Raptors Report: Summer League Roster, Scouting the Rookies & More!

Raptors Report: Summer League Roster, Scouting the Rookies & More!

[Music] It don’t matter. Feel [Music] [Music] nobody know. Woo. [Music] coming by. Here we go. Heat. Heat. [Music] coming to the line. Nobody. Hey [Music] [Applause] Hello everybody. Welcome to the Raptors Report podcast. I am here joined today as always with my co-host Steve. Welcome Steve. Thank you Julian. Yep. I believe this is the third podcast. So, we are, you know, just hitting our groove, getting uh oriented to the whole streaming lifestyle. Uh I like it. I don’t know about you. What do you think? I do. It’s Yeah. Okay. Well, we have a very cool program for everybody today. Uh, as it says in the title, you are looking forward to us speaking about the Toronto Raptors and their summer league team. And boy, they have a really exciting summer league team this year. Um, they have a lot of really uh fresh faces, but at the same time, some guys that uh you’ve probably heard of. A lot of really uh this is a stack team. Let me just put it that way. Uh this is probably the best summer league team that the Raptors have fielded in my memory. Like I can’t really recall uh a team that has looked this filled with NBA level talent. And uh we are going to go through the summer league roster, who’s on it, uh who you should look out for. Uh we’re going to be looking at the schedule. Then we’re going to be doing a little bit of scouting. Uh Steve and I have put together a little bit of a package talking about the two rookies that the Toronto Raptors drafted uh in June and I am excited to do that Steve. Uh how about you? You excited to put together this? Yeah, I mean probably for the next few months uh it’s just thinking about the rookies and thinking about the upside and thinking about the uh the outcome. It’s a very exciting time to be Raptors fan. You know, a lot of people are hoping for maybe a lower pick, but um personally, I’m very excited with who we end up with. Um the Elijah Martin pick. At first, I was a little hesitant, but digging into some film, I got a lot more pumped, so I’m sure what you’ve got on him will get more people uh pretty excited. So, I’m pretty excited to go through it. Yeah. Um always rookies, whenever you have something new, uh it’s exciting. That is something that I’m sure a lot of people are tuned in for. Very excited to watch these guys in their first, it may not be a real Raptors game, but I always watch the summer league and even though it’s not the highest level of competition and the plays aren’t developed and there’s a lot of guys who are sort of on the bubble that are jacking up shots trying to make a name for themselves, get picked up by an NBA roster. That’s not going to be a problem this time around because the guys who are going to be jacking up shots are guys who are with the Toronto Raptors who are on the team already. Of course, there’s some other guys uh notably some GLeague uh NBA Raptors 905 players are going to be playing with them, but a lot of Toronto Raptors and guys who should be playing for the big club. So, that should be exciting. And after that, uh, we’ve got a couple of things that are on the docket and should be exciting, uh, for you guys, uh, the Raptors related content. So, stick around for that. We will get started by discussing the summer league roster. So, why don’t we take a quick look at the Toronto Raptors uh, summer league roster really quickly. We will take a look at some of the names that are on the roster and uh the first three Jame Battle, Colin Castleton, and Olrich Shamsh are on the summer league team. What do you think about those first three? Probably the most exciting name for me there is Shamsh. Um I’m excited to see what he looks like coming back from I believe it was an MCL tear that he had that kind of derailed uh the end of his season there. So that right away stands out to me. Um Colin Castleton is uh he’s been in the league for a little bit, but he’s one of those players that uh I get on and support. Um he’s one of my gimmick players, so it’s nice to see him at least. Uh I don’t think now that we have a guy like Mamu that Colin will make the ultimate roster, but uh that’s always a fun name there. And um Jameson Battle, this is how he got his start. Yeah, exactly. He he came in with like I don’t think he had any kind of guarantees and uh he was more than just a guy who hit threes. He he really used his 66 like 230 frame um did a whole lot more than just uh being that corner boy. Yep. That’s right. And um as I mentioned, like if you watched last season, uh the summer league, the Jameson battle minutes, he was the guy who came in and just bang shots. And he made enough of them where it was just impossible to ignore. And he did the same in for the big club. Every time he came on the floor, you know, he was good for probably one or two threes. And of course, um you know, shooting is an extremely valuable skill in the NBA. Um, next up we’ll talk about some of the other guys who are on this list. Um, uh, Chucky Hepburn, Quincy Gerrier, uh, Jerkeel Joiner, uh, well, Chucky Heburn, Raptors 905, uh, Tyson, uh, Dejan Hart, excuse me if I’m mispronouncing some of the names. Uh, he’s a he was a senior. He’s a shooter. I’ve done just bare bones, uh, research on some of these players. Uh, of course AJ Lawson, we know AJ Lawson. He along with Colin Castleton got those uh partially guaranteed deals, the training camp deals for next season. So, he he actually did a good job. He kind of outdled his um who was the other guy who he was battling with? Uh um sorry to put you on the spot. I’m just so names. Yeah, I know. The name just slipped me too. Um, but yeah, they just they just cut him as well. Um, Happy Trails. Unfortunately, we can’t recall your David. I really liked him though. Like he had he had a small uh small opportunity with the Hornets and he um he was good in his minutes, but like on on the injured roster like he he he doesn’t I don’t know right now project to be more for this team that a team that’s trying to compete at this point. Absolutely. Uh, and back to the list, we’ve got Jonathan Mo. Uh, Colin Bur Boils, uh, you’re going to be doing a piece on him. Uh, Clifford Amur, uh, Amorei. Amarui, a five-year college player. Uh, Jamal Shed, of course, uh, we’re very well acquainted with Jamal Shed. He was probably the feel-good story of the Toronto Raptors. uh he played very well for the Toronto Raptors off of the bench. He will probably be, you know, the backup point guard come uh September. So, he’s pretty exciting. And uh then obviously rounding out the list, uh we have Jacobe Walter. Jacobe Walter uh was last year’s uh draft pick in the first round. pretty excited to have him be able to uh go out there and have a second summer league. Uh he did have a good summer league last year. Um he didn’t play all the games, but he looked uh he looked good, and I expect him to look even better this year with uh you know, he’s probably worked on his body, worked on his game. He’s going to come back and show us what he’s got. So yeah, I’m I’m hoping he’s one of the guys who you play one game and you say, “Okay, you’re too good for summer league. Take a seat.” I’m hoping that’s the level he’s at. Right. Yeah. And um a lot of secondyear guys are are kind of like that. Guys who don’t really have to prove that they belong. Uh guys who are assigned to guaranteed deals. Uh he was drafted in the first round. So he has that um rookie scale contract where he is signed for a number of years uh to a guaranteed money and so he doesn’t really have to go out and prove it. But of course if it’s your second year in the league and you’re not maybe a rotation player yet. He was kind of on the bubble last season. It’s always good to go out there and show that that you have you’ve you’ve got the goods and play against a lesser competition. really highlight what you bring to the game. So that is which I do think is maybe even the situation for Jonathan Mobile coming into this summer league. I think he’s a little bit on the bubble with the addition of CNB in terms of his minute. So I think that summer league will be pretty important for him to come in and show what he’s been working on this summer. Has he continued progressing with the shot? Has he is his processing