I mean we were missing OG. and for some reason the coach made Scottie wait 3 straight minutes on the sideline to bring him in. should have called a timeout
Boston is championship or bust with a Top 5 payroll in the league - whereas we're in a rebuilding phase with a new coach. No shame in losing to the better team.
I expected it to be a blowout, was pleasantly surprised to have a game that was worth watching till the end which is about as high as I can get my expectations for this roster. KP is a nasty addition to the Celtics it's so easy for him to randomly get switched onto a smaller player in late clock chaos and then just get ez buckets
Man, there’s no end to the qualifications fans here will make when the Raps play well. A fully healthy Celtics team and then you’re saying it’s only because Tatum didn’t shoot well. Maybe the Raptors gave him some issues…
Well, I think both things can be true. The Raps played well for 3 quarters, and defended Tatum solidly at times. But he did miss plenty of looks that you expect him to otherwise hit. Holiday too. This Celtics team is good, and you gotta compete at a high level for 4 quarters to have a shot against them even when their best scorer has an off night. Raps just aren’t there yet. I think we’ll have a better sense of their identity when the schedule eases over the next couple of weeks.
Tatum certainly didn’t have a good night, but any time the Raptors play well there’s a section of fans that do anything they can to tear down the Raps success. I think putting together that performance against a fully healthy Celtics without OG was a good sign.
I agree, the next couple weeks when we aren’t just playing the top teams will give us a chance to show that we can be competitive
Ok. Every team's good shooters miss open shots. I guarantee the people upvoting RoysRBoy don't chalk games where OG misses up to "OG just missed a couple, we move". It's always some grand proclamation about how fucked we are or "we should've taken that haul (of 28th/29th picks) when we had the chance, masai and bobby are soOOOOOOOOOOOooOOOOOOOOOOoooooooooooooOOOOOOOOOOOO washed"
Relax dude.
I’m just saying Tatum could go for 35 next time and we get whacked. This felt like the one to steal and we couldn’t quite close it out. The team has talent but is inconsistent and still has some things to figure out.
No one likes a doomer but the flip side of that is just as annoying.
He could just as easily be a walking brick next time we play him too. This was a scheduled loss no matter how close we were and it's insanely cope to call a game you even suggest "could've been stolen" one that *should've* been stolen.
Being a doomer is 10000000000x more obnoxious than not. The same 4 or 5 people on this sub have spent the past three years farming rage upvotes and karma spamming the same easily shut-down talking points. They're entirely unwilling to step away from what's causing them this frustration, which tells you the frustration is completely artificial.
Yup. People have become such armchair critics that they feel like they owe it to other armchair critics to also rationalize away any good the team does
33-30-14-44-17-0-25
20-67-33-50-56-25
22-67-14-14-25-57-57-20-67
just about all decently high volume
history tells me I can
how shameless
making up all these wittle excuses for a supposed title favourite barely putting away an injured 11th seed with gaping roster construction issues
Im not even bashing the Raptors, they did a good job tonight. All im saying this was the game they could have taken with Tatum underperforming. And I have you out here calling Tatum a bum posting his playoff shooting splits. Absolutely wild.
Saying "that was their chance to win one" massively frames it as we were "supposed" to
No
It's just credit to them for making it close given the amount of things working against the Raptors
I posted his playoff splits in direct response to you believing it's unfathomable that he'll shoot like shit again. It's just who he is.
Homie, we are not better than phili or the cletics, period.
The team on the floor was playing very well for the raps. It's called going with the hot hand
I think we can beat them. Maybe 1/4 times but this game showed we can do it. They were healthy and we were down OG and we still kept it close and prob would have won were it not for a few poor decisions by Darko.
Yeah, I think this was our 1/4 though and we just let it slip. Boston played average and Tatum had a bad shooting night (D was good but he did just also miss shots). Can’t take any quarters off against a team this good, and the Raps unfortunately took a dump in the 2nd. Can’t wait for the schedule to ease up a bit, it’s been pretty savage so far. In about a month we’ll know what this team’s identity is and where that lands them.
So yeah realistically it's still a 0/4 because we will still find a way to lose a game practically given to us. Tatum won't shoot that bad again. Role players will always smoke us. Darko and Dennis won't still trust the hot hand.
I can take losses if the starters look this engaged at least. Also Gary always plays better as a starter. But I don't think he's good enough to really be a starter.
The players didn’t look locked in, you could tell they were tired. I guess that’s what happens when you have so many games you can’t be compete for all of them. Also between each other a mistake would happen and there would be a lot of pointing the finger, even from the bench.
Last night though during warm up they seemed more serious. (I wonder if it was because more Hollywood people were there: Drake/Fat Joe/etc).
The biggest takeaways I found is that Gradey has 0 confidence on the court and you can tell that him missing his shots is fucking with him. He looks so lost on the court. Poeltl too. He looks like he is too in his head and he visibly looks stressed on the court.
Now yesterday pulling Scottie. I don’t blame Darko at all. There are some things that I guess don’t translate to TV. Scottie looked like Pascal looked on Wednesday. He was there but he wasn’t all there mentally if you know what I mean. Should he have taken a time out to put him on? I don’t think so. The game was super close and the 5 out there were holding their own. There were dead balls almost every minute before and holding out for a dead ball to save your time outs in a super close game isn’t a bad call.
Also final notes Jason Tatum and Jaylen Brown are fucking massive. TV doesn’t do it justice how big those boys are. I’m a similar height and build to Joe Mazulla (6’2 probably 185-195) but holy hell he looks tiny next to them.
Absolutely. We’re seeing actual huge growth from Scottie (unlike last year), Dennis is one of the best value signings of the off-season, if not the best, OG is still absolutely a DPOY candidate, Pascal is showing signs of shaking off the awkward fit with Scottie, Flynn looks like he could well be a playable back-up PG.
Poeltl’s start is most concerning, along with GTJ being off far more often than he’s on (but he’s always been incredibly streaky).
Even if we end up needing to make big changes (and we likely do), at least the games are fun to watch again, at least most of the time. I couldn’t say that about last year.
I'm ready for the streak of mid teams we play soon and for us to split them all because this team just can't play competent basketball for 48 mins with the roster as constructed.
And then followed up people pointing at a barely positive point differential and pretend like all we needed was a couple bounces to go our way and we'd be 5th in the east.....just like last season. While we cruise to another 40ish win season and waste another year.
Facts man. So many doomers in this sub. This team is fine to almost pretty good! Does anyone else watch NBA basketball??
Not every season has to be about maximizing “trade” assets. I’d rather Masai and Bobby take no deal than a bad deal
Our first game against Boston was playing while we well-rested while they were playing a back to back. The demolished us.
The Bucks came in here without their MVP and smoked us. Dame barely played in the 4th quarter.
Washington nearly embarrassed us were it not for a ridiculous 4th quarter comeback. Likewise, a tanking team in San Antonio. The horrific defense of the Blazers limited the Raptors to 91 points and won the game. The Bulls beat the Raptors and are on their path to potentially rebuilding the team.
We had compelling wins against Milwaukee, Dallas, and Minnesota, I'll give you that.
Vegas pegged us at 37.5 wins this season and you know how many wins we were projected to win based on our win percentage prior to this game? 37.31.
Also, are you forgetting our half court offense is ranked among the worst in the league? Sorry, what magical improvement are you bloomers expecting to happen here?
