The Raptors are playing the Phoenix Suns soon, who some people call the Raptors of the West. I do not really see it, but I suppose they both play basketball and have floors made of wood. Scottie Barnes is currently questionable with an illness, and Collin Murray Boyles has a thumb sprain.
I remember once having a thumb sprain in the eleventh grade while trying to open a jar of pickles at my uncle’s house in Wexford. It did not make me a lottery pick, but it did make me skip gym class for a week. Scottie might have the same thing Brandon Ingram has, which sounds like something you catch from being near a swamp.
People are starting to call the team soft after some things happened in the Pelicans game. Josh Lewenberg says the season is slipping away and nobody is saying, "enough is enough," which is a very dramatic thing to say. I usually say that when the line at the Warden station Jamaican patty place is too long, but I still wait in line anyway.
The Clock is Ticking Later
There is a lot of confusion about why the home games against the Pelicans and Kings on March 27 and April 1 are scheduled for late tipoffs. It feels strange to be at the Scotiabank Arena that late on a weekday. The sun goes down, the streetcar gets weirder, and we are all still sitting there watching free throws.
Maybe the league thinks we live in a different time zone now, or maybe they just want to make sure we are fully awake for the third quarter collapse. My neighbor says it is for TV markets, but he also once told me that Jamario Moon could have been the Prime Minister. I am not sure I trust his grasp on logistics.
Statistical Progress is Relative
The offense is technically better than it was last year, which is a bit like saying the weather is better because it is raining instead of snowing. We are still in the bottom ten of the league. It is progress, in the sense that walking in a circle is technically movement.
We watch the ball move around, and sometimes it goes in the hoop, and often it does not. We are watching a promising season slip into the abyss, and we are doing it while being called soft. I do not mind the soft label as much as others do, mostly because I enjoy a good loaf of bread, which is also soft.
Maybe Collin Murray Boyles will fix his thumb and Scottie will feel better after some soup. Until then, we just wait for the late games and hope the offense moves up to the bottom eleven. That would be something to talk about at the memorabilia shop.