[OhCanada-Participant]

These guys are balling. Bargnani is playing with as much confidence and belief in himself as anyone in the NBA. He is scoring 27-ppg shooting 54%. Andrea is actually competing. Not just competing he wants to hurt the other teams feelings. His numbers for rebounding, blocked shots, and steals are low but that does not mean he isnt playing good defence, or not rebounding. He is actually defending very well, and doing his part within the team rebounding Toronto has established. If he keeps this play up Toronto will keep winning, and if Toronto keeps winning he will be a clearcut Allstar.

DeMar Derozan just set a career high for 3-pointers hitting 5 out of 8 from beyond the arc tonight. Not only was that his game high but it was also a season high. Derozan hit 5 of 51 three point attempts last year, this year in six games he hit 10 of 16 attempts. In tonights game he seemed to be much more comfortable within Torontos offence, and even when he missed good shots he would take the same shot on the next possession with no hesitation. Seems to be taking too many jumpers though he definitely needs to make sure he improves his dribble, quickness, and strength.

Its great to see Bargnani play to his potential. So many coaches have tried and failed, but Casey has gotten through to them…for 6 games at least.

[T-Dot-BallerParticipant]

Bargnani is much more talented than Nowitski and its about time raptors fans are seeing this. All the raps need is a solid shot blocking center (Jonas V coming soon) a solid small forward via draft-MKG and I can see a very formidable team with a core of bargs and derozan. Also Jose is off to  a terrific start….when healthy he is one of the better points in the league. 

[benholt06Participant]

hahahaha. wrong

[db24kb24Participant]

 Bargnani is a scorer, wish he would/could rebound. I can’t blame him though EURO’s don’t like to rebound. Derozan really stepped his game up also, good to see (read on box scores). I’m suprised they let reggie evans go, he seemed to be the rebounding compliment for Andrea. Anyways it’s good 2 see the Raps on the right track again, finally. 

[T-Dot-BallerParticipant]

 Bargs not the best rebounder but defeneitly a much improved defender be it help defender

[fgrrghgParticipant]

 why would they ever keep reggie evans when theyre paing amir solid money and have ed davis waiting as well. Speaking of that, my only beaf with casey so far is that ed isnt getting enough time. Get big cat magloire out of there! (although he isnt playing too bad)

[Tongue-Out-Like-23Participant]

"Andrea is actually competing."

You’re not competing unless you’re doing everything you can do win.  0.6bpg, 0.4spg, 5.8rpg suggest otherwise.

[db24kb24Participant]

If your waiting on Ed and Amir you better grab a Snickers. I mean how much promise do you see in either? And Amir is getting 5mil, solid for a common man but chump change in the league. They aren’t even trade bait. Raps have to put something(a lot) more around Calderon(30)-Bargnani-Derozan sooner than later.

[seniokasParticipant]

 Im still high on Kleiza, its interesting how will he play after his surgery because at the moment the 3 spot is the weakest in Raptors starting five so Kleiza could help a lot.

He is versatile 3 who can play 4 standing 6’8 and around 245 with a strong frame and ability to shoot from downtown he is also able to bang inside sometimes. I think he can be a good mismatch player in some games and if he will be in similar shape as he was in 2010 world championship than watchout. You may think that he is a bust or overpaid and overrated player, but believe me he is a great player offensively although not quite as good defensively and I easily could see him averaging like 15 and 6 with >50% shooting.

Another good thing is that he is a leader, some players are afraid to take ball in the last minutes when the result is tied, so he is definetely not one of them. I still remember his winning three pointer 1.7 seconds left against Manu’s and Scola’s Argentina in 2008 olympics.

We will see how will he bounce back after the injury and I’m eager to see him especially when he is believed to be back in the end of January so very soon.

[OhCanada-Participant]

I agree, Klieza could have a huge role on this team. Butler is very inconsistant with his jumper, and James Johnson is a turnover prone, foul prone, defensive spark who forces bad shots and has no offensive game outside of a bit of playmaking abillities. We need a small forward to stretch the floor, space it out, knock ddown threes within the flow of the offence, rebound to compensate for what Bargnani lacks, play solid within the teams defensive approach, and be a bit nasty which James Johnson provides now.