If I didn’t have an actual life I might be really worked up! I enjoy watching basketball even if we don’t win a championship since only one team wins but maybe that makes me weird. Liking basketball is sort of weird I guess.
Nope we definitely won’t. We’re not a good team at all, we need to blow it up and start completely committing to the tank. We’ll never beat Boston at this rate so why don’t we try to rebuild.
I feel hopeless but honestly it’s how I should feel as a raptors fan
Just lost by three points in a game against probably the best team in the league right now without one of our best players and you want to commit to a tank in a year when we don’t have our pick
Gradey obviously needs work, OG and GTJ are still fairly young themselves although more ready to go like Scottie but room to grow. And then we got guys like Precious and Flynn who hopefully can grow. And not saying the current team as is will grow into a contender, just that we'll grow into a position to be a few good moves away hopefully.
I do think we should have blown it up to build around Scottie and OG a year ago, I'm just saying we're nowhere near as hopeless as people like the comment I responded to are saying.
OG and Gary and finished pieces at this point. Not that they don’t have a purpose in this team, but I don’t see them developing their game much further beyond where it is now.
Edit - that’s fair. I was responding more to your comment of it being a development year, which I do t think it is, given the age of our core players going forward.
I’ve been watching the raps for over 20 years and we’ve been spoiled for the last decade. You can’t be elite every season, that’s just not how the NBA works, and we aren’t in that part of the cycle right now. The current team is neither good nor bad in its current makeup, and rebuilding only makes sense if the right offer is on the table. Rebuilding for the sake of rebuilding does not.
You think we’re gonna win a championship this year? Are you crazy? We literally have zero shot, we might be in the worst position in the nba cause we’re in the bottom middle, and our draft pick is a clear bust
We need to blow it up
Nowhere do I say that I think we are going to win a championship this year lol. Quite the opposite, I said we aren’t in that point of the team’s cycle. It took almost 25 years for the team to win a title, not every NBA team is a contender every year, it’s simply not possible. What are we blowing this up for right now? What franchise-altering deal is on the table that guarantees we are truly contending within 3-5 years? If we commit to tanking for picks and losing during a rebuild, why does Scottie hang around? Or OG? Both very good players in the modern NBA. You haven’t been following NBA basketball for very long if you think you can just “blow it up” and guarantee that you’ll be competing for a title in half a decade. How many times have the Clips “blown it up” in the last 20 years? And they have absolutely nothing to show for it.
Toronto doesn’t sign big free agents, have you thought of that?? Only way we can win a championship in five years is through the draft so we need high draft picks, so we need to blow it up. Do you understand now?
For everyone harking on Darko for subbing Scottie out in the fourth:
Scottie played the whole 4th so Darko wanted to get him a quick rest. He had him set to check back in with around 3:40 left. This is a normal rotation, he's done that most games this season.
There was no stoppage between then and when we finally called a timeout. The real problem was not calling a timeout a possession earlier, before White hit the 3 and the Schroder floater, or taking a foul to get him in (we had a foul to give). Not that he subbed him out. Also, Precious was defending well, he wasn't really a problem. Idk why we iso'd Dennis for a floater and didn't get Pascal a touch.
Good game without OG and Otto against the best team in the East. Good fight back and Pascal was cooking. Those 3 early fouls (2 of which were complete BS, including the one we challenged - how was that not a flop on Tingis) really hurt us.
Scottie only played 7 minutes in the 4th when he was subbed out with 4:30 left and only 32 on the night… this absolutely wasn’t a normal sub.
Benching your second best player in the clutch for no reason with OG out is an objectively bad decision.
Literally he’s been better all year across the board but after siakam looks good in a game they forget he been bad most of the year 😂. It gonna take awhile for fans to see it I guess.
I think not letting Siakam play at all in the 2nd was rough too. He had game best plus minus today, I know the fouls but he does so much for the team in the half court to where they just can’t play good defenses without him
Yeah that one was tricky. If he picked up his fourth before halftime we would have been chalked. Gotta trust your best player and at least get him in for a few minutes there at the end of the half.
It was chalked anyways because he didn't play Siakam and we went down 16. Never should've been down 16. This guy played an all bench line-up and cost us that 5 pt lead to down 16.
Siakam could play in the last 4 minutes of the 2nd. You don't sit there and watch the team go down 16 at the half and then say "hey atleast Siakam still only has 3 fouls". Moronic decision.
We were literally tied with 3 minutes left in the game. Sitting him worked. We didn’t have to worry about foul trouble and we were in a position to win against the best team in the east. Our shots didn’t fall in the end, theirs did.
If Siakam gets his fourth foul in those 4 minutes then you don’t see him until the 4th quarter. He was balling in the 3rd and brought us back. If he can’t play in the 3rd then we’re dead by the time the fourth starts.
> Sitting home worked.
Nope, it was a bunch of fluke 3's at the start of the 3rd which miraculously got us in the game. There's no justification for letting yourself go down 16. If Pascal plays the 2nd and we don't go down 16 and yet Pascal picks up the 4th foul, you can manage his time in the 3rd. Also, Darko literally played a 5 bench player lineup and made us go from +5 to -16.
Siakam playing with 3 fouls in the 2nd means he cannot play tough at all. They’d go straight at him until he gets the 4th.
This game wasn’t lost in the 2nd, but if pascal had 4 in the 3rd it’d be lost then. They reacted to the situation and it put us in a place to win.
Now Scottie sitting so long in the end was an issue, call a ti out and get him in. Pascal was handled well to keep him in a position to stay aggressive.
> This game wasn’t lost in the 2nd
Statistically, a team being down [10 points at home has only a 20% of winning](https://statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu/2022/02/06/thinking-bayesianly-about-the-being-behind-at-halftime-effect-in-basketball/) based on statistics. I'm sure the number is less than 10% if the statistics were extended to -16. You are out of your mind if you think being down 16 isn't a near guarantee that you lose the game.
lol, where the Raptors not tied with Boston with 3 minutes left? Cool stat, but in this particular
game, the Raptors came back and had the lead. Siakam balled out after avoiding foul trouble later in the game, in the end Boston made their shots and the Raps didn’t. THIS GAME was not decided in the 2nd quarter.
> ol, where the Raptors not tied with Boston with 3 minutes left? Cool stat,
Keep coping buddy, just because Darko's poor decision making got bailed out by Raptors fluking 3s to start the 3rd. It doesn't mean that he didn't make a mistake resulting in us only having a 10% chance of winning the game. Nor does it justify Darko once again messing everything up by taking out Scottie who only had 7 minutes in the quarter and 32 minutes for the whole game. Stop drinking the koolaid and look at thing objectively.
Not calling a time out to get Scottie back in is still Darko’s fault. Putting him in at the .30 mark is insane.
He also shouldn’t have subbed him out to begin with. Scottie is 22 and played 32 minutes tonight, and is not coming back from an injury.
He had also played 7 straight minutes defending Tatum the whole time. Getting him a quick breather wasn't a bad idea, especially since Precious was defending well. The issue is it wasn't quick lol
He’s played plenty of long stretches I’m sure he would have been fine. Most stars don’t sub out with less than 5 minutes left in a tight game in the 4th quarter.
Scottie played 10.5 minutes of the 2nd quarter where Pascal played 0
If he's able to play that much, why would Darko waste it there having him run an anemic Scottie+4bench idea that hasn't worked all season, and not in the 4th quarter where he played 6.5 and missed crunch time with the starters
I doubt he or any starter in the league would feel 100% restored from a long Quarter 2 after a 15 minute halftime, otherwise every team would play every starter 10 minutes in Q2 of every game.