continued? Um because he’s already like 23 years old. So, you’re hoping that he’s showing um I mean, he’s he might even be 24 at this point, but you’re hoping that he’s he’s showing that progress. So, hopefully this summer league is a good chance for him to to put it out there and really say, “Okay, I I I deserve my spot on this roster.” Yeah. And uh thank you to ranked scrub uh in the chat. Uh Jared Rhoden. Jared is the name of the player. Yeah, that’s that’s good. Um we’re we’re experts. Yeah, believe us. Um, and so that’s that’s sort of the uh bird’s eye view of the summer league roster. And let’s just say that this is uh this is looking very good. Um, I’m very happy with um who the Toronto Raptors have going out there cuz if you’ve watched the summer league in the past, I remember not last season, which was okay. Uh, there was Grady Dick and of course uh Jameson Battle and a couple of other players. Jameson Battle of course was not known at that point but he kind of showed out and and uh he he was picked up and Jamal shed the year before that was really kind of a wasteland in terms of uh NBA caliber talent when it comes to the summer league. It was really only Grady Dick and a bunch of uh Joe Whis camp was on the team. There were a couple of guys uh but really it was not a lot of NBA level talent. So, you kind of had to squint your eyes and hope that maybe one of those guys were going to pop off and could join the big club. And they didn’t do very well either. No surprise. Yeah. We had we had Maris Noel as well, right? Five 5 foot n or whatever. He 5 5’8. Yeah. And and he was exciting, but it wasn’t wasn’t exactly winning basketball. No. And he famously said he wanted to be the greatest Raptor of all time, which I love the confidence. I love it. He’s I I saw him on somebody else’s summer league roster, so he’s getting another shot. That’s cool to see. Um Yeah. Well, you know, good for him. Uh wish him the best. Uh we are going to be moving on now to the teams that the Toronto Raptors are going to be playing against in uh the summer league. Uh so obviously the Toronto Raptors released their summer league schedule and uh we’ll just take a quick look at it. The first game that they play is against the uh Chicago Bulls uh July 11th. And I think that that will be the most exciting game uh that they’ll play because the Bulls have a couple of guys that I I’m interested in watching. A and B uh I really like. So, uh the first guy is uh uh Bzelis. Um he was on their big team last season. Uh he’s obviously just a really uh exciting young player, really good dunker. He showed he’s got a bit more game uh than you would expect. And then Noah Essen, uh the player that they drafted in the first round this year, and I was pretty high on him as well uh in this year’s draft. Do you like those guys? Yeah, I I love Mattis. Um I I like kind of um he has this kind of give a [ __ ] about him like he he really wants to prove something, right? And um like I I can’t remember what it was. It was he was doing workouts and he had um like his competition up on the wall on a video screen that he was kind of going against. Like he really has he tries to pull this drive to be better than the other people around him. And he seems like to me he’s their the guy that they’re building around. And that’ll become a lot more clear this year once they kind of weed out the other people and they resolve the Josh Giddy situation. I think Mattis is their piece that they’re going to try to build around. I think that’d be the right thing to do. Um and yeah, pre-draft I was really high on Noah Sang kind of followed him for like a year or so. Um I like the length. I like the the two-way potential with him. Um it should be interesting to see how how close he is because kind of the book on him is he’s a lot of potential and we’ll see how close he is if he’s you know a year or two away or if he is going to be getting some minutes. I mean that’ll kind of tell you where the Bulls direction is. A lot of people wonder what the Bulls if they’re going to shoot for another play in. Right. Um so it’ll be interesting to see. Um, and uh, I think, yeah, the first game of the summer league is usually the most exciting because that’s when everybody plays before guys start dropping off, right? That’s true. Uh, now, uh, next up is, uh, the, um, the Orlando Magic. Uh, the Orlando Magic drafted a guy that I liked before the measurements were released and it turned out that he was a lot smaller. Uh, Jace Richardson. I think that he was a a savvy pickup by their front office. Uh later in the first round, he was picked up in the 20s uh when their pick rolled around. And he’s an exciting player. He can shoot. He can handle the ball. He can make plays. Uh he’s good defensively. I like his game. And obviously, I mean, nightmares from last season. uh Tristan Dilva who absolutely bushwacked the Toronto Raptors in that first game that they played against the Orlando Magic when they were like super injured but they beat the Raptors anyway. So he is going to be uh the other guy to watch for in that game. That should be pretty interesting. Do you like Jace Richardson? I I really do. And especially for the Magic they got rid of Cole Anthony. They brought in Jace. it it makes them not try to force Anthony Black as a backup point guard and they can continue trying to test him as like a ball handling wing whereas it was looking like if they move on from Cole who’s their backup point guard Anthony Black who’s not exactly ready for that. So Jace knows how to play he’s he’s going to like I thought that the height thing doesn’t really matter for the Magic who have a lot of size already. they’re going to be able to put him in a back court with uh Anthony Black who is like 67. So, I think that that’s a savvy pickup for them. And then they also got that other that other French player as their second round pick. Um, of course, the name is slipping my mind, but I I liked what they did in the draft and and that should be pretty exciting. Tristan Dilva is an older player. He’s already 23, 24, but um he’s like kind of like a mini fron for them. Yeah, he’s like break in case of emergency France Vagner. Yeah, exactly. Which is a nice thing to have, right? We just get another and and he was picked one pick before Jacobe. I think that at the time um the Raptors had had him in for a workout or two. I thought there was a potential that they would select him. I’m happy with the Jacobe pick obviously, but uh I think it’s interesting how close that was to potentially being one of our guys. Yeah, it’s true. Uh, next up, we’re not going to go too too ind depth because the next two teams are probably the ones that are, you know, the the least interesting in terms of from a talent standpoint. So, uh, the penultimate game, uh, July 15th against the Denver Nuggets and, uh, the the only real kind of interesting name is, uh, Don Holmes, uh, Deron Holmes II. Uh, of course, he missed his first season uh with an injury and he will be uh playing in this year’s summer league. He he injured himself in last year’s summer league if I’m not mistaken. So, this uh I I liked him uh in the draft. Uh the last time that that uh it was two drafts ago, I was hoping that he would fall to the Raptors and he did not. Uh so, it’ll be interesting to see um you know how he fares. And then the Golden State Warriors, uh, they really didn’t have, uh, many picks and, uh, the only guy that really I saw on their summer league roster, Alex Tui, uh, he’s, I don’t know, their second round pick. He’s from Australia. So, yeah, that’s really front-loaded here. The the Bulls and then the Magic. Those should be fun to watch. And, of course, all the games are going to be worth watching because I think that the rookies are going to get a ton of run. Should be fun to watch. And uh yeah, that’s pretty much the summer league. Uh anything else you want to add there before we move to our next section. Um no, nothing more with that. All right. Well, this is the next section is the interesting one because we’ve done some uh some scouting here. Uh you’re going to be able to take a look at um what um Steve and I have uh put together. Uh just a quick quick and dirty uh scouting report on the two rookies for the Toronto Raptors. That’s right. Uh Colin Murray Boils and Elijah Martin. So Steve