recent improvements, at the time Bargnani was still one of the best centers in the league. I mean look at some of the other bums that play center in the NBA that make more money. Samuel Dalembert makes about $12 million a year. He is not half the player Bargnani is. Bargnani may not be as good a defender but Bargnani's ceiling for improvement is unlimited in comparison. Brad Miller is making over $12 million, Andrew Bogut is making 10, Tyson Chandler making about 12, Eric Dampier, 10, and he's making $13 million next season. Now... can you tell me how much you'd pay Bargnani in comparison? Not only that, he's very very happy with the deal telling me he's not a greedy bastard. I mean giving a person $10 million a year to play 82, two and a half hour games, a few practices a week, then get the summer off? Who wouldn't be content? Other NBA players, that's who! Bargnani is a quality player and Colangelo is a friggin genius. Darko is making $7.5 million and he's an absolute useless 7 foot tall pile of garbage. $2.5 million more and it upgrades you to Bargnani? Sounds like a pretty good deal to me. Let's face it, besides a few exceptional players, most centers are just tall guys that wave their arms around. Very few of them can shoot jumpers, even fewer of them can drive the ball, handle the ball, and the ones that can shoot threes? Well you can count them all on one hand. Bargnani, Troy Murphy(might be considered a PF), Brad Miller, Mehmet Ohkur, Rasheed Wallace(also might me considered a PF). Now that Bargnani has added shot blocking and rebound on a more consistent basis we now have one of the premier centers in the game. Dwight Howard might be a zillion times better but the man is naturally a PF and so is the boringest player in the NBA, Tim Duncan.

Now if only they can parlay Turkoglu into a decent wing we'd be a legit contender. No offense to Demar but since he's a rookie and for no other reason, i think we need another wing in order to go deep into the playoffs. Nobody wins a championship without a solid slashing, scoring, wing who possibly could be able to post their opponent up. Who does that sound like? Kobe and Lebron are extreme versions of this but someone a bit less skilled(and cheaper) would do the trick too. Kind of the way Carter used to be before he turned into a giant buffoon. Or at least until we realized he was one.

Trading Calderon was an option too when he was injured, but since he's come back he's played his way back into the lineup, back into respectability and back into my heart. LOL. But in all seriousness he's run the second unit so well and has executed the offense so well that he's untradeable in my books. He's showing that he's back to form. The type of form he had so long ago, most of us forgot how it used to look like. He's driving the ball and using that sweet lay-in. He's making great crisp passes to teammates that put them in good position, he's confusing the opponent's defense with quick swing passes, and he's hitting his shot off screens like he used to instead of clanking them really badly. Making shots instead of missing them? Great insight I know. There's no longer a huge drop off in PG play and offensive direction once the starting PG sits down for a rest. Other teams are finding that their secondary PGs are no match for us. Unlike Slowmo Ukic, who was garbage, human garbage. He's also finding Bargs more. Bargnani doesn't seem to get the ball enough in key moments of the game before. Bargnani would score 12 points in a first quarter, then the team stops giving him the ball. It's happened on many many occasions. Know how people always wonder why he does well in first and third quarters and disappears? Well it's cause he's not getting any passes!!! The only passes he gets is to move the ball in position for a play to feed Bosh or someone else. So when he does get the ball he forces up an ill advised 3 cause it's the only chance he gets to score.

So kudos to Bargnani and Calderon. Boo to Hedont Turkoglu.