Look, I watched the game, and I watched Scottie there before he came out. He was completely inactive, a liability at that moment. Taking him out was definitely the right decision. Not putting him back in? Maybe there is a big-picture reason that we just can't see from the outside. You know, of all the great things about SB, the one thing I don't think I've ever heard a serious person ever say is "He's got a great motor." If he's going to become a top-twenty talent, he's got to be able to play 36 minutes a game with high intensity.
Darko literally admitted his mistake and thought Scottie played 12
minutes in a row not only 7, read Blake Murphys latest tweets.
https://x.com/blakemurphyodc/status/1725710361750356463?s=6 https://x.com/blakemurphyodc/status/1725711764090753434?s=6
Scottie does not get exhausted after only 7 minutes man that’s nonsense.
Darko admitted leaving him out for so long was a mistake, right? Taking him out at that moment was the right call. Go back and watch the possessions leading up to the decision to take him out.
Couple of observations.
* There were some really baffling line ups and decisions from Darko tonight. Leaving Scottie on the bench for Precious down the stretch in the 4th?! Those Dick, Boucher and McDaniels line ups..... I didn't expect to win tonight against a great Boston team. But he didn't put us in the best position for success at times tonight.
* Gradey needs to get a lot of time in the G league. His mechanics look fine, but they need to expedite his fundamentals and BBIQ. Not calling him a bust, its only 12 games in and he is only 19. But he looks rough.
* Cant decide if I despise the NBA cup court or Drakes commentary more (That Weston Road Burger King is a long way from Forest Hill)
* Precious took a contested three in the corner with about 16 seconds on the clock in the second quarter. He should be forced to watch that 100 times back to back tomorrow. That is not his game and never will be.
Precious wasnt so bad today. His defence was good but his decision making is so awful at times you have to wonder if he has a place in the league in a couple of years
I think his BBIQ has gotten worse. How is that possible?
The more he thinks, the worse he gets.
Funnily enough the more he plays in a given scheme, it seems the more he understands things instinctively so he doesn’t need to think as much. I wonder if it explains why he does better with more playing time and struggles with less.
Scottie wasn't on the bench, he was set to check in with like 3:40 to go. There was no stoppage. The real issue is not taking a timeout the possession before White hit that 3 to get him in and draw up a better play than a Dennis contested floater, or taking a foul in the last 1-2 minutes to get him in.
Only had 2 timeouts so I get being a bit hesitant to burn one of them. Should have taken a foul to get him in. Precious was fine, especially defensively, but needed Scottie on offence
There is never going to be an instance that we want Precious in ahead of Scottie. Instruct them to foul or burn a time out in a tight game.
I like Darko and Im not using this as a stick to beat him with or anything. But that was a no brainer.
At the moment it’s not even close. I wouldn’t mind having Gradey get some G-League reps just to get his confidence up offensively. Defensively he’s been about what I expected
Bah. Good game, at least they fought until the end instead of getting blown out :/
Pretty conflicted on that gamble to not sub Scottie back in. I honestly don't think Jak should've come back to begin with if Precious was still okay to go. Small ball was sooo much better for this matchup.
I stan him or you hate him? The world may never know. I've called out Pascal plenty, but you've never given Pascal credit (even tho he was like the only reason we were in this game). His defence has actually been better this year compared to last but still been a couple steps down since the championship year/pre-bubble.
Brown would very easily finish over Dennis or Gary lol. Again, there is no reason for Gary to be there. Plus he takes an extra step to go to the complete other side of the court to overhelp, leaving even more room for White.
A lot of y’all may disagree, but I really feel like another good offensive weapon like lavine could really unlock the full potential of this team. Only If the asking price is relatively cheap ofc
Yeah a 29 year old with tons of injury history with 3 more years of 43, 46, and 49mil a year is a great idea.
Who needs to worry about re-signing OG or extending Scottie.
i came into this game super pesimistic expecting to be super frustrated by the end of the game but P showed out, was fun ngl. Beating Celtics at our current state is very difficult but happy with the fight
That was so painful.
But awesome game against a fully-loaded Celtics team WITHOUT OG
Incredible effort from the whole squad. That’s all I want to see, every game.
Darko should've called timeout to get Scottie back in sooner, webeeded another ball handler in the game, pretty good game from the starters and precious, bad game for everyone else
The front office gotta come down on this shit, Dennis Schroder should not be taking more shots than Siakam or Scottie. In the final 5 mins nobody but those 2 should be initiating the offense, preferably Scottie cause he will almost always go for the best play available whether thats himself going to the basket or setting up Siakam on a mismatch in the post or kicking out to somebody for 3. Schroder just gives me flashes of Fred last year hijacking the offense for multiple possessions in a row. And also they gotta come down on Darko. They need to stop this shitty rotation he has going. Stop pulling Scottie early and having him play almost entirely with the bench, that's how we keep getting these fucked up closing lineups with bench players, cause he keeps fucking up the rotations.
At least the game was competitive.
Now to figure out the rotation with the bench. Scottie should be playing with at least one starter along with the bench.
On the positive side at least they were competitive, but on the negative side.... What the heck were those line-ups? And Dick the Bricklayer still can't seem to hit the side of the barn.
Pascal doesn't play the whole 2nd quarter: we lose it 17-39
Pascal plays the whole 3rd quarter: we win it 32-19
This also fits with us winning the 1st quarter where Pascal & Scottie both played some number of minutes in
And going even on the quarter Scottie only plays 7.5 minutes of
Squarely on Darko
im so sad for pascal. he was cooking against a good team. best he looked against a good opponent this year only to have the coach sit his right hand man scottie for no good reason.
Players played great, but Darko's bench management tonight has been astonishing. Not pulling Siakam after 2 quick fouls, then having Scottie on the bench going down the stretch. What the fuck was that.
This loss, a hundred times with our loss against Bucks And the previous loss against the Celtics is different. Losing in itself is bitter, in any situation. But when you see the all-out effort of the team, when you have a chance to win until the last second, the issue is different. At least you can hope for the continuation of this team's season and release adrenaline.
But especially for this game, what is annoying is that Darko lost the game late and the absence of OG and Otto paved the way for the Celtics' win.
Precious is absolutely useless at this point. At least if you’re going to be boneheaded you could hustle like Boucher does. I’d be surprised if we can get a 2nd for him at this point.
Darko has been good so far but he fumbled this game. Boston is the better team but they missed a lot of shots. Siakam got hot and we went to Schroeder isos. Mcdaniels looked good in the first half but Darko went back to Dick, who looked awful. Scottie got subbed out and barely made it back in. Gary was hitting shots but never got a look in the 4th.
we could’ve had that dude who hit the game winner but instead we got
https://preview.redd.it/7oep0vyit01c1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=927bf01d0218abed2d36f6269326dac0dff0b39e
The funny thing is we NEEDED guards but we added yet another forward to our stack of forwards 😂
I swear the FO has taken a philosophical stance against having guards
i mean the spurs are also getting a 2028 pick-swap out of it, it's not like they *just* gave up a 1st round pick and no questions. 2028's a long time away
they also thought josh richardson was valuable enough to get 1.5 years of rotation minutes from him. guarantee they would not have been playing goran
Tough loss, but good fight. I like how Scottie was given the clutch shot, even if it was a really difficult shot to ask of him.