will be leading off. Why don’t you uh take it away? We can talk about Colin Murray Boils. Yeah. So um Conor Murray Boils was a a four-star recruit, not a fivestar. Was a bit interesting. um he had a couple offerings and uh ultim went to South Carolina which was him staying home. Um so I think that kind of speaks a bit to his character. I saw recently his brother interviewed somebody that he cited as being the reason that he is where he is. He put the basketball on his hand. Um I think the Raptors have really been going for character with a lot of their draft picks and I think that it really seems like Conor Murray Boils is another stab at that. Um, I went through and I found a couple uh what I would consider interesting stats from his last season. He was uh first in the SEC in field goal percent. Uh he’s notably a fantastic rim finisher. A lot of people are concerned about his 667 frame. He doesn’t really seem to have any kind of issue with getting to the net and finishing. Uh he was third in rebounds in the SEC. Again, very impressive when he’s playing as a small ball five. He was six in free throw attempts, like total free throw attempts. Um, that’s another thing about him is he really drives and he is happy to finish through contact. He’s good at driving, uh, good at drawing fouls. Uh, he was seventh in defense at Bucks plus minus. Probably one of the bigger upside swings about Conor Murray Boils is his defense. Um, he’s he’s a tough defender with really strong hands. In one of the clips, we’ll show just kind of um how he can can really pretty much emasculate the guy that he’s defending. It’s pretty impressive. I like that. And yeah, I because he’s he’s a he’s 67 240. He’s very stocky for the height that he is and he’s very strong. It’s a it’s a very it’s impressive how like his athleticism is not exactly a um explosive burst athleticism, but he is very coordinated. I’ve noticed his footwork is pretty impressive, especially for his 240 pound frame. So really, he becomes kind of like a a bull in a Chinese shop bowling ball coming through the lane where it’s it’s not like Scotty how he’s kind of like frog hopping into the lane. He’s kind of just weaving through and taking every bump that he can on the way to the net. Um it’s pretty impressive when he’s consistently matched up against a guy he’s giving up four or five inches to. And uh one stat that I find interesting because I I like to do these kind of player comparisons with um with some highlevel players here. So when you look at um his 4.7% block rate and his 2.9 steel rate, you can compare that to number one overall pick Cooper Flag who had a 4.9 block rate and a 2.8 steel rate. almost identical on the counting stats there except Conor Murray Boles played for a team that had much less defensive isol or insulation than Cooper did because he didn’t have a big like common malawatch with him. So I think it’s pretty impressive that he had those kind of numbers compared to a guy like Cooper who is being heralded as this amazing two-way star. I think that really highlights CMBB’s uh two-way potential, which is what the Raptors seem to be shooting for. Now, that’s a really good breakdown. Um maybe I can just talk with you a little bit about kind of the the processing and the feel for the game on both ends. And as you were talking about um with his ability to handle the ball and get to the rim, can you tell me like a little bit about like what like jumped out at you? What was his process like? Why was he able to score so effectively uh at the rim in college? Yeah. So, um I think it really comes down to uh his strength on the ball. He’s very confident with his dribble. Um he’s able to keep a good low dribble and he’s able to kind of fend off dig downs that happen to him. He’s not afraid to face up dribble the second he gets inside the ark and he has really like a lot of sauce getting around the rim. Like if you’re familiar with how Grady Dick is very um he can kind of loop the ball up around comfortably everything. He does that but in a much bigger frame while getting hacked. So I think he he really has the like clear intention. He’s very intentional when he’s driving to the net and he’s um some players have it where they kind of seem to look past their defender where it’s like you’re not bothering me. And that’s pretty much how he is the second he decides to grab and go. Something I found pretty impressive. And I have I’ve pulled some clips on it. I don’t know if you want to. Yeah, I just showed I I showed the first one where I think it’s uh went very nicely with what you were saying where it was just that uh clip of him uh driving the ball. He caught it on at the three-point line and then just kind of very deafly kind of dribbled the ball into the lane and went around his man and scored. So, yeah, why don’t you break it down for us uh this uh this little clip here? Yeah, that’s that’s what I found. um that probably it’s not the majority of his offense. The majority of offense does come in the post and it does come uh in the low block area, but something like he kind of has a knack for is this grab and go gap punching from the outside, which is not common for a center to do, but because he’s a he’s playing as a 67 center, he’s very mobile and he can he can grab and he’s he’s able to just bob and weave all the way to the net. um and and ready to finish over whatever contact comes. Yeah, it’s just uh it seems like what you were saying with the coordination was just like that that pops to me right there in that first clip where he’s handling the ball. uh he kind of bumps off of his man, rolls off of his man, and then just kind of glides to the rim, and then has to change his uh has to change the shot. like he has to go up and under, which um th those are a bunch of very difficult skills chained together in a way that gives me an idea of what he could do at the next level where it’s not going to be number like he’s not maybe the number one option on the floor where you just give it to him and say, “Okay, cook.” But let’s say on a not maybe not a broken play, but maybe off of just a a quick swing and his man’s out of position, he’s going to the rim and he’s beating the help defense. That’s a that’s big time. That is something that any team could use, especially from a forward slash big. Yeah. If you think if you think about how RJ Barrett carves out some of his offense, it’s it’s kind of like a late in the clock. Okay. you can toss it to him and he’s going to be able to punch it in. Except now imagine RJ with like elite finishing, which is something that R.J. struggles with. So now you’ve got this kind of like you don’t have to drop a play for him. He can just grab, go, punch it in. at the NBA level, you probably won’t have so many people biting on it and they will probably wall up sooner, but that’s um that is later when you have to talk about his his shot developing to be able to convince them that that first jab is actually potentially a shot. Yep, that’s true. Okay, so set up this second clip here if you if you can recall it. Um all so second clip I believe is kind of another example of his uh his grab and go here. I believe he was just passed here and this is him against the player of the year Jana Broom. And if you see how he immediately gets into his face up dribble. He is going against one of the best players in the country and he’s not he’s not going into a back down in the post. He’s confident with his dribble. He’s confident to get him shifting one way, left, right, and he gets a little internal spin. Beautiful off the glass finish like it’s nothing. It’s It’s smooth. His footwork is beautiful. It’s It’s confident. It’s like it it it it really I think will translate. Obviously, he’ll have a tougher time with with some bigger bigs, but he I think he reads the game well. And in the next clip, you can kind of see how he has a different approach when the big is a bit of a different player, right? Cuz Janai uh is a little on the small side. That was kind of the criticism of him as a prospect at the NBA level. And I find it interesting like his shot was a bit bothered uh in that clip where uh Janai kind of uh moved his feet and stayed with him and he went for the hook shot off glass into the net. And um obviously I I think the degree of difficulty is he’s not going to make that