Your Toronto Raptors

Hello again friends...YOUR TORONTO RAPTORS are a dozen games into the 2010-2011 campaign and thus far it has been a dirty dozen...lets review shall we...

You know how we do it around here...The Good...The Bad...The Ugly

The Good

I have seen improvement and growth from DeMar

When you have played 12 games and only have 3 ticks in the W column finding The Good is difficult...I will say this - the Craps..sorry Raps...have played 8 road games which is more than any other team in the East (Only Portland - who is in the West - has played as many road games as that) not to mention 4 of those were n the West Coast...when the sched evens out a lot more and the other teams in the East have to go on those trips while the T-Dot catches up on their home games we could see more W's...

Although it is true that Andrea Bargnani has struggled a tad with consistency he still is getting 20 points per game on average which is 6 points higher than his career avg of 14 ppg

Last season we lamented that Reggie Evans was never healthy to contribute to the Raps...this year he is averaging a team-high 12 rebounds per game...those are Craig Ballard at Father Michael Goetz numbers!!!  (a laugh there for those of you who have known me since my high school days)

Sonny Weems is coming off the bench and at 14.1 points per game he is doubling his career avg

I have thought during stretches of time that the light bulb is going on for 2nd year player DeMar DeRozan...his offensive game has improved, but I am referring to his decision making and aggressiveness in stretches where the Raps really needed it...to have a 2nd year guy provide that for you bodes well for his development...

To have a 3-9 start and only be 2 games out of the 8th and final playoff spot is good

The Bad

Oh boy...2-6 road record...0-4 West Coast trip...

blown out at Washington when John Wall was not even playing...any of the last minute plays that Jay Triano has drawn up...

The fact that Reggie Evans leads your team in steals (come on Jose...Jack...DD...Sonny...Julian Wright...Barbosa)...

David Anderson has played in 10 games (yikes...I may be a better option..did I mention my high school rebounding prowess?!?!)...



more often than not we do no want to look either

Jarrett Jack's shooting numbers are plummeting...DO NOT let JJ shoot from downtown where he has made just 4 of his 24 attempts (YIKES)...JJ's turnovers are up and assists are down...

The other PG is Jose Calderon...Calderon's also has shooting numbers that are way down, as are his assists
The Ugly



STILL waiting for Alabi and Davis to debut

 Sure the Raps lost Bosh and Hedon't Turkoglu in the off-season, but they add Leandro Barbosa, Linus Kleiza, and Ed Davis...all 3 have struggled already with injuries...Davis has not even made his NBA debut yet...personally I cannot wait to see what kind of pro Mr Ed will be as I am excited about him...heck even fellow rookie Soloman Alabi has yet to make his debut...

The New Orleans Hornets are 9-1...the lone loss came at Dallas by 3 points...they are playing great...former Raptor Marco Belinelli has started all 10 games and is averaging 12 points per game and playing very well...as a Rap he started 1 game and averaged 7 points last season

The Raps still offer no consequences for taking the ball to the rim against them...teams are still able to run lay-up drills vs the Raps D as the middle is s-o-f-t

This team has looked brutal in the 4th Q this yea...they are really a young team who needs time to jell...it does not help that the new guys are all hurt...adding new guys has its own built-in learning curve but when the guys are not even healthy the jell process is of course further delayed which as already added to Raps fans frustrations...

I would have thought 4-8 was worst case scenario for this squad after a dozen games so to be below even that is upsetting and ugly...

Go Raps Go

craig.ballard@hotmail.com