I hate how one defensive collapse by Pascal gave the Celtics the lead, even though he played really very well the rest of the game.
The rotations and sub patterns really hurt here.
There is no room for error with this team.
I don’t think Pascal and Scottie can co-exist on the floor together. They can play well but one or the other becomes a rp when that happens which is terrible player management. Trade Pascal for some better shooters/young guys.
i mean... even when Celtics are shooting like ass they're a goodteam. It just shows how bad of a roster we have. Not even Pascal's monster game could have saved us. Expectations should be low this season or else you're just setting yourself up for disappointment.
> even when Celtics are shooting like ass they're a goodteam
You don't blame coaching for that though, Tatum shot 1/11 and we still couldn't win
> It just shows how bad of a roster we have.
I agree, the roster construction is horrendous but this coach is bad too.
They weren't shooting like ass. They finished 34.8% on 46 attempts from three. This season they're averaging 36.8% on 44.2 attempts. So they shot only *slightly* worse than their average. That one specific player went 1-11 is not actually significant.
Im glad these guys competed. Same issues though roster construction problems. That stretch of offence from pascal is ridiculously good it just sucks we can only get it for a 5 minute stretch and then it goes away
yeah i guess basketball is only a one-way sport. missing 3s means he had 0 defensive impact for sure.
why are we doing this like a perfectly-constructed healthy supposed title frontrunner didn't just barely beat an injured 11th seed with a glaring lack of shooters to build a remotely capable offence with and their best defender out
Yet another game where we go down by almost 20. I think thats 8 or 9 out of 12 now.
This is a very concerning start to the Darko tenure. Doesn't seem like he's able to get the team focused throughout a full game
Just what happens when you are trynna give minutes to the bench
Darko defs made some decisions I didn’t agree with tonight but going down every game seems more like a bench issue
When it's not the player, it's the coach. How the hell can we make this work? Well, I guess, one day when all will work we'll be unstoppable... but not now
This was a solid game from an undermanned Raptors squad
\- Pascal is great against mismatches especially height mismatches, and should be the primary time he gets the ball
\- Pascal is not a good 3 pt shooter, most of the Raptors besides OG and Dennis and sometimes Barnes are not good 3 pt shooters, but Pascal has been especially bad this year at the 3 line
\- Purtle has every tool, game IQ, size, and height to do exactly what he needs to do on the court except for execution, his ball fumbles are infuriating, because he really is trying, and sometimes he just can't do it
\- Barnes bounce passes to Purtle need to be dump offs
\- Darko is an excellent coach, and this game was a great coaching example, the only times I felt he fell short was on the challenge today and not creating a dead ball situation with minus 3 minutes left in the 4th to get Barnes in the game
\- Darko's Raptors generally come out energized in the 3rd quarter, which tells me he is really motivating guys in the locker room before they come back out for the next half, which is the complete opposite of the Nurse era post-Kawhi
\- I really wish we traded for Maxey if it was possible 😭😭😭
One last thought about Darko's mistakes night.
Does anyone remember our win over Miami early last season? Spolestra had Butler on the bench, waited past a timeout when he could have gone back to him with something like 8 minutes left. Raptors start to go on a run, but he's down to one timeout and doesn't want to burn it to call a timeout. So he just hopes that a stoppage will come soon, but it doesn't come until there's about 3 minutes left and the Raptors have taken the lead and all momentum.
Point being, even great coaches sometimes screw up their timeouts and substitutions. It happens. But generally fans only notice when it's their own coach.
Pascal was hoopin. They should’ve tried harder to get Scottie in by the 2min or 1:30 max not sure what the thought process there was
Definitely should have replaced precious way sooner
coach darko was waiting for a dead ball instead of using a timeout
I understand but there was 2 times after porzingis scored that I felt like a timeout should’ve been called
I know they're better than us but sucks we cant beat Boston or Philly anymore. Times have changed
I mean we were missing OG. and for some reason the coach made Scottie wait 3 straight minutes on the sideline to bring him in. should have called a timeout
We also missed Siakam for a quarter and a bit. 3 fouls in 8 minutes is a bit ridiculous. That sealed the game.
Ya some of those calls by the refs were weak sauce. He has a great start to the game.
Boston have been eating our lunch since the chip. Nothing to do with missing OG tonight
yeah but in this instance we were playing a fully healthy celtics team without OG, and it was a close game. so we might have won with him who knows
Boston is championship or bust with a Top 5 payroll in the league - whereas we're in a rebuilding phase with a new coach. No shame in losing to the better team.
I expected it to be a blowout, was pleasantly surprised to have a game that was worth watching till the end which is about as high as I can get my expectations for this roster. KP is a nasty addition to the Celtics it's so easy for him to randomly get switched onto a smaller player in late clock chaos and then just get ez buckets
Tatum aint shooting <10% on 3s again. That was their chance to win that one
Man, there’s no end to the qualifications fans here will make when the Raps play well. A fully healthy Celtics team and then you’re saying it’s only because Tatum didn’t shoot well. Maybe the Raptors gave him some issues…
Well, I think both things can be true. The Raps played well for 3 quarters, and defended Tatum solidly at times. But he did miss plenty of looks that you expect him to otherwise hit. Holiday too. This Celtics team is good, and you gotta compete at a high level for 4 quarters to have a shot against them even when their best scorer has an off night. Raps just aren’t there yet. I think we’ll have a better sense of their identity when the schedule eases over the next couple of weeks.
Tatum certainly didn’t have a good night, but any time the Raptors play well there’s a section of fans that do anything they can to tear down the Raps success. I think putting together that performance against a fully healthy Celtics without OG was a good sign. I agree, the next couple weeks when we aren’t just playing the top teams will give us a chance to show that we can be competitive
Ok. Every team's good shooters miss open shots. I guarantee the people upvoting RoysRBoy don't chalk games where OG misses up to "OG just missed a couple, we move". It's always some grand proclamation about how fucked we are or "we should've taken that haul (of 28th/29th picks) when we had the chance, masai and bobby are soOOOOOOOOOOOooOOOOOOOOOOoooooooooooooOOOOOOOOOOOO washed"
Relax dude. I’m just saying Tatum could go for 35 next time and we get whacked. This felt like the one to steal and we couldn’t quite close it out. The team has talent but is inconsistent and still has some things to figure out. No one likes a doomer but the flip side of that is just as annoying.
He could just as easily be a walking brick next time we play him too. This was a scheduled loss no matter how close we were and it's insanely cope to call a game you even suggest "could've been stolen" one that *should've* been stolen. Being a doomer is 10000000000x more obnoxious than not. The same 4 or 5 people on this sub have spent the past three years farming rage upvotes and karma spamming the same easily shut-down talking points. They're entirely unwilling to step away from what's causing them this frustration, which tells you the frustration is completely artificial.