shot as often as maybe in the first clip where it’s like he he just clearly just gets past everybody and gets it to lay it up off glass. So that’s a bit higher degree of difficulty. He’s not going to make that every time. But maybe you can touch on just his touch because I think that that is another kind of magical sort of element to his game that makes him pop as a as a prospect. Yeah, he had he had some of the best finishing numbers in the the country. And it’s it’s very impressive considering how strong he’s going up to have a really soft touch up there. And you can see how he’s he’s very comfortable changing direction of it once he’s already off the floor. This is something that a lot of players struggle with. And it it’s like he makes it look like it’s it’s easy for him. It’s It’s probably one of the most impressive parts of his game and something that will translate I think when he’s able to drive against players his size. He’ll probably like I mean it’ll be a lot tougher to do that against a a Zubot or a Go Bear, but that’s tough for everybody. But yeah, he’s he he really very surprisingly has a a butter soft touch. Um yeah, and if you I don’t know if you want to pull that next clip there. Yeah. Yeah, let me just quickly cut to that and then we can take a look at that. the uh the next clip here where you’re talking about against a larger defender. Yeah, this post. Yeah, this is he’s in the post here and he’s against a I think he’s 7 foot2 7 foot3 Zavanameir Visich, one of the Visich twins. So, this is a just a massive guy known for shot blocking. um probably going to contest the shot. And uh you kind of see him size him up and he makes the right decision here where he says, “Okay, I get another dribble.” He after he avoids the swipe, he says, “Okay, I get maybe one dribble.” And you take a step back and he hits a nice little uh jumper over him. The mid-range is not where he’s going to get a majority of his offense. And this this clip is not necessarily to say, “Oh, you can hit a jumper.” I mean, it’s nice to see, but like the the three-level scoring is is not something that will happen immediately. Hopefully, it’s something that he can work on and continue to build, but um I think it’s just interesting his his decision making there is not to drive into the the massive player. It’s to just make him drop a little bit and hit the shot over him. Yep. That’s uh the process is good. Um, I mean that’s every time you watch a a player uh at that size, like a 7 foot2 player, you want them to be concerned about protecting the basket on a blowby because, you know, if you’re that big, usually slower foot speed, so there’s going to be a gap. And of course, um, CMB not an amazing three-point shooter, but as that clip showed, uh, he has that little mid-range, uh, Jimmy. And if that’s the way that you can exploit space that’s being given to you, then that’s uh you know that’s a good sign, that’s a good uh process. So why don’t you set up uh the next clip here? Yeah. So the the next clip I think this is just the him hitting a three. It’s just to calm the people who think he can’t hit threes. Obviously when you pull a make it’s going to look better, but really the the shot to me it’s it’s not broken. It’s you see he can his base is a a little bit awkward but he doesn’t have a hitch in it. I think as as he’s mentioned he’s not he knows about it that he has to improve his shooting. It’s something that he’s not afraid of and something that he’s been working on all summer. Um so and that’s the kind of the secret to him hitting a bigger upside is is can he step out? Can he hit some threes? Um, and this clip shows that he’s uh willing to and like he gets a good amount of space because they know he’s not a shooter. Yeah. Any kind There was no hesitation there. That was just kind of he pulled the trigger. Yeah. Exactly. And that’s what a lot of his threes look like when you go to the tape is is he’s not um he’s not mentally hesitating or anything. He’s just putting it up and it rattles in. You know, it’s a make. If you look at a player like Jonathan Mobile who hit zero threes in his in his last year at college and then he came in and he shot maybe like 30 whatever percent or maybe 28% not super high but he started making threes. I think that the the Raptors obviously are known as a bit of a development um organization and I think that there’s a lot of leeway and and runway for him rather um to continue to build his shot out. So, it’s something that I I think in a couple years like I realistically he only has to be a 33 35% shooter to get people to respect it more to be able to help him with those the way those first couple clips were with those punching of the gaps or attacking a close out is if they really believe he gets to these bangies pulling that trigger. That’s what unlocked Scotty Barnes’s game. Not this past season, but the year before when he started to hit a couple, they said, “Okay, we actually can’t stand 10 feet back of this guy now. we actually have to play up. So hopefully that’s something he keeps working on and uh adds to his game and it’s kind of paying dividends for a guy who’s no longer with the team. I know I talked about him maybe a little too much, the former Raptor Pascal Seakum, they had him on a very uh threeheavy shot diet in his first season cuz they were trying to figure out what they had with him and uh at that point it was just kind of like he has to play off the ball somewhere. So, put him in the corner, get him to shoot a whole bunch of threes. And he did not hit many threes. And it’s taken him since like what what is it? Year 10 or something like that. Year nine or something like that. And now he’s finally like a 40ish% three-point shooter. So, you know, hopefully it’s not that long if he’s uh going to learn how to do it. But Colin Murray Boils, maybe some potential there. Who knows? Yeah, it I mean it it looks like a pretty fluid motion. Like with Pascal, I don’t know if you remember, he always had he had like this toe tap that he does before every shot and then when the shot would get away from him, he would stop doing the toe tap and then you would see him kind of consciously try to bring back the the one little tap as he sets his feet and there was a big kind of mental aspect to it. Connor shot doesn’t or Colin shot doesn’t look like it has too many moving parts in it. So, right, idiosyncrasies. Yeah. Okay. Okay, so this last clip here, uh, just set it up for us and then we’ll get to it. This is probably, I think, maybe the coolest, uh, Colin Murray Boles clip that there is. Um, I don’t know if you’re if you remember there there’s kind of like an a legendary Kawaii clip where it’s like eyes in the back of his head where he he dives and grabs makes a steal behind his back and it’s like, how did he even see it? It’s just instinct. It’s just anticipation. So this is where he the player um I believe starts to go to make a pass and he just one hand peels it out of his hand like it’s nothing. It is it is feel. It is instinct. It is Yeah. You can’t teach that. No. Exactly. Yeah. It is. And it and it speaks to his one of his biggest upsides of his defense is his his strong hands. like his his steel rate probably could have been higher, but he’s getting a lot of um deflections and dig downs and stuff that his teammates are picking up. And yeah, like this is just he’s he’s completely sun the other player. It’s crazy. And he immediately looks, okay, all right, we’re going the other way now. It’s it’s such quick processing. It’s very impressive. And I think those are his his his way to minutes is by being a dog of a defender and by doing really strong plays like that. So something like that, it it it’s exciting. You probably won’t see something as cool as that again. But um yeah, I it’s it’s probably the most exciting point of his game is what he can add to the Raptors defense, who at the end of the season were improving as a defensive team, but at the beginning they didn’t look very good. So the more positive defenders you get in a door, the better. And it really to me it’s looking like Colin is a plus on the offensive side potentially, but definitely a huge plus on the defensive side. Okay. Well, that’s a good breakdown and I agree with pretty much everything you said there. Um I think that defensively, I mean it’s