The start of the weekend mail, as usual

A bit of rant – not mine, but one I’m proud of – to start and then some of the usual stuff.

I’m on a plane most of the morning, will get to what I get to when I get to Orlando. And it’s looking increasingly like a lobby bar stool tonight since few of you gave me Orlando ideas, which I contend says as much about Orlando as it does you.

Have fun.

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Q: Hi Doug. This isn't a question. Well, not my usual sort. It's a rant. And I hope as a Tenured Irregular you'll allow me to say this here. I was sort of amused by your grumping about game ops and how inane you find them. Amused because I watch all my Raptors games and TV and am spared from having to endure them. But during the home opener Wednesday night I found it somewhat insulting to have the camera focus repeatedly during the game on bosomy women jumping up and down waving those bits of cloth souvenirs handed out to all attending the game.

Sadly, I find women sports fans are still often thought of as either wishing to engage with athletes or encouraging their children; seldom is consideration given to the fact that many of us are intelligent fans of the game. These images do nothing to illustrate positive images of women as serious, thoughtful sports fans.

However, that being said, everyone has their own definition of fun, and we all watch and attend games for different reasons, but I wonder whose idea it was to broadcast - and indeed, linger - over those particular images and how does one go about encouraging them to rethink their shot selection? Thank you.

Lorie P, London

A:I think you may just have; I believe a few people with titles in the office may see this. Or have it pointed out to them.

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Q: We had a power outage last night and almost missed my alarm this morning - good thing we have a dog that was hungry.

This got me thinking about close calls that you might have had throughout the years. Have you ever almost missed a game because your watch was set wrong, or the snooze button was hit when it shouldn't have been?

Traveling would also be difficult especially with all the different time zones you could cross. Do you have to set your watch accordingly every time you are about to travel?

Lastly, how do you keep track of game start times? Do you have a Blackberry device that keeps track of those things?

Just curious.

S S, Newmarket

A: I’ve actually been very lucky over the course of a decade and a half of a lot of winter travel. The only game I’ve missed, at least that I can recall, was a home game on a Sunday night against San Antonio – it was actually the game Bosh went past 10,000 points, if I remember correctly – and it was because silly Air Canada couldn’t get me out of Logan on time because of weather. Other than that? I’ve lived a pretty good travel life.

But the greatest fear? We book so far in advance that I’m afraid I’m going to be flying to, say, Charlotte, while the team’s going to say, Orlando. Never happened but it’s what I fear.

As for game times and the like? I do it week-by-week and hope I don’t screw up.

So far, so good.

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Q: Doug, there are times when I watch DeMar that his game reminds me a little bit of HWSNBN. Could you please compare how you think DeMar would measure up to HWSNBN when he was at this stage in his career?

Jordan Z, Toronto

A: In his third year, Vince was exponentially better than DeMar is right now; he had deeper shooting range, a far more explosive first step and a knack for getting to the rim and dunking that DeMar can only hope to emulate some day.

Look, I think DeMar’s got some major talent but he’s no Vince. I think time has clouded people’s memories at just how good HWSNBN was.

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Q: Hi Doug. Thanks as always for your diligence on the blog. Not sure where you find the time/energy to do it. Couple of questions for you.

I saw that Damien Cox wrote an article about the HOTHC. How long before you write one about the Leaves?

You've mentioned many times that it's very difficult to compare stats from one basketball league to the NBA. In particular, you've talked about how the NBDL is probably good for showing who CAN'T play in the NBA, as opposed to who can.

How then is one to judge how well Jonas Valancinuas is doing given he plays in a different league?

Best wishes for you and Super Family for the New Year.

Sohail G, Collingwood

A: You are able to judge him primarily on the development of is skills, not by the success or failure of his team or his pure stats. You want to see if he’s getting more comfortable in screen-roll situations, you want to see if his footwork on defence is getting better, you want to see if the form on his jump shot is smooth and consistent, you want to see his body mature. Lots of ways to find out if he can play even though the relative merits of the two leagues are light years apart.