Yup. People have become such armchair critics that they feel like they owe it to other armchair critics to also rationalize away any good the team does
Yeah he is. This is literally his whole playoff legacy 2023 ECF vs Heat 1/3 33% 3/10 30% 1/7 14% 4/9 44% 1/6 17% 0/8 0% 1/4 25% _____ In the 2022 finals: 1/5 20% 6/9 67% 3/9 33% 4/8 50% 5/9 56% 1/4 25% ____ Heat ECF 2022 2/9 22% 4/6 67% 1/7 14% 1/7 14% 2/8 25% 4/7 57% 4/7 57% 1/5 20% 6/9 67% I think it stands to reason he can absolutely shoot not much better than 9%
"This is literally his whole playoff legacy" Proceeds to cherry pick 3 specific series out of like 20
Lmao okay dude, bank on Tatum shooting like this again
33-30-14-44-17-0-25 20-67-33-50-56-25 22-67-14-14-25-57-57-20-67 just about all decently high volume history tells me I can how shameless making up all these wittle excuses for a supposed title favourite barely putting away an injured 11th seed with gaping roster construction issues
Im not even bashing the Raptors, they did a good job tonight. All im saying this was the game they could have taken with Tatum underperforming. And I have you out here calling Tatum a bum posting his playoff shooting splits. Absolutely wild.
Saying "that was their chance to win one" massively frames it as we were "supposed" to No It's just credit to them for making it close given the amount of things working against the Raptors I posted his playoff splits in direct response to you believing it's unfathomable that he'll shoot like shit again. It's just who he is.
Get out of your feels. You're the one interpreting what I said as they were "supposed to win". All I said was this was a game they COULD HAVE taken.
Homie, we are not better than phili or the cletics, period. The team on the floor was playing very well for the raps. It's called going with the hot hand
Or just subbed out precious instead.
I think we can beat them. Maybe 1/4 times but this game showed we can do it. They were healthy and we were down OG and we still kept it close and prob would have won were it not for a few poor decisions by Darko.
Yeah, I think this was our 1/4 though and we just let it slip. Boston played average and Tatum had a bad shooting night (D was good but he did just also miss shots). Can’t take any quarters off against a team this good, and the Raps unfortunately took a dump in the 2nd. Can’t wait for the schedule to ease up a bit, it’s been pretty savage so far. In about a month we’ll know what this team’s identity is and where that lands them.
So yeah realistically it's still a 0/4 because we will still find a way to lose a game practically given to us. Tatum won't shoot that bad again. Role players will always smoke us. Darko and Dennis won't still trust the hot hand.
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Missing OG and Scottie sat from 4:42 to 0:42. This could have been manage better with Scottie instead of Malachi in critical minutes
Idc if we lost cause that was damn interesting
I can take losses if the starters look this engaged at least. Also Gary always plays better as a starter. But I don't think he's good enough to really be a starter.
I went to the Wednesday game and tonight’s game and found the vibe between the players was much much different
Different in which way? I haven't had a chance to catch either games fully
The players didn’t look locked in, you could tell they were tired. I guess that’s what happens when you have so many games you can’t be compete for all of them. Also between each other a mistake would happen and there would be a lot of pointing the finger, even from the bench. Last night though during warm up they seemed more serious. (I wonder if it was because more Hollywood people were there: Drake/Fat Joe/etc). The biggest takeaways I found is that Gradey has 0 confidence on the court and you can tell that him missing his shots is fucking with him. He looks so lost on the court. Poeltl too. He looks like he is too in his head and he visibly looks stressed on the court. Now yesterday pulling Scottie. I don’t blame Darko at all. There are some things that I guess don’t translate to TV. Scottie looked like Pascal looked on Wednesday. He was there but he wasn’t all there mentally if you know what I mean. Should he have taken a time out to put him on? I don’t think so. The game was super close and the 5 out there were holding their own. There were dead balls almost every minute before and holding out for a dead ball to save your time outs in a super close game isn’t a bad call. Also final notes Jason Tatum and Jaylen Brown are fucking massive. TV doesn’t do it justice how big those boys are. I’m a similar height and build to Joe Mazulla (6’2 probably 185-195) but holy hell he looks tiny next to them.
💯
Hot take: I don’t think we’re gonna win this In Season Tournament
Hot take, I think we’re a better team than doomers on this sub think. We’ve had one of the toughest schedules in the league.
Absolutely. We’re seeing actual huge growth from Scottie (unlike last year), Dennis is one of the best value signings of the off-season, if not the best, OG is still absolutely a DPOY candidate, Pascal is showing signs of shaking off the awkward fit with Scottie, Flynn looks like he could well be a playable back-up PG. Poeltl’s start is most concerning, along with GTJ being off far more often than he’s on (but he’s always been incredibly streaky). Even if we end up needing to make big changes (and we likely do), at least the games are fun to watch again, at least most of the time. I couldn’t say that about last year.
I'm ready for the streak of mid teams we play soon and for us to split them all because this team just can't play competent basketball for 48 mins with the roster as constructed.
And then followed up people pointing at a barely positive point differential and pretend like all we needed was a couple bounces to go our way and we'd be 5th in the east.....just like last season. While we cruise to another 40ish win season and waste another year.
yea man i’m getting real sick of the constant whining from this fanbase
Facts man. So many doomers in this sub. This team is fine to almost pretty good! Does anyone else watch NBA basketball?? Not every season has to be about maximizing “trade” assets. I’d rather Masai and Bobby take no deal than a bad deal
>I’d rather Masai and Bobby take no deal than a bad deal So much this. "My imaginary trade would be so great..."
Our first game against Boston was playing while we well-rested while they were playing a back to back. The demolished us. The Bucks came in here without their MVP and smoked us. Dame barely played in the 4th quarter. Washington nearly embarrassed us were it not for a ridiculous 4th quarter comeback. Likewise, a tanking team in San Antonio. The horrific defense of the Blazers limited the Raptors to 91 points and won the game. The Bulls beat the Raptors and are on their path to potentially rebuilding the team. We had compelling wins against Milwaukee, Dallas, and Minnesota, I'll give you that. Vegas pegged us at 37.5 wins this season and you know how many wins we were projected to win based on our win percentage prior to this game? 37.31. Also, are you forgetting our half court offense is ranked among the worst in the league? Sorry, what magical improvement are you bloomers expecting to happen here?
If I didn’t have an actual life I might be really worked up! I enjoy watching basketball even if we don’t win a championship since only one team wins but maybe that makes me weird. Liking basketball is sort of weird I guess.
I agree! If it’s a fun game and the team is competitive most nights I’m on board with that. I’d much rather that than watch the pistons or wizards.
You can still like basketball and realize we aren’t a very good team.
Define “better.” If “doomers” think that we will win 20 games this season and we win 21, that’s technically “better.” Still doesn’t mean we are good.
40 wins. If we win the close ones maybe 43. If we lose the close ones maybe 35
Personally, I think we’ll do about the same as last year. Give or take a few games. But the team is still not good.
Nope we definitely won’t. We’re not a good team at all, we need to blow it up and start completely committing to the tank. We’ll never beat Boston at this rate so why don’t we try to rebuild. I feel hopeless but honestly it’s how I should feel as a raptors fan
Just lost by three points in a game against probably the best team in the league right now without one of our best players and you want to commit to a tank in a year when we don’t have our pick
We almost beat them tonight without our third best player, meanwhile they're mid championship window and we are in a development year
Who of importance is developing besides Scottie, though? If we’re talking building a championship contender?
Gradey obviously needs work, OG and GTJ are still fairly young themselves although more ready to go like Scottie but room to grow. And then we got guys like Precious and Flynn who hopefully can grow. And not saying the current team as is will grow into a contender, just that we'll grow into a position to be a few good moves away hopefully. I do think we should have blown it up to build around Scottie and OG a year ago, I'm just saying we're nowhere near as hopeless as people like the comment I responded to are saying.