additive. Um, a lot of teams, I think for the Toronto Raptors, their identity has been to find uh players who can guard multiple positions and really do have a defensive sort of identity. Like they they’ve drafted a ton of dogs, quote unquote, over the past couple of years. uh guys who can really dig in on the defensive end and provide an element that you know is looked over quite a bit in the NBA. Of course, you want defense uh on your team, but a lot of the time I think front offices say, “Okay, we’ve got our defender.” And then they sort of, you know, dust off their hands and say, “Now, let’s go and get the offensive players. Let’s go get the guys who can put put the ball in the basket.” I feel like the Toronto Raptors work at it from the different angle. They go out and find guys who have that dog in them that really want to play on the defensive end and then they try and teach them how to shoot and how to be uh useful on offense. And of course, Colin Murray Boils is not like a project on that end because he really does have a great feel for the game and he can score inside and he can handle the ball. It’s really just about the shooting. But I feel like they can de the Raptors feel like they can develop that and they’ve they have no qualms about uh drafting guys and then, you know, trying to put the work in, teaching them how to shoot. Yeah. I I think with him, he comes in, I think, more offensively gifted than Scotty Barnes did. I think when you look at his his feel and his footwork and everything and his especially his handle, I think he’s ahead of where Scotty was at that point. So So that’s pretty exciting to me. um because we saw the development that Scotty has had on the offensive side. Still has some struggles, but he definitely took a lot of steps compared to what he was kind of uh build at draft night. So, I think for for Colin, that’s pretty exciting that we were able to grab a guy with potentially a lot of upside at the ninth pick. Yeah, I completely agree. Um thank you to Michael uh Fasciolo uh for the shout out. Appreciate it. Um, and everybody who’s in the chat, really appreciate you guys tuning in. Uh, it’s always nice to have people who appreciate your work and, uh, I’m glad that you’re enjoying the content. But next up, we are going to go to, uh, Elijah Martin. So, Elijah Martin is, uh, the Toronto Raptors, uh, draft pick from the second round this year. He was drafted 39th overall. And um one thing to note about uh Elijah is that he is an older rookie. So this was his fifth season in uh college basketball. He will be 24 entering the uh the NBA season. And um I think that there is a good chance that he makes the final roster because um he does bring a lot of things to the table and as an older rookie um you kind of expect those guys to hit the ground running and not require as much uh development time. So uh just a little bit of background on Elijah Martin. So, first of all, he played with uh Florida Atlantic University uh his first four seasons and uh then in his final year, he transferred to Florida State where, you know, he won uh an NCAA championship uh in the tournament. He was very good in the tournament and kind of made a name for himself and started, you know, moving up draft boards. Uh, one of the things just immediately right off of the bat that you will notice when you watch him play is that he has a developed body. He has an NBA ready body for a guard. Uh, he is uh, you know, broad shoulders, developed musculature. He is, you know, he is well well on his way to being having an NBA physique. Of course, he needs probably will need to work on it a little bit more, but that is one of his calling cards is the fact that he kind of he was a bit of a bully in terms of playing at the guard spot in college basketball. And that was one of the elements that really helped uh Florida State win the championship was that he was able to uh you he played the point of attack. uh you put him in front of the other team’s, you know, lead ball handler and he would move east west very well and use his uh physicality to stop them from getting into the lane and uh navigate screens, bump, do all that kind of stuff. He really is does have that kind of dog mentality. Um some other things about him uh is that uh I think he’s a good athlete. Um, I don’t think he’s like an elite athlete, but I think that he is a uh a strong athlete. Uh, I mean, if you’ve watched any of the highlights from him, I’m sure after uh the Raptors drafted him, you went on to YouTube just like I did and just sort of consumed some of the highlights that he uh, you know, created during his um, tenure in college basketball. And the guy is like has some sick dunks. Um, a lot of them are like posters and that kind of stuff. one comp. And I know that this is very uh man who’s only seen Boss Baby uh seeing his second movie. Wow, this is a lot like Boss Baby. He kind of reminds me of uh Norman Powell a little bit. And Norman Powell, as you may remember, um he is now more of a a scoring guard and a shooter and a guy who can, you know, create one-on-one and stuff like that. But in college, he had a defensive rep and he was known as like a defensive stopper. And one of the things like he was also an older player. I believe he was a senior when he entered uh the draft. So similar circumstances, also like pretty big guy, pretty pretty muscular guy, like not a little shrimp. um also pretty athletic and also um he didn’t have the shot coming in like he could shoot a little bit but um he did eventually become and now he is a lethal shooter so maybe there’s some upside comp there hopefully Elijah Martin is a little bit uh better of a defender maybe a bit more situationally aware that was always uh Norman Powell’s uh issue at the NBA level anyways but um yeah maybe that’s a good comp I don’t Um, another Yeah. Uh, another thing to note is that he is uh very right-hand dominant. And this is something that screams. Okay. So, if you are a a onehanded player as a guard, you’re an offball player, you you’re a role player. Uh, that in in my opinion, you have to be able you have to be ambidextrous. You’ve got to be able to to go both ways. And, uh, he’s very right-hand dominant. Um, and there pretty much very very few instances of him dri dribbling with his left hand. It’s almost always uh just he he will switch back to his right and uh whenever he drives to the rim and and finishes, it’s with his right hand. Uh with that said, he’s a pretty good connector. Uh he didn’t average many um assists in uh with Florida. Uh pretty pretty poulry for a guard. I mean, it was better than his other seasons, uh, with 2.2 2.6 per 36. Um, I would say that’s just generally because he was not asked to create for them. Uh, he would do the Florida, if you watch them, they like to share the ball. They like to move the ball around, but he was played mostly as a connector. Um, so generally he will be um making dump off passes. He’ll be ma making post feeds. they’ll give him the ball uh on a curl and uh you know if he’ll come off a screen, get into the lane and then he’ll make a you know pretty decent pass. Uh there’s a couple of um nice plays where he’s uh uh creating for his teammates, but it’s all just stuff where it’s um his uh uh it’s it’s all kind of secondary creation, none of the first option stuff. So I I wouldn’t expect that from him. Um, next up, let’s talk about the shot. That is one of the biggest swing skill, as it is with pretty much any prospect. Um, these days, if you have the ability to shoot the three-point shot, there’s a very good chance that you are going to be an NBA player. And, uh, he has a very large volume and a large sample size of, uh, three-point shooting. So he was in five years in college, shot the the ball quite a bit, about six per game um every year. Uh so that’s quite a bit. And he has he averages uh about 36 3 point 36% from from three over that uh time span, which is of course not elite and a lot of it is spot up, but uh it’s there and there’s there’s a big sample size. So, there is a a decent chance that he could become a shooter at the next level. Uh, the shot in terms of the mechanics looks pretty good. Uh, it’s a little low. It’s a little on the slower side. Uh, nice follow through. Um, I I think it’s a pretty nice looking shot. Uh, I will say though, I think he’s a