Paul Jones

Paul Jones is the voice of the Raptors on the FAN 590 and writes regularly for Sportsnet.ca.

The Bynum-Bosh deal is just the first of a number of ridiculous trade rumours you will hear before the impending deadline.

It's silly season folks and as we approach the trade deadline on February 18 there will be many crazy rumours out there for you to sift through and find out how much truth, if any, there is to all of them. The latest rumour has Chris Bosh going to Los Angeles for Andrew Bynum.

First off, Bynum is a base-year compensation player which means his trade value is not the full value of the contract he is being paid. Secondly, while he might be a good fit in Toronto, why would you trade one of the league's top players straight up for a guy who is a celebrated role player? Bynum has not shown any consistency and has his "star" looking brighter than it really is because of the people he is playing with in Los Angeles, namely Kobe Bryant. It also doesn't hurt to have the likes of Pau Gasol and Lamar Odom around either.

From this seat, I don't trade Bosh until I have to do so. When he says, I'm gone at the end of the year, then its time to deal and even then, I do it in the off-season after I have signed him to a max contract. Heck, he's going to get max somewhere else if he leaves and at least this way, you have more money to trade and hopefully take back some decent players from your trade partner. Until then, Bosh works for me. Remember, it is silly season.

Bosh had one of his best "traffic jams" in a long time on Sunday when he served up a huge helping of what I like to call "grilled cheese" for Shelden Williams in the second quarter.

The moniker from this was given to me by former Raptor Oliver Miller -- funny to get a food reference from Miller, huh? He always used to say that back in the day when there a serious dunk on a player or what some of my broadcast colleagues called "a facial". The root of it, grill - obviously for being in the face (grill) and cheese coming from the grimace of the defender that is immortalized in pictures or as Miller used to say, "smile for the picture, oh no, not the grilled cheese."

Back to Bosh; as I thought it was one of the most powerful I'd seen from him in years at which point someone on media row said, with a laugh, "His (Williams) wife probably does that to him all the time."

For the record, Williams is married to WNBA star Candace Parker, who is the sister of former Raptor Anthony Parker.

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For those Raptor fans that were upset at the loss to the Celtics last night, I'll say this; Boston is a championship-calibre team. I said it at the start of the season and am sticking to it. If the Celtics are healthy, they will win the NBA title. The key word is i.

I received a text midway through the first quarter from one of my broadcast colleagues in another city during a time-out which read, "Hey, tell the Raptors the game started at 1:00 p.m.".

No kidding huh? The start of the game was a killer for Toronto as they were down 10 less than two minutes in and never effectively recovered.

Thanks to his post-game comments yesterday, Hedo Turkoglu has created a bit of stir, hinting that he needs to have the ball in his hands more. To be truthful, Turkoglu handling the ball is not an issue. He may not have it as much as he would like to but he does have it enough to create plays when you consider there are a couple of capable point guards in the line-up.

As for yesterday, late in the game, put yourself in head coach Jay Triano's position. Do you give the ball to a guy who you need to make a play but doesn't have his best game with him? Or, do you go against your better judgment and give it to him regardless because he has made plays in the past with the game on the line? Triano chose the former, and let the second-guessing begin since Toronto lost the game. It says here that the post-game comments by Turkoglu probably represented a bit of a defense mechanism to deflect criticism of his play with a convenient excuse, at least yesterday, of saying he needed to have the ball more.

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With the recent happenings around Gilbert Arenas, how coincidental is it that former NBA player Jayson Williams has pleaded guilty to shooting a limousine driver back in 2002.

In light of all that, it was interesting to sit and chat for a few minutes with one of the NBA's more grounded players in Boston's Ray Allen yesterday in the locker room. The conversation centered around life, kids, future, human interactions, socio-economic status and just everything about as far from basketball as possible.

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Rasheed Wallace might the NBA's best "villain" right now as the guy everybody loves to hate. But by all accounts, 'Sheed is a great teammate and the antithesis of the public's perception of him on the court. He's the guy that takes the rookies out and buys them custom-made suits and new luggage and really cares about his teammates. To quote one member of the Boston traveling party, "The dude just doesn't like refs."

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Is it too much to ask that the NBA's official website have recent picture of players with their current teams? It always makes me chuckle when I update my stats and numbers doing game prep and see a photo of a guy that is out dated. (Check out Turkoglu, or Marco Belinelli's photos or the aforementioned Wallace for that matter.)

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Hmmm, wonder of the network executives are having second thoughts about taking this Friday's upcoming game between Toronto and New York of national TV in the US. At the time they made the move, I can see why they did it. But since mid-December, Toronto and New York are both well about the .500 mark in a 17 game stretch. Just curious, I mean if you want offense, this game will sure have it.

And while we are on the subject of turnarounds, the Raptors have had their quickest turnaround in team history. They have fallen below .500 before and in past seasons the following reclamation projects should be noted. In 1999, they started the season 6-12 and it took 10 games to get back to the water mark at 14-14. More recently in 2006-07 the 3-9 start was fixed in 32 games when they hit .500 at 22-22. But this season it has only taken 8 games to get back to .500 after the 11-17 start when the won 7 of 8 to get back to 18-18.

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All the pundits predicted the Memphis Grizzlies would have difficult year and it sure started out that way with the Allen Iverson saga hovering over their heads. But in this space, more so than Scott Brooks, Lionel Hollins of the Grizzlies is the Coach of the Year to this point in the season. There are negotiations in the works that will see Hollins receive a contract extension and it is hard to argue with the results his team has produced this season.