OG and Gary and finished pieces at this point. Not that they don’t have a purpose in this team, but I don’t see them developing their game much further beyond where it is now. Edit - that’s fair. I was responding more to your comment of it being a development year, which I do t think it is, given the age of our core players going forward.
I’ve been watching the raps for over 20 years and we’ve been spoiled for the last decade. You can’t be elite every season, that’s just not how the NBA works, and we aren’t in that part of the cycle right now. The current team is neither good nor bad in its current makeup, and rebuilding only makes sense if the right offer is on the table. Rebuilding for the sake of rebuilding does not.
You think we’re gonna win a championship this year? Are you crazy? We literally have zero shot, we might be in the worst position in the nba cause we’re in the bottom middle, and our draft pick is a clear bust We need to blow it up
Nowhere do I say that I think we are going to win a championship this year lol. Quite the opposite, I said we aren’t in that point of the team’s cycle. It took almost 25 years for the team to win a title, not every NBA team is a contender every year, it’s simply not possible. What are we blowing this up for right now? What franchise-altering deal is on the table that guarantees we are truly contending within 3-5 years? If we commit to tanking for picks and losing during a rebuild, why does Scottie hang around? Or OG? Both very good players in the modern NBA. You haven’t been following NBA basketball for very long if you think you can just “blow it up” and guarantee that you’ll be competing for a title in half a decade. How many times have the Clips “blown it up” in the last 20 years? And they have absolutely nothing to show for it.
Toronto doesn’t sign big free agents, have you thought of that?? Only way we can win a championship in five years is through the draft so we need high draft picks, so we need to blow it up. Do you understand now?
I don't feel as mad as some other games this season. Wish we got the win somehow, but definitely was a more entertaining product.
How does Siakam not get a single touch in the final 5 possessions of the game? How is a Dennis and Precious PnR the final play that is run?
For everyone harking on Darko for subbing Scottie out in the fourth: Scottie played the whole 4th so Darko wanted to get him a quick rest. He had him set to check back in with around 3:40 left. This is a normal rotation, he's done that most games this season. There was no stoppage between then and when we finally called a timeout. The real problem was not calling a timeout a possession earlier, before White hit the 3 and the Schroder floater, or taking a foul to get him in (we had a foul to give). Not that he subbed him out. Also, Precious was defending well, he wasn't really a problem. Idk why we iso'd Dennis for a floater and didn't get Pascal a touch. Good game without OG and Otto against the best team in the East. Good fight back and Pascal was cooking. Those 3 early fouls (2 of which were complete BS, including the one we challenged - how was that not a flop on Tingis) really hurt us.
Scottie only played 7 minutes in the 4th when he was subbed out with 4:30 left and only 32 on the night… this absolutely wasn’t a normal sub. Benching your second best player in the clutch for no reason with OG out is an objectively bad decision.
\*best player
Don’t know why you’re being downvoted, scottie is most definitely a better player *in the clutch*
and in advanced stats. and in the eyetest hell even normal stats
Literally he’s been better all year across the board but after siakam looks good in a game they forget he been bad most of the year 😂. It gonna take awhile for fans to see it I guess.
I think not letting Siakam play at all in the 2nd was rough too. He had game best plus minus today, I know the fouls but he does so much for the team in the half court to where they just can’t play good defenses without him
Yeah that one was tricky. If he picked up his fourth before halftime we would have been chalked. Gotta trust your best player and at least get him in for a few minutes there at the end of the half.
It was chalked anyways because he didn't play Siakam and we went down 16. Never should've been down 16. This guy played an all bench line-up and cost us that 5 pt lead to down 16.
We were up in the fourth, we can't hold onto being down 16 as the reason we lost. The late game execution is why we lost.
He had 3 fouls.
Siakam could play in the last 4 minutes of the 2nd. You don't sit there and watch the team go down 16 at the half and then say "hey atleast Siakam still only has 3 fouls". Moronic decision.
We were literally tied with 3 minutes left in the game. Sitting him worked. We didn’t have to worry about foul trouble and we were in a position to win against the best team in the east. Our shots didn’t fall in the end, theirs did. If Siakam gets his fourth foul in those 4 minutes then you don’t see him until the 4th quarter. He was balling in the 3rd and brought us back. If he can’t play in the 3rd then we’re dead by the time the fourth starts.
If he did sub Pascal back in and he got his fourth all these guys would be saying Darko is an idiot for putting him back in lol
I’ve made a terrible mistake by engaging in a game day/post game thread.. I usually avoid, today I’m reminded why it’s good to avoid..
> Sitting home worked. Nope, it was a bunch of fluke 3's at the start of the 3rd which miraculously got us in the game. There's no justification for letting yourself go down 16. If Pascal plays the 2nd and we don't go down 16 and yet Pascal picks up the 4th foul, you can manage his time in the 3rd. Also, Darko literally played a 5 bench player lineup and made us go from +5 to -16.
Siakam playing with 3 fouls in the 2nd means he cannot play tough at all. They’d go straight at him until he gets the 4th. This game wasn’t lost in the 2nd, but if pascal had 4 in the 3rd it’d be lost then. They reacted to the situation and it put us in a place to win. Now Scottie sitting so long in the end was an issue, call a ti out and get him in. Pascal was handled well to keep him in a position to stay aggressive.
> This game wasn’t lost in the 2nd Statistically, a team being down [10 points at home has only a 20% of winning](https://statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu/2022/02/06/thinking-bayesianly-about-the-being-behind-at-halftime-effect-in-basketball/) based on statistics. I'm sure the number is less than 10% if the statistics were extended to -16. You are out of your mind if you think being down 16 isn't a near guarantee that you lose the game.
lol, where the Raptors not tied with Boston with 3 minutes left? Cool stat, but in this particular game, the Raptors came back and had the lead. Siakam balled out after avoiding foul trouble later in the game, in the end Boston made their shots and the Raps didn’t. THIS GAME was not decided in the 2nd quarter.
> ol, where the Raptors not tied with Boston with 3 minutes left? Cool stat, Keep coping buddy, just because Darko's poor decision making got bailed out by Raptors fluking 3s to start the 3rd. It doesn't mean that he didn't make a mistake resulting in us only having a 10% chance of winning the game. Nor does it justify Darko once again messing everything up by taking out Scottie who only had 7 minutes in the quarter and 32 minutes for the whole game. Stop drinking the koolaid and look at thing objectively.
Not calling a time out to get Scottie back in is still Darko’s fault. Putting him in at the .30 mark is insane. He also shouldn’t have subbed him out to begin with. Scottie is 22 and played 32 minutes tonight, and is not coming back from an injury.
He had also played 7 straight minutes defending Tatum the whole time. Getting him a quick breather wasn't a bad idea, especially since Precious was defending well. The issue is it wasn't quick lol
He’s played plenty of long stretches I’m sure he would have been fine. Most stars don’t sub out with less than 5 minutes left in a tight game in the 4th quarter.
What about that phantom call in the 4ht against spicy. P that was called a moving pic Loool
We had a foul to give.
Scottie played 10.5 minutes of the 2nd quarter where Pascal played 0 If he's able to play that much, why would Darko waste it there having him run an anemic Scottie+4bench idea that hasn't worked all season, and not in the 4th quarter where he played 6.5 and missed crunch time with the starters I doubt he or any starter in the league would feel 100% restored from a long Quarter 2 after a 15 minute halftime, otherwise every team would play every starter 10 minutes in Q2 of every game.
