Overreaction: Game 53/82 - Valid Concern

So the Raptors lose another high profile game against the Bucks.

Let's roll in the excuses here:

- No JV
- Lowry is not healthy
- Kawhi is not 100%
- The team hasn't had a consistent practice with a full roster

We'll get JV back soon, so that means Ibaka won't be overextended, and JV would be able to start on certain matchups. That's good.

Lowry is not healthy. However, from the looks of it, he won't be healthy anytime soon, and we'll see more of Lowry's floor than his ceiling for the rest of the season. Heck, maybe for the rest of what's left of his career. It sucks for me to say all of this because I'm a big K-L-O-E guy. But when we get his floor, where he's closer to being the 7th best scorer than the 3rd best scorer on the team, what happens? We're almost fucked.

The book on Kawhi this season is out: Play him straight up on defence with defenders that can absorb the contact and bang with him, have help defenders ready should he gets past his man because chances are, he won't make the extra pass. Is he healthy? I think so. Is he in game shape? I'm not 100% sure, and it doesn't look likely. Good lord, he better not be, because if this is who he is at 100%, the Raptors are fucked. Especially on days where he can't even be the clear cut #1 scoring option.

The onus here is on the coach, on Nick Nurse. He has to roll with who can play his offence. That means he can pamper Kawhi with all of these load management crap, but Nurse should be able to get Kawhi to return the favour and get him to be a willing participant in his offence.

Nurse also has to let go of the politics, and play the guys that are playing well, and are suited for the situation. For example, Delon Wright is a much better defender than Fred VanVleet, especially with Kyle Lowry on the floor when the Raptors are playing a defensive possession down the stretch. Also, if Delon is playing well down the stretch, you don't take him out because VanVleet's got dibs in crunch time, especially if VanVleet is not playing well.

Tonight, Danny Green should've gotten the rest of the night off because he's got the shits, but lo and behold, Nurse had to put him back in during crunch time, because, he's Danny Green. Even though Green hasn't done anything offensively the entire game. He got to play instead of Norm Powell and Delon Wright, both guys who were a big part of that run that got them back in the game.

Lastly, Masai can't be watching this game, or the games recently and be satisfied. Do your job, Masai. This team need some help.

Overreaction: Game 46/82 - What Point Guard Depth?

• This is the best start I've seen in a while from Kyle Lowry. I'm not talking about running the offense, I'm talking about his aggressiveness looking to score in between setting his guys up.
• Remember that "Scott Sterling" viral videos before? Kyle got banged up today in so many different ways like Scott.
• I really like the energy that  Fred VanVleet and Delon Wright provided when they came in. Their appearance single-handedly cost them the game.
• Fred and Delon could not handle the physicality that Rozier, Smart, and Brown brought, and it got contagious, even the starting unit got affected.
• Siakam is also another guy who couldn't handle the physicality that the Celtics frontcourt brought to them. He could not get his offense going at all.
• Silver lining re: Siakam: His playmaking was phenomenal.
• I like how Moose battled and got some offense in, but man oh man... he's such a liability on defense.
• I love how coach Nick Nurse took the decision making aspect out of Serge Ibaka. Ibaka's basically put in a position where he's only doing one thing in the midrange and in the paint: shoot. If he's in the 3pt line? Swing pass or shoot it. No more playmaking to be done.
• I feel bad for Jordan Loyd. He's getting his NBA days via DNP-CD. At the same time, I don't think he's 100%. Based on what I've seen in the G-League, he's banged up.
• Am I concerned about this loss? Sure, the backup PGs are unreliable, we can't contain Kyrie, and the usual crunch time ISO-ball. But do keep in mind, Moose is playing JV's minutes, and if this is a playoff series, we won't see that much FVV+Delon minutes, especially together.
• I know Kawhi needs his reps in crunch time, but the Raps can't go all-season letting Kawhi cook in crunch time and just have 4 bystanders. They also need reps.

Not a Good Way to End/Start a Year

Plenty of thoughts, not enough time to write. Or not well enough to write.

I've been battling flu-like symptoms since the turn of the year, and yeah, I can definitely say that I've been sick all year.