[Mr. 19134Participant]

 I can’t believe some of the crazy things people say.  Like Bargnani being more talented then Dirk, and 5 mil being chump change, and what does a salary have to do with a guy’s performance anyway?

I have always like Bargs, I have always wanted for the Sixers to somehow pull off an Iggy for Bargs trade which I thought was a possibility during the draft considering Casey is defensive minded and they drafted Jonus V.  So I’m thinking a starting lineup of Calderon, Derozan, Iguadola, Ed Davis, Jonus V, would be extremely exciting and competive.

I’m also really surprised that Derozan is already becoming such a 3 pt threat I didn’t think that would happen for like another 2 years.  DDR is really developing fast and it’s fun to see.  The Raptors future suddenly looks extremely bright.  They are just missing they’re PG of the future because I think Calderon is too old to lead this team into this young decade.  But imagine getting somebody like Tony Wroten in the draft and watch out.  And whats up with Sonny Weems is he still over in Europe?  Him and DDR are lightning on the court together.

[db24kb24Participant]

 Mr. 19134 What does salary have to do with performance? Ask the man who is paying Rashard Lewis 22 million dollars! Think about how much they are struggling and then look at their salary cap. 5 mil for what Amir was based off of potential and hopes that he would turn into the ROLE player that he is projected to be. What? 6pts 6 boards for 5mil? Reggie is making 1.3 mil this year, and he is a much better rebounder than Amir. Somebody commented saying Amir was being paid Big $, that’s midlevel money and easily feasable to most NBA teams. But when you are the toronto raptors it hurts a lot more when all you get is 6pts 6rbs avging 25 mins for a guy in his 6th year. Thats not’s not getting the job done. 

[mcbaileyParticipant]

@Based-Out-Like-23: It’s hard for a player like Bargnani to get offensive rebounds because a big part of his game is playing away from the basket, and that’s going to deflate his rebound total for any given night. That said, Dirk is averaging less rebounds this year, and I don’t think many people would say that he’s not competing. You have to play with what your skillset is, and Andrea is doing just that.

[WizardofOzParticipant]

 If only the Wizards had a coach like Casey to starighten out Blatche. *Sigh*

[Scottoant93Participant]

DD and Bargnani duo is looking like the next big thing for the raps if they can do this game in and game out raps might be a borderline playoff team.

Bargnani is improving constantly and will continue to improve as he adjusts to the the new system(remember training camp was short,so was preseason) same goes fo demar(wasn’t a big fan but he continues to improve and is playing well now). I remember when raps fan were split between Bargnani and the Young Guns(or whatever they were called) as the future. They should have just realized that they only needed demar and Bargs

[FellyBaby905Participant]

no more talk abobut reggie evans…..he could rebound thats it…..was an absolute terrible defender…..amir gets solid boards but plays good d………remember toronto raptors are 1st in opposing fg% so far

[HaleParticipant]

 I really like Derozan. He seems to have improved on everything at least a little bit and he made big adjustments between his rookie season and last year. I think he is a guy with great work ethic that no one really talks about and I hope he keeps imrpoving until he gets to that star level we all thought he could when he got drafted.

[JNixonParticipant]

Derozan is better than I thought he’d be coming out of college. He was a guy who was a spot-up jump shooter, nice size and nice yet overrated athleticism. Now he’s been looking to score much more, he’s made steady improvements on his jumper, assertiveness, and handle. He still doesn’t pass much or defend as good as I thought (he seemed like he was going to develop into a stopper in his rookie year), but he’s scoring the ball better than I ever thought he would this soon. He still is like a Richard Jefferson in his prime type of player, and you can do alot worse than that.

[PulseGlazerParticipant]

I can see DDR as a Jefferson type, but given his age and rapid rate of improvement, it’s not hard to see him ending up doing more than that, either.  Jefferson never really had this kind of nose for the basket.

And Bargnani, it seems, is going to be controversial all year.  So, let’s step this up – is he an Eastern All Star right now?  At the 5, he’d be behind Dwight and Noah, but has he been as good or better than Horford or Bogut?

[Author]

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