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• Justin Engelas commented on Pete Schauer's profile

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  By citing the fact that the Raptors are "a franchise that isn't even based in the United States" as one of the negative aspects of Rudy Gay's trade to Toronto, you demonstrated exactly the type of nationalistic ignorance typical of american sports fans (particularly in the NBA). Such narrow minded biased thinking contributes not only to the difficulties the Raptors have always faced as a franchise, but also restricts the growth of the NBA internationally. I have a hard time imagining US sports fans and journalists, and the players themselves, treating a European franchise any differently than they do the Raptors. When these international franchises cannot attract any top tier talent and constantly lose their best prospects to free agency because of bias perceptions within the league due to its non-US residency, the prospects of long term international success seem bleak. Such success is near impossible when teams can't attract/retain any quality talent and thus have to overpay for subpar players. Making things worse, these players get little to no respect or the benefit of a doubt by the referees, who have cost the Raptors 4 wins this year alone due to blown calls during the final possessions of a number of games (2 of which the NBA actually apologized for, not that it makes any difference). Unfortunately for Rudy Gay, this won't change until everyone involved in the league starts to focus less on where franchises are located, and just appreciate them for what they are - a basketball team in the greatest league on earth... the only thing that matters.

  107 days ago

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