spot-up shooter uh at at the next level. That’s probably going to be his role in the NBA. He did it quite a bit at Florida State. they’d have him parked in the corner and uh he would be the recipient of kickouts and um they did some other stuff where he would come off of screens and shoot the ball and and do a little bit of that. Um but nothing major like the the two ways that he scores generally shooting off of a kick out uh cutting to the rim that’s in the half court and then like his superpower. So the guy is like a very very good um transition player. So he is really really good at a creating the circumstances for a turnover because he is a a ball hawk and b uh he is very good at uh finishing plays and he’s also a good outlet passer. So those are a couple of things that uh work in his favor. So let’s just take a look at some of the uh the clips that I put together. I did didn’t do anything as kind of uh robust as Steve put together, but but I have a couple of uh uh clips here. So, uh let’s just go to this quickly. Um so, uh he is um right here. He’s um he’s waiting in the wings as you can see. Um he’s on the weak side. Uh he is a ball hawk, so he’s not sticking with his man completely. He’s doing what all good defenders do, which is um you know, keeping an eye on his man and the ball. So, he’s looking at the ball right now. And he sniffs out that there’s going to be a a pass to uh Janai Broom, and he picks it off and goes the other way and slams it home for a nice dunk. And this just shows that um a he’s always he’s lurking. He’s here, I’ll just pause it for a moment. He’s lurking and waiting for other teams to make mistakes. uh this is, you know, a a good way to pick up steels in the NBA in in college is capitalizing on mistakes. Not all steels are just stripping people. A lot of the time it’s sensing when there’s going to be, you know, a bobble or, you know, an errant pass and just being in the right spot at the right time. and he couples that with just good foot speed. Um, uh, a a competent handle running the break and, um, he’s a very good finisher. So, this next one is a very good example of that. Um, where he just picks off, uh, this kind of pretty crummy uh, looking pass. Okay, so this was actually a steel that was created by Florida center. it was poked away, but he kind of jumps in there and manages to beat two players down the court and um finish off like a really sick dunk. So that um obviously, you know, you want to be able to see that as a a player um in at the NBA level, you want to be able to see a guy who can finish on the fast break. Uh the Raptors in fact were a very poor finishing team and that might be hard to wrap your mind around it because they have a lot of athletic guys who should be good in the open court. Um but they for whatever reason just did not have a very good completion rate when it came to uh finishing fast breaks and he could really help with that by finishing the break and also starting the break with uh his good outlet passing. So this last one, this one is is more uh just sort of what are the other stuffs, the other things, excuse me, that he brings to the table. And one of the things that he brings to the table that um I really like is just his uh willingness to do the dirty work. And because that will be his role probably at the next level, you are looking for the role player uh qualities. So, this next one is a nice one where it just shows that he is willing to uh seek out a a a man to box out. So, let’s just take a look at this quickly. He is uh guarding the corner. He’s standing in the dunker spot and he sees the shot go up. What does he do? Immediately, he looks to the perimeter. Okay. He sees um I believe that’s uh oh um gosh, what’s the name of that? Who’s the guy who was drafted out of Yukon? the white guy, the shooter. Uh, um, not cockbrunner, but uh, Riley McNeely. Mcne McNeely. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, so he sees McNeely, um, who wants to come in and get the offensive rebound, and he immediately just puts the lumber on him, boxes him out, and what that allows is Condan is able to come over and just snag the board there. And um that’s the kind of stuff that you want to see from a role player. A guy who understands uh that his role is to just make winning plays. You’re not out there to score. You’re not out there to be a superstar. You’re out there to do the dirty work, bring your lunch pail, and just get to work. And he does that on tons of possessions. As soon as the shot goes up, he’s looking for a guy to box out. he’s looking for somebody to put the lumber on and make sure that um they are going to uh get the the rebound. So, that’s a nice thing in terms of uh I know that I’ve been going on pretty long. I’ll just uh we’ll I’ll I’ll just go through all the points here. Um so, his body is very very good. Lets him finish through contact. He has good hand eye coordination. He can finish at the basket. Uh he is a disruptive defender as I was mentioning. He is a ball hawk but he’s also able to stay in front of guys. Um he uses a good east west movement. He has good lateral foot speed and he has a developed body that can sort of stop players when they’re moving towards the rim. Uh obviously Florida was extremely successful. Uh he arrived there. They were good before that but he arrived there and then they won the championship and he was their point of attack defender. he was the guy that they were putting in front of the guy who had the ball. That’s a really good sign. Um he had some really nice defensive games. There were really good games against Yukon, Texas Tech, Auburn, uh where he just stayed attached to his man, was able to uh be one of the cogs that allowed them to play such effective defense. And then and then the big thing, the transition play. So, those are the things that I would look out for. Defense, transition play, and three-point shot. And you’re looking at a guy who has a a road map towards becoming uh an NBA role player. If you have those three things in your bag, you know what? You’re probably going to make it into the league. Uh did you notice anything about um about Elijah Martin that uh that you want to share? Yeah, I mean, first of all, I think he did a really good breakdown on him. Um, I was somebody who initially because I didn’t have my eye on him as a player that the Raptors might choose, I needed a little bit of selling on. And I think you’ve just further sold me on him because I think something that the Raptors very much lacked last season, the season before, was this identity. And it seems like the identity they’re trying to form is that we are two-way. We will bruise you. we will get the body on you and make it hurt like the Orlando Magic have been like some of the more successful teams establishing their defensive identity and he’s another guy that can kind of add to that. I like the re the ability that he might have to put pressure on Jamal Shed to come in work and be better as well because kind of how it crystallized out of last season was that the backup point guard role was pretty clearly Jamal Sheds. I think internal competition is great and having another guy who projects to be that two-way dog who has a little bit better shooting than Jamal Shoff Rip um will only make both of them better. So, I I think that’s very great for both of them and the team. I like to see that. Um, one thing that I saw that it kind of made me chuckle about um, Elijah Martin is someone described him as what if he is just the good bits of Patrick Beverly, which much maligned player, but if you take out all the the negative drawbacks of Patrick Beverly, okay, great. He’s a good dog defender. He’s a guy who can hit an open shot. He’s a guy who helps establish this this mean identity to your team. So, if Elijah Martin, as you said, if he can if he can hit a shot, if he can defend, he can do this, he can carve out a role, I like that direction that they’re going, and I like that he’s another piece towards that. So, great breakdown. I think that he’s somebody that I’m really excited to see in the in summer league cuz I think his his his foot speed, his ball hawking, everything, it makes other teams so uncomfortable, right? So that’s the kind of look that we might have from the team coming in or off the bench if if he’s going to be the first guy off