All Day In The T-Dot-O For Exits And Goodbyes

I am off to Toronto tomorrow to cover Raptor exit interviews in the morning and later that night the battle to be 6th worst and claim the ping pong balls that go with it. The Nets have to win the lottery to keep their pick as it is only lottery protected for the top 3. The Raptors own their pick no matter where it happens to land. This game could be and likely will be one of the most ugly basketball games you ever watch. If you are a fan of car accidents this could be the basketball game for you.

The Raptors in the last two games have treated them basically as glorified exhibition games in which they try a number of odd line-ups and just accept whatever comes from that. I would expect Jose Calderon will not play once again and we see all of the normal starts play sparingly at best. Expect to see a lot of Solomon Alabi and probably even a Jaamal Magloire appearance. He is expect to address the crowd as he did to start the season. I will attempt not to puke while he is. He was on the Fan 590 today stating his desire to return to the Raptors. I would like to say if the Raptors have him back this will be a sign that Bryan Colangelo has made a mess out of this off-season. The reality is to have a guy on veteran minimum deal that has offered very little in terms of the on the court product is a waste of cap space.

Speaking of wasting money a rumour was rumbling on twitter that Raptors have offered former Laker and Net Sasha Vulajacic a contract for 4.5 million dollars for 4 years and grand total of 18 million dollars. This looks like a lesser version of the terrible mistake Bryan Colangelo made in signing Jason Kapono to an even larger deal few years back. He eventually was forced to trade away his mistake and was able to acquire Reggie Evans from the Sixers. If this is true than this is an epic failure on the part of Colangelo. It is not like "The Machine" is even still dating Paris Hilton. He spent the season over in Europe and actually had numbers that were not as good as Sonny Weems. You could get Weems for cheaper and he already has chemistry with your team. That said both Weems and the Raptors at last check were not even close to being on the same page. The Raptors do still hold his rights as a restricted free agent as they did off a qualifying offer to him prior to the lockout and him deciding to take his talents to Europe.

This off-season Colangelo has no room for his mistakes of the past. He needs to hit home runs and if he doesn't his future as the G.M would be in serious doubt you would have to figure. It all gets started after the epic disaster that the Nets and Raptors is likely to be. Colangelo will be able to go to work and would be able to talk with all none playoff teams about trades. Not that it will happen but one of those teams would be the Suns and perhaps Steve Nash would work with the Suns on a sign and trade that sends him to Toronto. It is highly unlikely but Colangelo as we have seen above tends to repeat himself good or bad. In fact if you added Nash he might even be able to make "The Machine" look good. Just doing some think out loud in the form of the written word.

So tomorrow check in on @Dinonationblog for details on Raptors Exit interviews ( Locker Clean Out Day minus the Locker Clean Out). I will be at least tweeting from the various pressers that are scheduled to begin at around 11am after the Raptors shoot around. Also if you have interest in being part of the Dino Nation Blog please check out the post below as we are starting to look for #TeamDNB and build the DNB to exciting new heights. I am also looking for someone to hang out with in between the pressers and the game tomorrow night so if you want to have lunch with me tomorrow could be your lucky day.

I can't lie and say that I am not happy to see this season almost over. I am happy because this was a very hard year for doing this. There have been some good moments for sure but when all is said and done it has been a difficult season. Still this off-season I am going to work hard to improve the DNB and make it even better than it ever has been. That is the goal and let's hope I am successful. After all of this end of season stuff is done. I likely will be taken a week or so off to refresh myself for the upcoming lottery, draft and off-season. But never fear even if I am on a vacation and something significant happens I will end my time off to get the news to you. Thanks to all of you for your support and love for another season. Hope to have some great material for you all from spending the day working in Toronto tomorrow.