Me and the pucks?

Surely you jest!

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Q: Doug: You were so anti-Babcock in the past. And you have been so positive-Colangelo over his tenure.

Will you now, with this terrible team, admit that Colengelo is a failure. When he entered with the Raps, he had a #1 pick, cap space, a budding all-start in Chris Bosh, and he still couldn't take this dream situation and turn the Raps into a credible playoff team....Terrible!

Doug, I believe your cheerleading of Colangelo has made you a modest accomplice to the sad state we are seeing with the raps.

I truly hope one day you will hold Colangelo's feet to the fire, as you did with Babcock (although undeservedly in that case).

Sincerely, a disheartened Raps fan craving for the media to call it like it is!

Jessu S, Toronto

A: This is one of these great ones: It’s not so much a question as a plea for validation of an opinion and you’re barking up the wrong tree.

When he entered the Raps, he had a No. 1 pick, a terrible roster, some money to spend and – to kind of refresh your seemingly failing memory – he turned that team into a 47-win division champion. Yes, things went on a downward trend after that season and, oh yeah, the playoff team of the next year but they are, in my opinion, on the upswing now.

Sorry to disappoint and not agree with you but I have a feeling you don’t truly want people to “call it like it is” as much as you want people to “hey, agree with me, I’m right and you’re wrong.”

The Goods On The Game, Raptors at Mavericks

Hey folks.

Welcome back

You don't get respect, you earn it

Well, that didn’t take long.

My man C. Kelly reports that there was a little snippet of the “respect” card played at Raptors practice on Thursday when they were breaking down the Wednesday night Indy game.

(I was sitting in a tiny plane waiting to de-ice before the flight down to Dallas, sorry I missed it).

Anyway, here’s the pertinent Casey quote; thanks Cathal.

“Toughness. We’ve got to continue to play hard and aggressive and then that’s when you get the respect of the officials. When our guys are playing hard, when the guys are doing that then the officials will see that that’s how the Toronto Raptors are playing, they’re playing hard they’re playing physical, they’re getting on the floor after loose balls they’re not the same Toronto team of the past.”

Already, two games in, and we are were we’ve been so many times in the past, with the HOTH worried about treatment from officials and the fairness of whistles and the reputation they have.

Here’s a wee bit of advice from a guy who’s heard it so many times before:

Play hard more often. Not two games, not five games, not three games this month and three games in February or a game or two in March and maybe a couple in April.

Dwane’s exactly right: If you do that every single night, “get after it” in the vernacular, it’s not only going to be officials who respect you, it’s going to be opponents and that’s ever more important.

Look, were there some questionable ticky-tack fouls called against Toronto in the Indy game? Sure.

Look, were there some questionable fouls called against Indy in the Toronto game? Sure.

There will be every night. It’s part of the game; I still say NBA officials do, on the whole, an excellent job with their judgment calls. A lot of the whiny about the non-whistles was just that, whining and trying to “work the refs,” and I’m not sure it works (it truly does become white noise often). Nothing speaks louder than action and the only ones who can turn any “perception” of the HOTH are the HOTH.

The Raps have shown in very little spurts a willingness to play “hard” in the past, they have never really done it consistently for more than a handful of games in a row.

We’re at two and counting this season, I have no clue whether it’ll turn into 10 games or 20 or three, but until it’s a regular occurrence, they can’t complain.

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Hey, everyone ready for Amateur Night, aka New Year’s Eve?

Since tomorrow starts stupid early and includes a practice in Orlando that won’t finish until 5 p.m., there’s every chance the night will be an evening at the airport Marriott lobby bar or this really dumpy buck-a-beer joint we know in a strip mall on Semoran.

But in case things get done early, any suggestions welcome.

I’m not a big Orlando fan by any stretch, it seems a city without a soul, or even a neighbourhood, so your help won’t hurt.

