Four Biggest Holes in the Raptors' Roster

Overpaying for Substandard Talent

The total amount for their salary commitments ranks tenth in the NBA, but their money is invested in all the wrong guys. Let's analyze where the cash is going, exactly.

Almost $32 million is due to Chris Bosh, Jose Calderon, Jason Kapono, and Marcus Banks.

For a team which claims it has a bright future, these four contractual obligations seriously hinder any opportunity for significant improvement in the near future.

Throw big man Kris Humphries and his $3.2 million in, and you have nearly half of your entire salary devoted to players who are grossly overpaid for what they provide.

Frequently, these guys aren't even on the court; instead, they're wearing a suit. Bosh, Calderon, and Humphries have become quite accustomed to that attire this season.

Kapono is signed for the mid-level exception, yet is far from being the “average” player. He’s a defensive liability and a shooter who can’t (or at times doesn’t feel like) shooting the ball.

Jose Calderon, while paid quite reasonably for his numbers, is just not the core piece he’s been made out to be. Like Kapono, he can’t guard a pylon to save his life. Of course, unlike Kapono, he starts; but he plays a position for forty minutes per game where stopping lane penetration should be the primary objective.

Instead, Calderon takes a page out of the fans' book, using “the hand clap" as his defense. He masks his inability to shuffle his feet east-to-west by applauding the opposing player in hopes that the player will simply burst into laughter and turn the ball over.

Not only are the players not turning the ball over, they’re penetrating at will, and creating open shots, fouls, or generally killing any opportunity the Raptors have for being a fast-paced team.

Now to Marcus Banks, a player Pat Riley cleverly pushed into the O’Neal–Marion swap. He’s a streaky shooter, a good defender, but in the end, an undersized scrub shooting guard who makes poor decisions.

If Calderon is your starter, Ukic is your backup, why bring in a player who, even at his best, is still worse than Ukic?

Right. So you can pay a third-string point guard over $4million per year for the next three seasons.

Trading for Kris Humphries was one of the best moves Colangelo has made to date. But awarding him over $3 million per season with a player option was truly silly.

He simply isn’t smart enough to play significant minutes, and players like him are readily available in every single draft at the beginning of the second round. Certainly, he’s still young and provides the Raptors with some grit, but he’s a ball-stopper, average defender, incapable offensive player, and a general numb-skull.

While not the better player, fellow Raptor Nathan Jawai is a far better long-term prospect if he can stay healthy. If the Raptors can unload Humphries’ contract this off-season, they shouldn't hesitate for a second.

We now turn our attention to the man Shaq dubbed the “RuPaul of NBA big men”.

Chris Bosh is not in any way worth the salary he earns, much less the salary the Raptors seem ready to pay him in 2010. While drafting him was a sound move, anointing him a “franchise” player was premature.

I’ve stated emphatically for the past three seasons that Bosh simply isn’t a player you can build a team around. People simply don’t see how large a gap there actually is between a player like him and the talents he’s often compared to.

I’ve heard Raptor announcers saying that 2010 is the year of James, Wade, and Bosh. Ironically, he’s always paired with one guy or another.

There isn’t a team outside of Detroit that wants to bring him in as their main cog. Which begs the question, why are the Raptors so hell-bent on keeping him as theirs?

If he’s shown for over half a decade that he isn’t that guy you can just rely on to win big games in close situations, why even pay him? Why venture down the Minnesota-Garnett "nightmare road to mediocrity again," let alone with a player with half the talent of the "Big Ticket."

Coaching Woes

There hasn’t been a legitimate coach in Toronto since the disinterested and out-of-touch Lenny Wilkens, and there hasn’t been a guy who actually knows how to coach since the days of the “Diet Pepsi Man” himself, Kevin O’Neill.

I doubt the Raptors will be putting any investment into Jay Triano this offseason, and this opens the door for a new coach to come in.

Let’s pray for the Raptors’ sake that it’s either Van Gundy or Messina that they pursue, because this team could truly use a complete coach.

Mitchell may have said the right things, and Triano may call the right plays, but until this team can get a coach who can do both consistently well, they’ll have trouble against elite level teams. And with the very obvious exception of Boston, they all have very capable minds patrolling the sidelines.

Lack of Franchise

Back to the "dreaded wonder" himself, Chris Bosh. Outside of perhaps the Timberwolves with Jefferson, the Grizzlies with Gay, the Pacers with Granger, and the Wizards with Arenas, I can’t imagine a team with a worse No. 1 guy than the Raptors with Bosh.

Just how large is the gap between a Kobe, LeBron, or Wade?

Let's say all three swapped teams. Would one team fall off completely, or would another catapult to new heights? I doubt it.

What is the difference between having Chris Bosh, and someone like Howard, Duncan, or Garnett?

I’d say 10 to 12 wins is being extremely generous. Put Bosh on the Spurs in place of Duncan and they’re not in the Playoffs, much less contending for a title.

In Bosh, the Raptors have a player with glaring weaknesses; but worse, he's content with his weaknesses. He knows what’s wrong, but recently, has described the team’s problems by saying “we don’t defend," “we need to be tougher at the end of games," and so on.

I’d have a hard time saying "we," when it was me launching contested fadeaways over players who were six inches shorter than me. But Bosh uses the plural liberally, dodging the blame.

If Bosh is content with being a 20-10 guy, being an All-Star, and being a minor YouTube celebrity, then so be it. But let’s not put the label of "franchise player" on such an incomplete player; it’s just insulting.

The Point Guard-Oriented Attack

I’m a firm believer that point guards should be able to penetrate, but that the ball should leave their hands at some point and the offense should be created by the wings and from the post, as the Pistons did with Billups and their offensive system in recent years.

Considering the Raptors have a star post player who can neither play down low nor create for others and lack a competent ball handler on the wing, they’ve asked Calderon to be their version of Steve Nash.

Even if he was at Nash’s level, history still shows us that this method of over-initiating your offense through your lead guard hasn’t led to a single title since the days of Magic Johnson.

Jason Kidd, Steve Nash, John Stockton, and Mark Jackson, for all their glorified assist numbers, have not one ring among them to show for it.

The fact is, however, that Calderon isn’t near the level of those four. He's more like a cross between Derrick Fisher and Brevin Knight.

When was the last time either of them were the second option of a team's offense? This isn’t to say that someone like Chris Paul, Deron Williams, or Derrick Rose won’t change this in five years, but to date, it just hasn’t worked so well.

The Raptors have big decisions ahead in 2009, and if they can start by unloading any three of Bosh, Calderon, Kapono, Banks, and Humphries, they'd be in a good place. With a competent coach and a creative wing, perhaps the Raptors' faithful can finally have something to cheer about again.