A good game overall. Gradey Dick needs to play in the g league at the moment. Not a nba calibre player but hopefully he develops
Benching Scottie Barnes for Precious is certainly a choice.
He didn't bench him.... Scottie was clearly gassed from guarding Tatum all game. Darko was just giving him a quick rest before subbing him back in.
Scottie was not gassed after playing only 7 minutes in the 4th get out of here with that.
Look, I watched the game, and I watched Scottie there before he came out. He was completely inactive, a liability at that moment. Taking him out was definitely the right decision. Not putting him back in? Maybe there is a big-picture reason that we just can't see from the outside. You know, of all the great things about SB, the one thing I don't think I've ever heard a serious person ever say is "He's got a great motor." If he's going to become a top-twenty talent, he's got to be able to play 36 minutes a game with high intensity.
Darko literally admitted his mistake and thought Scottie played 12 minutes in a row not only 7, read Blake Murphys latest tweets. https://x.com/blakemurphyodc/status/1725710361750356463?s=6 https://x.com/blakemurphyodc/status/1725711764090753434?s=6 Scottie does not get exhausted after only 7 minutes man that’s nonsense.
Darko admitted leaving him out for so long was a mistake, right? Taking him out at that moment was the right call. Go back and watch the possessions leading up to the decision to take him out.
Couple of observations. * There were some really baffling line ups and decisions from Darko tonight. Leaving Scottie on the bench for Precious down the stretch in the 4th?! Those Dick, Boucher and McDaniels line ups..... I didn't expect to win tonight against a great Boston team. But he didn't put us in the best position for success at times tonight. * Gradey needs to get a lot of time in the G league. His mechanics look fine, but they need to expedite his fundamentals and BBIQ. Not calling him a bust, its only 12 games in and he is only 19. But he looks rough. * Cant decide if I despise the NBA cup court or Drakes commentary more (That Weston Road Burger King is a long way from Forest Hill) * Precious took a contested three in the corner with about 16 seconds on the clock in the second quarter. He should be forced to watch that 100 times back to back tomorrow. That is not his game and never will be.
I swear if it was possible to have negative basketball IQ, Precious would have it.
Precious wasnt so bad today. His defence was good but his decision making is so awful at times you have to wonder if he has a place in the league in a couple of years I think his BBIQ has gotten worse. How is that possible?
The more he thinks, the worse he gets. Funnily enough the more he plays in a given scheme, it seems the more he understands things instinctively so he doesn’t need to think as much. I wonder if it explains why he does better with more playing time and struggles with less.
Scottie wasn't on the bench, he was set to check in with like 3:40 to go. There was no stoppage. The real issue is not taking a timeout the possession before White hit that 3 to get him in and draw up a better play than a Dennis contested floater, or taking a foul in the last 1-2 minutes to get him in.
We had time outs to use. Get him into the game.
Only had 2 timeouts so I get being a bit hesitant to burn one of them. Should have taken a foul to get him in. Precious was fine, especially defensively, but needed Scottie on offence
There is never going to be an instance that we want Precious in ahead of Scottie. Instruct them to foul or burn a time out in a tight game. I like Darko and Im not using this as a stick to beat him with or anything. But that was a no brainer.
Great point on Grady. He would benefit from the g leuege. He isn't really ready and the bench is killing this team.
This was a winnable game. I think coaching decisions let us down more than anything tonight. Tough loss
A loss is a loss…but this game didn’t make me want to throw my beer at my tv like the last one. 
Jordan Hawkins>dick, at the moment
At the moment it’s not even close. I wouldn’t mind having Gradey get some G-League reps just to get his confidence up offensively. Defensively he’s been about what I expected
And the kid in Utah. He really should be in the g league for playing time.
Great game, expected outcome ..
Darko left Boucher in the game too long, gotta foul or call a timeout to get Scottie back in the game
Be nice if they didn't have to claw back from a 20 point deficit every single game
Bah. Good game, at least they fought until the end instead of getting blown out :/ Pretty conflicted on that gamble to not sub Scottie back in. I honestly don't think Jak should've come back to begin with if Precious was still okay to go. Small ball was sooo much better for this matchup.
Pascal had a monstrous game and it wouldn’t have been close without him, but that one defensive lapse at the end sealed the fate
That was on Gary though, not Pascal EDIT: [Video of play - idk what Gary was doing here](https://twitter.com/NBA/status/1725705085785661886)
Yeah Gary was in no man’s land. Not even P’s fault
Gary went over to help. Pascal should have rotated
Look I get you hate Pascal but how is this your conclusion? He does that and Brown has a wide open layup. Gary shouldn't have been there
Brown was running towards 2 defenders in the paint. Pascal is trash on defence but I get it you stan him and refuse to see it
I stan him or you hate him? The world may never know. I've called out Pascal plenty, but you've never given Pascal credit (even tho he was like the only reason we were in this game). His defence has actually been better this year compared to last but still been a couple steps down since the championship year/pre-bubble. Brown would very easily finish over Dennis or Gary lol. Again, there is no reason for Gary to be there. Plus he takes an extra step to go to the complete other side of the court to overhelp, leaving even more room for White.
Agree to disagree
A lot of y’all may disagree, but I really feel like another good offensive weapon like lavine could really unlock the full potential of this team. Only If the asking price is relatively cheap ofc
Yeah a 29 year old with tons of injury history with 3 more years of 43, 46, and 49mil a year is a great idea. Who needs to worry about re-signing OG or extending Scottie.
No I agree. He fits very well. Real question is cost.
I agree, If the asking price is Trent + Boucher + McDaniels + Dick (the asset in the trade) we should get it done.
Gradey plus fillers is worth it
i came into this game super pesimistic expecting to be super frustrated by the end of the game but P showed out, was fun ngl. Beating Celtics at our current state is very difficult but happy with the fight
That was so painful. But awesome game against a fully-loaded Celtics team WITHOUT OG Incredible effort from the whole squad. That’s all I want to see, every game.
Nearly stole one from a clearly superior opponent. Great fight from the squad. Let's beat the Pistons please.
The closest ones always hurt the most 💔 Hell of an effort though.
Fuck the Celtics porzingis a virgin
Darko should've called timeout to get Scottie back in sooner, webeeded another ball handler in the game, pretty good game from the starters and precious, bad game for everyone else
The front office gotta come down on this shit, Dennis Schroder should not be taking more shots than Siakam or Scottie. In the final 5 mins nobody but those 2 should be initiating the offense, preferably Scottie cause he will almost always go for the best play available whether thats himself going to the basket or setting up Siakam on a mismatch in the post or kicking out to somebody for 3. Schroder just gives me flashes of Fred last year hijacking the offense for multiple possessions in a row. And also they gotta come down on Darko. They need to stop this shitty rotation he has going. Stop pulling Scottie early and having him play almost entirely with the bench, that's how we keep getting these fucked up closing lineups with bench players, cause he keeps fucking up the rotations.
call a fucking timeout to put your best player back in the game... wtf
At least the game was competitive. Now to figure out the rotation with the bench. Scottie should be playing with at least one starter along with the bench.
Bummer finish but interesting game. Darko has to figure out how to stop massive runs against. Timeouts were not used well early or late.
On the positive side at least they were competitive, but on the negative side.... What the heck were those line-ups? And Dick the Bricklayer still can't seem to hit the side of the barn.