During the holidays, my wife chose to accept an invite to spend a christmas eve with one of our friends. It was already pre-planned among friends, and they were the host this year (or last year). Unfortunately, their entire household were sick. I voiced my reservations, but my wife wanted to go. Fast forward to the NYE,  same group of friends at another house, and majority of us were sick. Now we're here.

I'm such a flu/cough/cold magnet, I could go to church and sit front row, and if there's somebody sick all the way to the back and would sneeze, I'd probably get sick the following day.

For such an active person (I go to the gym pretty much everyday to workout or to play ball), I get sick waaaaay too often. My wife who's as sedentary as they come, don't get sick at all.

When it comes to coughing, here's my list of what I would normally drink:

1. Benylin
2. Robitussin
3. Life/Equate brand version of Benylin
4. Buckley's

Benylin is costly, as they have different cough medication for different situations. However, it's what works for me. I just couldn't be bothered with Buckley's, even though it soothes the throat much better for the first hour upon taking it.

It's the accompanying occasional migraine that I'm getting that's paralyzing me. It could be a coincidence that it manifested around the same time as the flu-like symptoms started. Or it could be a sign that I need a better prescription. Man, Lasik is starting to get tempting.

"Googling" "Signs it's time to change your eyeglasses" led me to this article.

Based on the article above, here's the checklist:

• Headaches: Yes
• Squinting: When driving, the street signs are starting to be a challenge
• Eye fatigue: I'm not really sure, but my eyes recently got bloodshot and it's probably from the strain from looking at my monitor at work and my phone in between.
• Blurred Vision: No
• Old Glasses: Yes. I've had the same prescription in almost 4 years now

I'm back after this coming Boston Celtics game.

Overreaction: Game 39/82 - No Show/Good To See You, Deebo

The Raptors no-showed one of the biggest games of their regular season. With all the lights, media, hype, etc. focused on the Raptors and the Spurs, majority of the Raptors let Kawhi down. Siakam showed up, and tried his best, but he's best at when he's somewhat under control. Same thing can be said with Moose. When you ask him to do more than the little things that he can do, it's not a good thing. Serge Ibaka, FVV, Delon Wright, Danny Green, OG Anunoby all no-showed and were disappointing at best last night.

Are they being too soft because of their friends?

Playing Deebo and Yak for the first time, there's a lot of emotions going on that might have taken some of the Raptors out of their game. It's evident - the start of the first and third quarters were a disaster. It's up there as one of the worst games I've ever seen for the Raps.

JV said in the summer that they need to learn how to put foot on the neck or something along that line. In this case last night, the Raps need to set aside any emotion about the game and just be professional and try to win the game.


Take away the first quarter brainfart, and you have a game where you can count on Kawhi to try to win. Unfortunately, that's not how it goes.

The Raptors PG - FVV and Delon even up to now still cannot execute the offense. Delon at least was not getting killed on the defensive end. Either way, all they did was pound the ball too much to get the offense going.

Nick Nurse should take some blame too, as he was front and centre on how Danny Green and FVV were crapping the bed last night, it should've been a quick hook when you have decent players that can take the minutes (Wright and Powell).

There were a few bright spots on a forgettable game, such as:

CJ Miles hit a rhythm 3. It was wide open, yes, but it was at least 1.5ft away from the 3pt line and he made it easily. Small victories.

Chris Boucher, my son, came in and did what I expect him to do: Hit his 3s and block/alter shots. He finished with a team high +9, to go along with 1 3PM, 2Reb, 1Blk. Heck, his 3PM made pop call a timeout.

As mentioned earlier, Moose came in to battle. Unfortunately, he felt compelled to do more than what's expected from him, and that's where his issues came up.

Can we finally say that Norm Powell is back? Can we say that the GoDaddy curse is lifted? How long before we officially lifted JV's curse label? When he's in control, he's a big time role player.

I'm not disappointed about the loss, I'm disappointed about the effort. Or lack, thereof.

All in all, I'm happy for Deebo. Just like coach Casey's win in Toronto, he could not have scripted this better. This is probably the only acceptable L in the Raptors history.