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I notice waaaaaaaaay deep in the news down here that there’s some Leaves puck angst going on, they don’t seem to be, you know, very good right now and all that blather about being among the best in the East sure seems a few years ago, doesn’t it?

All I’m waiting for now is for the coach to tweet his apologies that his special teams blow and the promise of the first six weeks is being replaced by reality.

Whaddya say, Ron?

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Last shot for mail, which I think we’ll end up doing both Saturday and Sunday as usual, despite the Friday game. Helps with travel (a 4:30 a.m. Central wakeup time Saturday’s a bit of a pain) and keeps us on the even keel) and it’s all about me.

Do it here, please.

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So the Mavs come home for tonight 0-3 after losing at the buzzer in Oklahoma City on Thursday following two blowouts at home and you have to know they’ll be rather grumpy.

But we do get to see our old HWSNBN friend and he might be a bit grumpy to. But I bet if some of you watch these highlights from last night – where Vince makes an apparent game-winner with a second left only to have Durant win it – you’ll feel pretty good.

All I know about tonight’s game is that there’s a good chance something wacky happens.

Last year the Raptors had about eight guys because of injuries, Linas got thrown out, Jerryd tweaked an ankle or something and they won.

Think it was the year before when they were up 25 or something like that and lost.

And now they get the defending champs on a three-game losing streak after a heart-breaking loss? Might be an interesting night if the Mavs are truly grumbly and want to make a point.

We’ll be here about 8:30 for one of those IGBT if you’ve got nothing going on for a Friday night.

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Teen pucks 10, Danes 2?

Yeah, that’s a true “world championship” isn’t it?

Why don’t they cut it down to the three or four teams that are, you know, legitimate, play a round robin and get it all over with.

It’s kind of like women’s Olympic hockey (wanna good bet? The 2018 gold medal game will be Canada-US) with no depth of talent and it’s becoming something of a joke early in the tournament, isn’t it?

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Hmm, this whole idea of getting this thing up and posted by 7 a.m. East each day might take a beating now that time zones are part of my life.

You Tall Foreheads understand, right?

Thanks.

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Bad numbers, bad starts but not a bad game

Well, that wasn’t too bad, was it?

Hardly a brilliantly-executed game, no question about it, but the HOTH played hard – there were more opposing bodies on the floor in that game than in some months the last couple of seasons – and it was a game until the final four or five seconds.

Can’t ask for much more than that and if they keep it up, I have a feeling you might come to like this team.

Anyway …

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THREE POINTERS

A telling stat

Toronto: Free throw attempts, 13.

Toronto: Three-point field goal attempts, 21.

Not good enough.

Sure, the presence of Roy Hibbert at the rim had something to do with it, so does the fact Toronto still doesn’t have a guy outside of Barbosa who can break his man down and get to the rim and neither do they have a true post presence but somehow, that’s got to change.

And change fast.

Maybe Ed Davis is that post player with the second unit; maybe the fact Jose didn’t have a great game running high screen and roll to get Amir Johnson to the rim but they aren’t going to win many games taking 21 threes and 13 foul shots.

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Showing it off

It was only a half dozen possessions or so but the Raptors unveiled their zone defence in the first half and, for the most part, it was quite effective.

I think the chicken scratch in notebook says they got stops and transition baskets on each of the first two possessions and Dwane said after the game he was pretty pleased with how it worked.

It’s going to become something of a defensive staple for these guys, the coach likes it because it changes the look just enough to get you a couple of quick stops and even if there were some blips last night, it’s fully on course to be a regular thing.

One good example of its use: Think it was the dying seconds of the first half, Pacers have the ball, Raps set up in the zone, which had befuddled them at times. Indy calls timeout, Raps do the expected and come out of the timeout playing man-to-man and get a turnover. Solid, if unspectacular, coaching.

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A hesitant start

Much was made of DeMar DeRozan’s big fourth quarter and second half (he “single-handedly got us back in the game, offensively” was how Dwane put it) but maybe enough wasn’t made of his scoreless first half.

