Dwane Casey Will Be Back Is Headline Of A Busy Wednesday In Raptorland

Lots of news items to get to for the Toronto Raptors. Some additions to the front office were the story of the morning.

Raps name Bobby Webster vice-president of basketball management and strategy. Basically, its capologist. Worked in league office for 7 years
— Eric Koreen (@ekoreen) June 19, 2013

Webster hire seems like a good one by Raps. Can't be five people on planet who know the ins and outs of the CBA better than him
— Ryan Wolstat (@WolstatSun) June 19, 2013

Obviously the Raptors have some challenges to say the least in terms of the cap. Webster from all accounts seems to be one of the most qualified people you could hope to find. He was part of the NBA side that created this current CBA so if he doesn’t understand really does anyone? He also has a background in the analytics which is something that Raptors have been trying to make a bigger part of what they do in the last few seasons.

RT @nuggetsnews Nuggets scouting coordinator Dan Tolzman is taking a director-level scouting job with the #Raptors
— Josh Lewenberg (@JLew1050) June 19, 2013

Makes sense that Ujiri would want someone from Denver to head up his scouting staff. I will not try and pretend I know much about Dan Tolzman. What I do know is the Raptors scouting department has been lacking over the years and to blow it up makes a lot of sense. It also might make the move to remove Alvin Williams as a scout makes more sense. It was also pretty smart to have Tim Leiweke tie his name to firing of Williams rather than Masai. If you think about it though this was Ujiri making this call and he would have some experience with what Williams did or didn’t do as he was part of the organization when Ujiri was still here. Probably worked with him as well given Masai’s role in his last time around with the Raptors. Also when you consider Leiweke is on the record saying that Ujiri will make all basketball decisions it all seems to make sense. Still to make Leiweke the “bad guy” to given Alvin the boot makes sense as well.

Perhaps the biggest news of the day was the confirmation that Dwane Casey will be back for the final season of his contract extension. The Raptors would not mention anything in terms of the coaching staff which most feel is going to be getting a face-lift. The Raptors have promised an announcement about the fate of the staff will be coming in the future. Given all of the shuffling we have seen with the front office it would be little surprise if we see changes to the staff as well.

This is a positive move in my view to make some changes to the staff. What might be a key for how much faith the Raptors have in Casey is if any of the coaching staff has experience as a head coach and could be a candidate to replace Casey if things do not go well. Time will tell on that. What question still remains unanswered is what the Raptors plan is for the on court product but with the end of the NBA Finals set for tomorrow those answers should be coming soon.

One other note from today was the Raptors released their schedule for Summer League. This is being tweaked by the sounds of it to some type of tournament format. In the preliminary round they are set to have 3 games vs. Miami, San Antonio and Sacramento. Here is the rundown with dates and times.

• July 13 vs. Miami 7:30pm (Local Time 10:30pm Eastern Time)
•  July 14 vs. San Antonio 7:30pm (10:30pm Eastern Time)
• July 16 vs. Sacramento 3:00pm (6:00pm Eastern Time)

Raptors have already announced that Jonas Valanciunas, Terrence Ross and Quincy Acy will be part of the roster for Las Vegas. This will obviously be an important time for all three. It also would be a target to have the coaching staff in place to prepare for Summer League so that might give you some idea as to when we might hear about the coaching staff.