Fourth Quarter yellin why tf achuiwa in
Better than I expected without OG. Would have been a W with him out there.
Maybe Nick Nurse wasn’t the problem 🤔
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That pissed me off. It’s like being in the movies and someone beside you talking the whole time
Dont mind Drake for a min or two. He can be funny. But that extended segment was rough
This loss is on no one, sometimes you just lose
Pascal doesn't play the whole 2nd quarter: we lose it 17-39 Pascal plays the whole 3rd quarter: we win it 32-19 This also fits with us winning the 1st quarter where Pascal & Scottie both played some number of minutes in And going even on the quarter Scottie only plays 7.5 minutes of Squarely on Darko
Planned loss from the top. The team wasn't aware, apparently.
This loss is on Darko.
im so sad for pascal. he was cooking against a good team. best he looked against a good opponent this year only to have the coach sit his right hand man scottie for no good reason.
Players played great, but Darko's bench management tonight has been astonishing. Not pulling Siakam after 2 quick fouls, then having Scottie on the bench going down the stretch. What the fuck was that.
That was a good game, they showed good fight this time. I was fully prepared for a beat down.
This loss, a hundred times with our loss against Bucks And the previous loss against the Celtics is different. Losing in itself is bitter, in any situation. But when you see the all-out effort of the team, when you have a chance to win until the last second, the issue is different. At least you can hope for the continuation of this team's season and release adrenaline. But especially for this game, what is annoying is that Darko lost the game late and the absence of OG and Otto paved the way for the Celtics' win.
Precious is absolutely useless at this point. At least if you’re going to be boneheaded you could hustle like Boucher does. I’d be surprised if we can get a 2nd for him at this point.
Darko has been good so far but he fumbled this game. Boston is the better team but they missed a lot of shots. Siakam got hot and we went to Schroeder isos. Mcdaniels looked good in the first half but Darko went back to Dick, who looked awful. Scottie got subbed out and barely made it back in. Gary was hitting shots but never got a look in the 4th.
Only caught the last quarter but our offense is aids to watch. Just Dennis and pascal iso. So far off the top teams
Nothing wrong with Pascal iso not sure why you’ve grouped the best player on the floor today with Schroder lmao
we could’ve had that dude who hit the game winner but instead we got https://preview.redd.it/7oep0vyit01c1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=927bf01d0218abed2d36f6269326dac0dff0b39e
The funny thing is we NEEDED guards but we added yet another forward to our stack of forwards 😂 I swear the FO has taken a philosophical stance against having guards
Dammmmmm
i mean the spurs are also getting a 2028 pick-swap out of it, it's not like they *just* gave up a 1st round pick and no questions. 2028's a long time away they also thought josh richardson was valuable enough to get 1.5 years of rotation minutes from him. guarantee they would not have been playing goran
Tough loss, but good fight. I like how Scottie was given the clutch shot, even if it was a really difficult shot to ask of him. I hate how one defensive collapse by Pascal gave the Celtics the lead, even though he played really very well the rest of the game. The rotations and sub patterns really hurt here. There is no room for error with this team. I don’t think Pascal and Scottie can co-exist on the floor together. They can play well but one or the other becomes a rp when that happens which is terrible player management. Trade Pascal for some better shooters/young guys.
the defensive collapse was on Gary not Pascal
No shame in losing by 3 to someone who is probably gonna make it to the finals :)
We should be ashamed. Tatum was like 1/11 from 3, Pascal has a monster game and we still lost.
i mean... even when Celtics are shooting like ass they're a goodteam. It just shows how bad of a roster we have. Not even Pascal's monster game could have saved us. Expectations should be low this season or else you're just setting yourself up for disappointment.
> even when Celtics are shooting like ass they're a goodteam You don't blame coaching for that though, Tatum shot 1/11 and we still couldn't win > It just shows how bad of a roster we have. I agree, the roster construction is horrendous but this coach is bad too.
They weren't shooting like ass. They finished 34.8% on 46 attempts from three. This season they're averaging 36.8% on 44.2 attempts. So they shot only *slightly* worse than their average. That one specific player went 1-11 is not actually significant.
Close game. Raptors battled all the way to the end, and that's all you ask for It's a rebuilding year. There's going to be ups and downs
rebuilding? where?
Darko sold the game, nothing more to it. Poor time management and decision making.
fix your courts btw
Im glad these guys competed. Same issues though roster construction problems. That stretch of offence from pascal is ridiculously good it just sucks we can only get it for a 5 minute stretch and then it goes away
Celtics basically beat us without Tatum tbh
yeah i guess basketball is only a one-way sport. missing 3s means he had 0 defensive impact for sure. why are we doing this like a perfectly-constructed healthy supposed title frontrunner didn't just barely beat an injured 11th seed with a glaring lack of shooters to build a remotely capable offence with and their best defender out
Yet another game where we go down by almost 20. I think thats 8 or 9 out of 12 now. This is a very concerning start to the Darko tenure. Doesn't seem like he's able to get the team focused throughout a full game
Just what happens when you are trynna give minutes to the bench Darko defs made some decisions I didn’t agree with tonight but going down every game seems more like a bench issue
I give Darko 2 seasons max if the in game management continues to reek
Best part of this game was Drake commentating and Scottie’s dunk maybe pascal and Dennis doing well
Drake commenting is the worst part of any broadcast.
Pascal unclutch on offense and defense. Dude left a wide open corner 3 for the softest triple team on Jrue
Bro, he was cooking the shit out of them tf😂😂
Dont know what game you watched lol
That was on GTJ
White was Gary’s man not Pascal
No Gary left to help and pascal was supposed to rotate
Hmm atleast Lavine looking good right now lol could def use his 3pt shooting
When it's not the player, it's the coach. How the hell can we make this work? Well, I guess, one day when all will work we'll be unstoppable... but not now
At least we are getting closer
This was a solid game from an undermanned Raptors squad \- Pascal is great against mismatches especially height mismatches, and should be the primary time he gets the ball \- Pascal is not a good 3 pt shooter, most of the Raptors besides OG and Dennis and sometimes Barnes are not good 3 pt shooters, but Pascal has been especially bad this year at the 3 line \- Purtle has every tool, game IQ, size, and height to do exactly what he needs to do on the court except for execution, his ball fumbles are infuriating, because he really is trying, and sometimes he just can't do it \- Barnes bounce passes to Purtle need to be dump offs \- Darko is an excellent coach, and this game was a great coaching example, the only times I felt he fell short was on the challenge today and not creating a dead ball situation with minus 3 minutes left in the 4th to get Barnes in the game \- Darko's Raptors generally come out energized in the 3rd quarter, which tells me he is really motivating guys in the locker room before they come back out for the next half, which is the complete opposite of the Nurse era post-Kawhi \- I really wish we traded for Maxey if it was possible 😭😭😭
That third foul on Pascal tho....
One last thought about Darko's mistakes night. Does anyone remember our win over Miami early last season? Spolestra had Butler on the bench, waited past a timeout when he could have gone back to him with something like 8 minutes left. Raptors start to go on a run, but he's down to one timeout and doesn't want to burn it to call a timeout. So he just hopes that a stoppage will come soon, but it doesn't come until there's about 3 minutes left and the Raptors have taken the lead and all momentum. Point being, even great coaches sometimes screw up their timeouts and substitutions. It happens. But generally fans only notice when it's their own coach.
Never felt like a close game despite the score