Maybe it was opening night jitters, maybe it was the defence of Paul George but DeRozan looked tentative and quite out of sync in those opening two quarters.

And if he’s not playing well offensively, there really isn’t enough firepower in that starting unit – given that small forward seems an offence-free zone – to make up for it.

DeRozan was indeed good in the second half; he’s got to be better in the first and he hasn’t been in either of the first two games.

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And …

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Hey! Remember when we used to do this?

I just did. Here’s how the one and only Mike Wells summed up that affair.

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Glorious teen pucks triumph, I hear.

Sadly, I’ll be spending the next five or six days south of the border, someone will have to let me know how the rest of the tournament unfolds; I’ll be a part of the world (which is everywhere but here) where no one pays a bit of attention to it.

Lucky me.

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You saw the dastardly Red Sox traded for all-star closer Andrew Bailey from Oakland yesterday, right?

Wonder if the Jays were second in those talks, too?

Seriously, though, I’m sure Alex is working every day trying to get something – stealth seems to be his modus operandi – but with everyone in the league seemingly doing something, he’d better pull the trigger on some kind of deal/signing soon.

Not to say he should rush into a deal simply to get something done but an off-season of great promise is slipping quickly away (must be less than two months until pitchers and catchers report), time is of the essence and the fans have to be getting impatient.

But he still shouldn’t do Prince Fielder. That’ll never change.

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With the exception of the picture of the Scrawny Beebs Thingy, the IGBT was pretty good last night, if I do say so myself.

Take a read through if you don’t believe me. You may have to scroll through this to find it but it’s worth it.

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Digression time.

(For those of you who only want sports, the scroll key’s probably near your right hand)

See this story? About the firestorm brewing over some people tweeting the location of RIDE checkpoints over the holidays?

Bad.

Very, very, very bad.

Don’t do it folks, it’ll only encourage those who booze and get behind the wheel; it’s in some ways cowardly and not a socially responsible thing to do.

No, it’s not like flashing you high beams at an oncoming driver to warn of a speed check coming up; it’s far more dangerous than that and you shouldn’t do it.

Please.

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Well, there were the typical histrionics to accompany the game, as we’d expected and talked about yesterday.

The best?

Well, if you adopt Shook Me All Night Long as the sing-along anthem for, say, the end of every third quarter, I’m quite okay with that.

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Mail?

Love some.

Deep thoughts, please. Right here.

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The Goods On The Game, Pacers at Raptors

Hey folks.

Welcome to the home opener

Gray cleared, Raptors have full complement for home opener

The Raptors might be a bit bigger for their home opener than they were for Monday’s game in Cleveland.

Hulking 7-foot centre Aaron Gray, who sat out the first game of the season as a precaution after an elevated heart rate popped up, has been cleared to play and will be available for Wednesday’s home opener against the Indiana Pacers.

Coach Dwane Casey said this morning he wasn’t sure how much – or even if – Gray would play but having a wide-bodied 7-footer available against an Indiana team that boasts Roy Hibbert in the middle can’t hurt.

“We need that extra body, his size and physical play. He’s one of our best post defenders, we need him,” was how Casey put it Wednesday morning.

And being able to guard the post one-on-one is huge.

“Indiana’s one of the top offensive rebounding teams in the league, they averaged 18 in the two exhibition games and the first (regular season) game,” said Casey. “When you’re double teaming and rotating, when the shot goes up and you’re in the process of rotating, bodies are loose … that’s what really gets you more than anything else.”

Other than that, it’s business as usual for Toronto.

They’ll trot out the same starters -- Jose Calderon, DeMar DeRozan, Rasual Butler, Andrea Bargnani and Amir Johnson – as they did Monday night in Cleveland.

 

 

Unfortunately, the game is seldom the thing

I’ve been quite lucky oh, these so many years, to have seen an awful lot of professional sports.

Basketball games, the odd hockey game, baseball games, football games, games of significance and games that have meant absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things.