Overreaction: Game 38/82 - New Year, New Career High

• Kawhi with a career night and pretty much got what he wanted and even took Joe Ingles' soul in the process. I mean, what can that accountant do to Kawhi?
• Joe Ingles and Donovan Mitchell combined for 7/28 shooting. Thank god we have Kawhi and Danny Green.
• Not to be outdone, Pascal Siakam also had an under the radar career night. 28 points and it looked very easy. He could've gotten more if he forced the issue a bit more.
• I know it's not gonna happen this year, but I can't wait to see a stronger and more skilled Siakam. I think there's another gear to his improvement.
• Norm Powell came in and did what most of us Raps fans hope he would do: be a spark off the bench, playmake, and hit the occasional 3. With him out there playing like this, the Raps don't really need to give Lorenzo Brown his minutes (Sorry Lorenzo).
• I thought CJ Miles's 3 minutes weren't a waste, he has a couple of steals/loose ball rebound. Let's start with small victories for now when it comes to CJ.
• I also thought this would be a game where Chris Boucher could come in handy, but I guess Nick Nurse does not think the same.
• Moose with an equally good as an equally bad game. I'm not sure if the good wipes out all the bad he's done all game.
• It would be interesting to see whether the Raps will bring Boucher and Malachi (either or?) for the trip. The Raps go to Texas to play the Spurs and DeMar on Jan 3rd, then go to Milwaukee to face Giannis and the Bucks on Jan 5th. The 905 plays on the 4th and the 5th back to back.
• Speaking of Spurs and DeMar, they just announced that Lowry is getting anti-inflammatory injections for his back, and there's no timetable for his return. So yeah, I expect him to play on Thursday against his best buddy DeMar.

Overreaction: Game 36/82 - Thank God We Got Kawhi as a Throw-in

I guess before I go on and on about the Heat game, I want to address the lack of overreactions for games 34 (W @ Cavs) and 35 (L @ Philly). The reason behind that is because the Cavs were the Cavs, and the Philly is a schedule-loss based on the injuries that are plaguing the team right now.

Hey, wasn't that a really good comeback, or not?

The way the Raptors, especially Kawhi and Pascal Siakam started, I was ready to go with "Oh, must be the hangover" excuse.

If there's any confirmation that I was looking for that the Raps would take an L last night, it was Serge Ibaka who came out with his vintage garbage game. He was totally outclassed by Hassan Whiteside on both ends of the floor.

Whiteside or most traditional bigs would almost always be a bad matchup for Ibaka. He's just smaller - Ibaka's listed at 6'10" which makes him around 6'8.5"-6'9" range, compared to Whiteside's listed at 6'11.5" if not 7' in most sites.

Speaking of Whiteside, Greg Monroe came in and provided excellent minutes against Whiteside. He just isn't that great against players of similar size and with comparable size. Especially if they have some offensive skills.

Here's a big challenge for Fred VanVleet. What does he do when his teammates, especially Kawhi and Serge are struggling? In the first half, FVV looked as if he's overthinking the situation when this happens, it's written all over his place and it says something like "What would Kyle do in this situation?"

I don't know what's real and what's not -- the last time the Raptors and the Heat played a close game, and I'm not even talking about that stupid Dwyane Wade game where we let him do as he pleases because it was his farewell tour, but it's either one of the following could be true:

• Nick Nurse and the Raptors defended well what Spoelstra wanted to do for the last possession;
• Spoelstra doesn't have a true point guard that can run the plays and he was stuck with giving the ball to Wade or Justice Winslow to do something.

Speaking of Winslow, I'm really impressed with his transformation this season. We've seen some signs of life last year, but this year he could be a candidate for MIP. He's fixed his body, looking much leaner and athletic. His handle looks better (hey, he can use his off hand to dribble now!), but most importantly, kudos to whoever fixed his shot. It looked totally different from how he shot a few years ago.