the bench maybe having that alternative identity coming off the bench like when you put in TJ McConnell. Okay, now the game has changed, right? It it’s a really good way to make the other team uncomfortable and if that’s the kind of thing that Elijah Martin can provide, then that’s great. They’re moving in the right direction with that. Yeah. I also think that um I think that he can guard up uh positionally. So his height is 6’2. So I didn’t even mention that in the breakdown. I probably should have. He’s 6’2 with a 68 wingspan. Uh 68 wingspan’s pretty good. Uh 6’2 not what you really want to see from an offball guard. A lot of the time the smaller players are point guards, which is, you know, you astutely brought up uh Jamal Shed. Um, I see him kind of as more like bit more of a wing like a maybe he and um, you know, uh, Jacobe Walter or Oiabaji. I think those guys might be more loggerheads. Uh, but of course, I mean, you can mix and match. I mean, the the Toronto Raptors have a lot of playmaking uh, at the forward spots. So putting him at a guard spot like at the point guard spot would make sense if you know Scotty Barnes is on the floor, you know. So there’s there’s a lot of things that you can do with players who can guard multiple positions. So I’m excited to see if he’s able to, you know, what he can bring in the summer league and then whether he can make the Toronto Raptors roster. So pretty interested to see that. Now, I want to talk about uh there are two villains here uh towards the end of the podcast and uh I’m sure they they don’t really need an introduction. Uh you probably know of Bill Simmons and Ryan Rasillo, the the two guys that have it out for the Toronto Raptors. They are guys who follow basketball. Um that is probably their main sports. They follow other sports. They’re sports generalists, but they they have their eye on the NBA most often. And there was a clip that has been making the rounds. If you’ve been on Twitter, you probably have seen it. It’s been shared quite a bit where they’re talking about the Eastern Conference and who they would least like to be over the next 5 years. And now that I’ve set it up for you, I’m just going to play the clip and uh you can watch it and judge for yourself and uh you know, see what you think. Let’s uh let’s cut over here. What roster situation, picks, contracts, assets, everything. Who would you not want to be for the rest of the 2020s if you could pick one team? I have mine. What’s yours? The next four years, five years. I don’t want to be Toronto. I don’t want to be Toronto because even though Scotty Barnes is better than some of the other team’s best players, it’s 38.5 million for him. It’s 38 million for Brandon Ingram. It’s 32.5 million for Quickley. It’s 28 million for RJ Barrett. Purle who’s fine. You know, 20 million that’s going to go up with the extension. There’s no moves here really for Toronto. And all of these players other than RJ are under contract for the next three years. They’re doing a lot of Alevel spending on like Bminus guys. My number one was Chicago. Okay. Um, so not a very flattering um, thing to say about the Toronto Raptors moving forward. Um, so I want to address a couple of things. Steve, you can give your thoughts, but I’ll I’ll just start it off here. Um, firstly, I see where he’s coming from. Okay, I know that that’s that’s kind of a sacrilegious thing to say from a Toronto Raptors uh podcast, but this is an expensive team this coming season and they haven’t proven anything. So, I think he’s speaking from a level of comfort here that the Toronto Raptors have been bad for the past three seasons and he expects that to continue. And usually that’s a good position to have. Things in sports change slowly. You go through the steps of being bad, then you’re mediocre, and then you’re good. So a team that is trying to skip the middle part where you go from bad, like a lottery team, the Toronto Raptors had sixth or seventh worst record in the league to a playoff team. That doesn’t happen very often. So from from that standpoint, I kind of understand. I get it. With that said, I I have some thoughts of my own, but Steve, why don’t you go first and just kind of give me your thoughts on what Rascilo is saying here. Yeah. Like, okay, I agree that there there is some validity to that because a couple of the the players are maybe four or five million too expensive. Um, but like Rasillo is victory lapping on a take that he had last year where he said, “This team doesn’t fit. This team doesn’t make any sense.” Well, with injuries, they barely played any minutes together as a whole team. So, it’s a pretty uh easy victory lap to take at this point because he’s going, “Look, I was right. They suck and they still suck and they’re going to suck going forward.” It’s again, it’s a little bit interaction batty because the Raptors are a pretty big fan base who are pretty active online and he’s going to get a lot of responses from it. I’m not naive to the way that these two do it. It It’s a constant kind of rage baiting with Raptors fans and it works quite well. He I think what was it? Bill put uh Chicago first or something instead. Yeah. But he still had the Raptors top three. I think when you if we were going to do the exercise, you look at some teams who don’t control their future pick capital like the Raptors do, right? don’t have a young team like the Raptors do or they’re entirely based on one player. Like if you look at the Milwaukee Bucks, I wouldn’t necessarily want to be the Milwaukee Bucks. It’s all on Giannis. And they’ve waved and stretched aim and they’re paying that money, you know, good money after bad for for years and years and years. But, you know, they don’t consider that because they just think I think in in the the long form clip they mentioned, okay, do we just go who’s got best player? Okay, so Scotty Barnes is not he’s a better player than some of these other teams would have and Brandon Ingram is a better player than some of these other teams would have, but they’re talking about a five-year window and you look at some of these teams like Brooklyn Nets who still don’t have a guy. They the draft I mean maybe Jaggar Demon is that guy. I don’t know. I didn’t love their draft. So, you know, and they still have Claxton, Cam Thomas not signed it. It’s murky. And are they going to find that guy in the next 5 years? I guess you think, okay, well, they’ll nail a next top pick, whereas the Raptors might be mid and they can’t get a high pick, right? So, like I do think, yeah, there’s there’s some definitely some validity to the fact that they might be spending a lot of money for a very mid team, but the fact of the matter is we haven’t seen this group together, especially with Brandon Ingram. So, you know, it’s a little hot takey. It’s a It’s a bit of an easy victory lap. And uh I mean obviously I hope it’s it’s different. I think um my response to it was to say uh I bet it’s the Celtics and obviously that’s a bit more of a hot take, but you know, maybe Tatum doesn’t recover so well from such a severe injury. They don’t have a center. They have Anthony Simons as their expiring point guard who has not been a winning player and maybe he’ll want a raise or maybe he’ll walk for free. two of their picks are are not under their control in the future. They still have Jaylen Brown. They still have Derek White. They still have a lot. It probably won’t be them, but uh yeah, I don’t know. I was I wasn’t surprised to see it. I always kind of wait for the the Anti Raptors Bill Simmons clips to to crawl around. Yeah. So, I mean, obviously this is, you know, shooting fish in a barrel. we’re we’re reacting to something that they put out there to react to, but at the same time, I think it’s a good discussion point. I think that there’s some interesting thoughts that could come out of this, and you did a really good job bringing up some stuff that I didn’t consider. Uh the victory lap scenario is is definitely like giving yourself a pat on the back for a take that you had before and then doubling down on it. That’s definitely a good good point. I’m going to say that uh here here are a couple of thoughts that I have. number one. Uh, so he’s saying like they’re paying A-level money for Bminus talent. Okay, if you have Bminus talent at every position, okay, that in the