I have seen full houses and half-empty arenas and it’s always struck me that pro sports teams treat the fans in the seats like they are, well, mindless dopes with the attention span of fleas.

And the NBA is, by a country mile, the worst offender.

It’s never really about the game, is it? It’s about the “entertainment experience” and the peripheral stuff, the noise, the distractions, the noise, the timeout antics, the noise, the stuff that really has nothing to do with the actual competition on the floor, ice or ersatz grass.

Baseball does stuff with dancers on the dugouts and stuffed animals roaming the stands.

Football has the dancing girls and the marching bands.

Hockey has the in-game host, and the contests and, in some arenas, I’m told, packs of roving dancers/cheerleaders.

Basketball? All of that, and more.

I guess – although I’m not entirely sure – that the patrons who fork over such big bucks to actually go to games want to be entertained constantly although watching them during the “contests” doesn’t prove that to be true.

Mostly – and I look quite often – they are talking to each other or staring off into space, anxious for, you know, the game to come back.

You can’t put that genie back in the bottle, we are never going to go back to the time when the play carried the night but I do wish we could put a halt to the escalation of the antics.

Every timeout, or stoppage in play, or pitching change cries out for something to happen. And I think what irks me more than anything else is the “scripted” nature of most games.

You know, first timeout of the fourth quarter we’re going to do this. First pitching change we’re going to do this. First TV timeout of the second period we’re going to do this.

If teams are going to bombard fans with ancillary stuff, at least have some sense of timing, know what the mood in the building is like, what place the game is in when it’s time to turn up the volume.

A little immediate creativity would go a long way, I think, to making a night feel more spontaneous, and perhaps engage those fans in a more meaningful manner.

Will it happen? No way. It’s too hard. And, besides, no one’s really complaining. Sadly.

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You’re not going to believe what I saw when the Smelly Ford Focus made a coffee stop at the Angola rest area on the New York State Thruway while hightailing it back from Cleveland.

A guy talking on a pay phone!

Really.

I didn’t know they still had ‘em, let alone had ones that work and if I had to make a call on one today, I swear I wouldn’t know how much money to put in.

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Wonder what’s in store for the folks in the seats tonight?

Unsure, actually. No one’s really talking about intro videos or timeout shenanigans and I’m quite all right with that.

For sure, whatever ditty they use to do video to introduce the team will be foreign to me, I’ll expect some help, but other than that …

Here are three things I truly hope they don’t do:

The silly over-and-under game.

You know the one, they march some lucky fan to midcourt, put a playing card up on the ribbon boards around the arena and he or she has to guess whether the next one will be higher or lower.

Saps whatever energy there is right out of the building.

Baby races

Yeah, we really want to see scared kids crawling to pleading moms and dads. Fun? Wow!

SportsCentre highlights

I see enough pucks as it is, thank you very much.

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I think we can all agree James Johnson is one of the more intriguing Raptors – along with one of the more frustrating ones some nights.

He’s big and strong, willing to play a role as a defensive specialist and I know Dwane Casey is quite interested in his potential.

But what’s going to kill Johnson’s playing time – and he knows it – are his turnovers. Ghastly, some of them; and far too frequent. He had four the other night in Cleveland – that seems to be about the norm for him – I think two were for travelling, one was where he bounced a pass off Andrea’s head and I can’t remember the other.

To him, a solution is easy:

Slow the hell down, or at least that’s what he was saying yesterday at practice:

“It starts here in practice, getting more shots up five-on-five, moving the ball during five-on-five, making the right play and making the right pass. Got a long ways to go but it’s close.

“I worked hard during the summer but I hadn’t played a real five-on-five game until the first Boston pre-season games; a couple more games in and things will start slowing down for me.”

I guess that’s the same for every young player – and Johnson is just in his third season and has only been a starter for less than half a season – but he’s got to be better.

Small forward is a bit of a black hole for this team, everyone knows it; it’s a job waiting to be claimed and if Johnson can cut down on his mistakes, the job is his.