There was a big discrepancy in FTM (Raps 19/23, Heat 6/12). Those missed FTs for the Heat definitely affected the game, as some of those misses came in the fourth quarter. I think I even saw Whiteside shoot an airball. What's surprising is the Raps got 23 attempts, and the Heat only got 12. I was not looking at the stats during the game, and with how much Kawhi and Nurse were pissed off about the lack of calls, I would have thought that it was the opposite.

Going back to Moose, I'm really impressed by what the bench provided last night. OG's lockdown defence, Moose containing and keeping Whiteside busy, Delon Wright showing the tip of the iceberg with what he can do, and Norm Powell with his 3rd straight good game. This group kept that Raptors afloat in the first half, preventing the Heat from running away with a blow-out, and continued the comeback that the starters initiated in the 3rd quarter. No CJ Miles last night, and understandably so. Powell had 5pts and 3 assists, which meant that he was directly responsible for creating 11 points in 16 minutes. In fact, Norm, Delon, and OG had at least the same # of assists as FVV.

Another game that Kyle sits with an injury, and I'm starting to get a bit concerned. Is this the type of injury that would linger on and off the season? If yes, why are we being stubborn with letting Kyle play meaningful games in October/November/December like the one in Philly if he's not 100% (or even 90%)? Now what? He'll miss the next 3 games so that he can get aggressively treated so that he can play against his best friend Demar next week?

Speaking of Kyle and DeMar:

Lastly, how about Nick Nurse and his adjustments? He doesn't get a lot of credit, but his 3rd quarter adjustments this season are really on-point. The sub pattern, zone defense, taking advantage of mismatches. He's damn good.

Overreaction: Game 33/82 - Game 1 of the Mooscher Era

The Pacers were in a lose-lose situation. Oladipo is not 100%, coming off a back-to-back. Still, there's no excuse for them to lose a game against a team that's missing 3 of their top 6 players, and one of them is banged up (Danny Green). Especially when you were up 17 against a team that can't seemingly buy a bucket. There's just no excuse for them not to win the game.

More thoughts about the game:

• Excellent job by Nick Nurse throwing things at the wall and figuring out what would stick, and here are some things that I'd like to note:
• Zone Defense
• Pascal Siakam at C
• Got the Pacers move away from their usual plays and made them iso on the post
• Quickly trying to see what would work between CJ Miles/Malachi Richardson/Lorenzo Brown
• Victor Oladipo was bad for most of the second half. I know he's not 100%, but do you need to be 100% to get the ball across to beat the 8-second count? That was a costly turnover.
• Speaking of Siakam, a couple of his moves are getting stopped more often than not now, so I guess that's the scouting report effect. The few times he was successful, he was able to beat his man because he had the space/head start. Something to keep an eye on.
• Chris Boucher made his appearance - finally - and I thought he played better than I expected him to.
• He was not shy to shoot, no hesitation, and that's a good thing because unlike with Brown, he's shooting "his shots." Those shots are the shots he's taking and making on a regular basis in the G-League.
• As expected, opposing bigs will try to muscle him down low. It was evident during his first half minutes.
• It looks like my hunch on Boucher's PNR defense is true
• What should not be missed is the way he adjusted in the second half. I thought he did a good job fighting in the post, and staying vertical instead of letting his man take the shot and try to block it in the air.
• I've never been upset and happy at Kawhi on the same game. That's normally reserved for DeMar up until this season, but he's filling in nicely. I didn't like how he gave up on that play where he was looking for a foul. Obviously he was frustrated, but that's a DeMar move FFS lol. Not complaining too much because when it mattered, he grabbed the game by the neck and got us the W.
• Ok, Moose is good offensively. But if he doesn't have the ball, he's a liability on the offense. Defensively he's bad. But he's fun to watch lol.
• A lot of people hate on Lorenzo Brown - and coming from someone who saw his MVP season, I think it's justifiable. But unlike those people, I'm not hating on Brown. I'm just disappointed. I saw what this guy can do, but for some reason, he can not get comfortable enough to do the things that he's capable of offensively.
• More on Brown - I've never seen Brown play with better defense and with more hustle than he did against the Pacers. IMO this game is better than any of his games where he got the post-game interview.
• In regards to the last play, I guess this is the time where we get to say "part of the ball" LMAO