East is a playoff team. That’s true. Okay, you do not have to be elite to to be good in the East. Th this is something that should be nailed home again and again and again. The East is injured and it’s bad. So, the teams that were good are injured and the teams that are bad still look like they’re going to be bad. This is the time, and the Hawks know this, too. They like the Hawks, and that’s fine. I mean, the Hawks, I think, have done a pretty good job with their rebuild. I think that Toronto should be getting some of the benefit of the doubt as well because some of these guys have a lot of talent. And I think that what you’re saying about the fact that they’re like some of these teams that are bad, they have the the draft lottery behind them, but a lot of the time that isn’t that that’s just as much of a roll of the dice as anything else. So there’s that. Next of all, uh I think that the Toronto Raptors don’t have a lot of holes in the roster. That’s one thing. if healthy. I I should put that uh little addendum in there because there is a health concern here. And if one or two players who have had injury problems in the past continue to have injury problems, then the Toronto Raptors are probably not going to be very good. But if they’re healthy, the center position is squared away. They resigned Purle. They have a bunch of forwards. They just drafted a a really good forward slashcenter. Um Scotty Barnes has been an all-star. I think Emanuel Quickley is being slept on a little bit. RJ Barrett, I’m not exactly sure if he’s the best fit, but he had the best season of his career. And then there are a bunch of players that I think have the potential to grow into their roles. And um there were a lot of really fun stories and and of course you know bearing the lead here uh Brandon Ingram. Brandon Ingram I think is one of the best well he’ll be one of the best scorers in the Eastern Conference and when you have a player that can put the ball into the basket the way that he can I think that you’re going to have a chance to win a lot of games. Um he did mention the fact that the talent level in terms of the amount that is being paid is uh a little overrated and you mentioned this as well. Overpaying for for players is a problem when you have to add via free agency. Mhm. And the Toronto Raptors are not a free agency destination. Sandro Mamu Kellishvilli is like one of the you know that’s a for us that’s a good free agency signing because he has the potential to do something. Raptors don’t really have a lot of options in free agency. The way that they get talent is by making trades, signing their own free agents, and through the draft. And so, this is just going to be more of the same. This is it’s not as if they’re in they’ve painted themselves into to a corner. This is simply just they will have to if if something doesn’t work out or something does work out or they see an opportunity, they can use the contracts they have on the books to make another uh trade. And a lot of the time guys aren’t valueless. Like they’re talking about these guys who are signed to maybe larger contracts than they deserve. It’s not that is better than having a player that is, you know, imp has an impending free agency. Having a guy under contract if they are a useful player, that’s a player that you can trade. Yeah. If you if if they say, “Okay, I can’t believe you gave Ingram this much,” which I think is ridiculous. I don’t think that’s too much. But if you decide that’s a problem, who’s expiring? Zack Lavine’s expiring. You don’t think that the Kings would flip Zack Lavine for Brandon Ingram? They would do it in a second and then all of a sudden you’re out of that problem. Yeah. Which I don’t think it’s a problem to have. But if somebody’s looking at it purely as oh this thing is so expensive, which I mean I don’t care that the team is expensive as long as they’re not in apron trouble. They’re over the tax and they will duck the tax by the the deadline by by moving off a piece. I think that they are still shopping pieces. That keeps getting rumored. So, you know, I I don’t think that I think the roster is probably set for the starting lineup and stuff for going into the the season, but I don’t think it’s set for the rest of the season. I think that the front office understands that this group doesn’t work perfectly, but as you said, they don’t really have major holes. There’s there’s other teams who are paying some guy’s minimums to be their shooting guard who probably isn’t a starting guard or you know the Kings who are are playing Dennis Schroeder to be a starting guard because their other parts of the roster are a bit inflated in in those salary situations. So having everybody kind of earn a decent amount I don’t know it we c we have to see it honestly. Yeah. And and Van Hoot here mentioned something that I I actually noticed. Uh Van Hoot 2234 said uh the one thing that I would point out about Ryan and Bill, they didn’t realize that Ochai was on his uh rookie scale contract cuz uh Ryan said, “Oh, yeah. Uh and Otai, he’s overpaid, too.” It’s like, “No, he’s not. He’s on his rookie scale contract.” Yeah. Um I mean, that’s fine, but people make mistakes all of the time. Uh, but you know, this is like a lot of the time I I think that this is a team that could surprise people. I think that this is a team that does not have to be elite in order to make the playoffs. That that’s the biggest point that I will make is that if everyone is healthy, then this is a team that has, you know, a punch chance of making the playoffs. Uh, so that’s those are those are my thoughts about that uh little hot take that Ryan had about the Toronto Raptors. And it’s easy to hate guys, but then again, I mean, they’re doing exactly what I like to do and what a lot of people like to do, which is, you know, trashing teams that you don’t like and uh smack talking and and running it back and saying uh like how smart you are when a team that you thought was bad turns out to be bad. Yeah. And so I get it. But um then again, I would like to rub it in Ryan’s face and you know, quote tweet it and uh you know, have him have to eat humble pie and all that sort of stuff. So yeah, that that that’s pretty much uh my thoughts on that. Do you have anything that you want to say before uh maybe we uh end the podcast? Yeah, I mean I think by the time we’re doing the next episode, um we’ll have had gone through a summer league game. So, uh that’s exciting. That’ll be something to look at. Um everybody, it is on the 11th, the first game. I think it’s at like 5 or something. I’m not sure. Um but so something to look forward to and hopefully we’ll be covering that shortly after. Yeah. Um for now, uh at least maybe we can square this away. we can talk about kind of what what we’ve been discussing about the podcast. Um the summer of course is not a busy time for basketball. It is the off season of course and there are things that happen in the offseason but like many basketball podcasts we’re planning on doing something about once a week. Um and then when the season starts up then probably multiple times a week. But um just in case like cuz during the day I want to be able to clip things and put things together and I’m going to be taking stuff from this podcast and re-releasing it on YouTube. But um yeah, so we’re we’re thinking of doing once a week. Maybe on Mondays, maybe at 8:30. Maybe that’s a good time. Uh so yeah, that that’s what I was thinking. What do you think, Steve? Yeah, I think I think that works for me and it’s a good way to kick off the week, at least for for me and hopefully for everyone else. All right. Well, that is the Raptors Report podcast. We are in at just over an hour. So, hopefully you enjoyed that and uh we look forward to hearing from you guys. Leave a comment in the comment section. Make sure to check both of us out on Twitter at Rapsreport and Raptors Shack. If you want to get in touch with Stevie or with myself, you can do that. And we I love talking to Toronto Raptors fans. As you well know, we are the best. Don’t let anyone tell you any differently. And as always, thank you for tuning in to Raptors Report, your source for indepth Raptors content.

Breaking down the Raptors’ stacked summer league squad, an in-depth look at the rookies and some additional Raptors content. Tap in!