He is a very good defender and looks like he could be a pretty good rebounder but he can’t be coughing up the ball as often as he has been.

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Oh, you were wondering about what I would like to see in timeouts?

Sing-alongs

Not with Jack and Matt necessarily but the in-house karaoke I see in other arenas and stadiums is cool.

I know we haven’t come up with a song but there has to be one, right?

If all else fails, if you can’t get these guys …

Remember these guys …

The Chicken

You cannot get enough of his/her/its hijinks. You can’t.

The Chicken, I’m told, spent some time on the DL in the summer after a rather serious tumble during a road trip to China (can you imagine the look on the Shanghai doctor’s face when a big red dinosaur with a bum leg came in?) but he/she/it is back in shape.

The June Taylor Dancers

Why not, right?

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First call for mail; there are weekend games and a road trip so I’m not sure what will get done when but I’m pretty sure some of you are just dying to say hi and get something off your chest, right?

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Don’t forget, it’s a 6 p.m. start time tonight (those of us with deadlines thank you) and that means about a 5:50 p.m. start to the IGBT.

Come one, come all.

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Good things from the Raptors; not so much from Brees

Overall, not a bad night for the fans and the lads, right?

Good defence against a bad team, very good offence compared to what we’ve been seeing in the pre-season and a road win’s always a good thing.

Biggest surprise had to be how well the offence worked (again the Cavs had a little bit to do with that); biggest disappointment, if there was one, was the continued lack of offensive production out of the small forward spot but that’s nitpicking.

And here we go …

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THREE-POINTERS

A quick glimpse?

Got a first look at what kind of thing Dwane Casey might draw up in big situations and it was a good one.

End of the first half, they’re up eight, Dwane uses his 20-second timeout and we’re wondering what he calls.

He’s got two big weapons – Bargnani and DeRozan – and one of them are going to get the ball for sure, right?

Well, Jose dribbles down the clock, there’s a meanlngless handoff to kill some time, and there goes DeRozan around a Bargnani screen, heads to the rim, Jose hits him with a perfect lob and a dunk ends the half.

And if the defender had gone with DeRozan and taken away the lob, Bargnani simply pops to the top and probably gets an open look.

Of course, every scout in the NBA will have that play diagrammed for their teams by about noon today but it was a good one I’m sure we’ll see again.

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Two big ones

Yes, Amir Johnson had a very good game, 13 points, 13 rebounds, three blocked shots in his first start and, yes, he was quite bouncy.

But he also made two big plays that few might have noticed but were precisely what was needed.

Final minute, game’s probably over but you can’t be sure and not once, but twice, Johnson gets offensive rebounds, the second on a really nice tap-back of miss, that seal the win.

That’s the kind of extra effort that should be rewarded, and noticed.

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Fire the big guns

So, do you like the Casey “this is not a democracy” idea that’s prominent in the game story I’m sure you’ve all read and loved?

(Here it is, if you haven’t?)

I do. Just hope it keeps up.

There is no doubt that, last night notwithstanding, there will be times when the offence isn’t as good as it was and this team struggles to score.

With the coach more than willing to clearly define roles, everyone will know where to look and who’ll get the touches and the shots and as long as the other Raptors know it, accept it and work at it, everyone should be fine with it.

Of course, there will be nights when both of them are cold, and Toronto will likely lose those nights, but having those two guys imbued with the confidence that they’ll get their chance has to help.

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And now, a digression or two and more hoops …

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Look, we all like Drew Brees, right? The New Orleans Saints quarterback is hugely talented, a nice self-effacing young man, having a season for the ages and just a good story all around; we can all agree on that.

But the thing last night? The chasing of Dan Marino’s single-season passing yardage record in the second-to-last regular season game? It stunk.

No one seemed at all up in arms about – probably because the home fans loved and it was a nice story and, well, Brees is Brees but, really?

Leaving guy in during a rout, letting him keep throwing meaningless passes to run up the score when the game was decided, including a totally meaningless TD that set the new mark?

Disrespectful. A nice little running up of the score and rubbing the noses of an opponents in the dirt that we’d be decrying if it wasn’t Brees and these circumstances.

Yes, I know. Good story, great record, helluva guy, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Let him get the record at the start of next week’s game, when that game is still in doubt and means something.’

It was nice to see and a wonderful accomplishment; how it was achieved kind of left a bad taste in the mouth.

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So, Tristan Thompson?

As advertised. Active, long, quick, good rebounder, raw rookie, work-in-progress and really, really offensively challenged.

But there’s a lot of promise there, the Brampton kid sure looked like a keeper in his first game and when the season really goes south for the Cavs – and it will – I can’t see why he wouldn’t supplant Antawn Jamison, 84, in the starting lineup.

If they’re going to play Irving a lot to see what they’ve got, they may as well throw Thompson out there for 30 minutes a night instead of 18.

Although, I must say, a frontcourt of Thompson and Anderson Varejao may be retina-burning for its offensive abilities more than four feet from the basket.

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I cannot believe I didn’t use this either yesterday morning or during the IGBT last night. Dopey me.

Speaking of the IGBT, we do have a lot of fun most nights. Read through it here and make it destination reading for the rest of the games.

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Been travelling to Cleveland to cover games for something like 17 years now and saw two things this trip that I’ve never seen before:

A post-game spot that peddles Samuel L. Smith products (try the pale ale, you won’t be disappointed) and construction on a downtown building.

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Teen pucks win?

They won’t be dancing in the street when I get back this afternoon, will they?

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Seems Dwane’s been channeling, um, me with this quote:

“It was good that we had this opportunity to get our offence kicking a little bit, it’s still a process. We don’t want to get happy on the farm, it’s one game. We just have to continue to execute.

“Again, I like what I saw; it’s a process. I don’t want to get too excited on wins and I don’t want to get too upset with losses. There’s 65 more game.”

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Long drive back, lots of work to do when it's over; if I'm a tad late on comments, don't get upset, promise I'll get to 'em.

 

 

The Goods On The Game, Raptors at Cavs

Hope this works

Casey not giving out Raptors starters yet

A wee new twist this season: We’ll try to get some kind of post-shootaround stuff up, if they have a shootaround in this oddest of seasons, of course.

Today’s news:

Well, Dwane Casey knows who’s going to start to the Raptors but we don’t yet.

Casey didn’t want to give up his starting five – the biggest question would be at centre with point guard perhaps a consideration – because this is a truly odd situation.

With only two exhibition games, no team is fully ready to start the season and any advantage they can get, they’ll take.

It’s not going to be a major secret after the first few games but early … nobody knows,” said Casey. “It’s kind of unusual, nobody really gave their whole offensive package in the two exhibition games. Everybody’s kind of in the dark.”

The choice at centre, of course, is Jamaal Magloire, Aaron Gray or Amir Johnson, unless Casey goes against all form and starts Ed Davis alongside Andrea Bargnani. The Cavs are expected to go with Antawn Jamison and Anderson Varejao in the front court, which would lead to some speculation that the quicker Johnson may get the call for Toronto.

And one Cavs mystery has been cleared up.

Cleveland coach Byron Scott told everyone Monday morning that rookie Kyrie Irving, the first overall pick in last June’s draft, has beaten out veteran Ramon Sessions as the Cavs’ starting point guard.

“He’s a guy who has a great command of the basketball in his hands, he thinks attack first,” Casey said of Irving. “I think he’s had seven three-pointers or something like that – I can’t remember the number – but he’s capable. Once he starts to knock those down, he’s going to be a terrific, terrific player. But, again, he’s an attack-mode type point guard.”

In other news, Casey said that both Leandro Barbosa, who's been bothered by a back back, and Anthony Carter, who missed both pre-season games with a sore shoulder, are available for tonight's opener.

That’s about it from delightful Cleveland; we’ll be back right around seven for the game.