Paul Jones

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

Hedo Turkoglu wants to play in Atlanta Friday night.

Hedo Turkoglu will try a wide variety of protective masks in an attempt to play against the Hawks.

As many thought, its going to come down to the final few games to see who gets the eighth and final playoff spot. Will it be the Toronto Raptors or the Chicago Bulls? You'll just have to stay tuned.

Here's the update from Friday morning's session at Philips Arena in Atlanta. As mentioned yesterday, Hedo Turkoglu wants to play and is willing to play even while wearing a mask to protect his broken nose. But the mask that Turkoglu will hopefully sport tonight is not the one that was made for him after he suffered a facial injury earlier in the season. Seems that hearing he had a broken nose, as opposed to the orbital fracture that he suffered in January, Turkoglu contacted the training staff in Orlando and they have found the mask he wore to protect a broken nose when he was accidentally elbowed by his then teammate Dwight Howard. There are plans to send it to Atlanta and with any luck it will be here for him to wear tonight against the Hawks.

"Thank (goodness) they kept it, they are going to send it here and I'm going to try that one. If not I'll use the old one, (the one made this season)" said Turkoglu in reference to his sudden collection of protective masks.

If the mask does not arrive from Orlando, he will don the one made for him and his injury in early February, even though it may not offer maximum protection. So will this one be more comfortable?

"It's more protective of my nose, but I don't think any mask is comfortable," remarked a smiling Turkoglu who was in good spirits. "But this one is more fitted to protect my nose."

The rest of the walking wounded for Toronto - Jarrett Jack (ankle), Antoine Wright (ankle), and Amir Johnson (knee) - will all suit up and be ready to go as we were told this morning.

OK, I'll say this (and even my wife claims that sometimes my mind gets the better of me with my conspiracy theories and I see ghosts where there are none), I'll offer this up anyways.

Does the league want Chicago in and Toronto out? Forgive me folks because I usually don't subscribe to all the "oh this is what the league wants" stuff and maybe it's a Tim Donaghy hangover but it looked awfully fishy last night when LeBron James was sitting out against a potential first-round playoff opponent.

You want evidence? OK, here it is. The other night in Cleveland, it was hinted that James might play against Chicago, after all it was a national game on TNT in the US involving the third-largest media market in North America. The plan was then to have James rest against Indiana at home tonight. Hmmmm, somehow things got changed. I guess a plausible explanation is that the season seat holders at home deserve to see LeBron play on Friday and I can see that, but do you risk losing a game to a first-round opponent to give them some confidence when you may be playing them between four and seven times over the next two weeks? Or is it a back-handed compliment to Toronto? The Raptors have played Cleveland well this season and even though the Cavs won three of the four contests, one was in overtime, without Chris Bosh in Toronto's line-up and the other losses were by eight and 12 points respectively, in Cleveland.

It is said that coaches are always leery of teams that can score and Toronto ranks fifth in league scoring while the Chicago Bulls have their challenges putting the ball in the hoop sitting 24th at 97.1 points per game.

"Nah, I wasn't surprised at all (that LeBron didn't play), I said it," exclaimed Sonny Weems. "Cleveland would rather play the Bulls than play us in the playoffs. I wasn't surprised at all."

"If you look at it, every game we have played Cleveland has been close. We played them close in Cleveland without C.B. They feared us on that. I see it as a little respect but I think it's still kind of messed up that they didn't play LeBron. But that's their team (and they can do what they want) and we can still get in the playoffs. We have games left that we should win."

You want more, let's see, last play of the game, Cleveland going for the win and they pick and roll with Mo Williams, who had a solid fourth quarter, and wait for it… Anderson Varajao? And Williams gives it up to Varajao for a go-ahead look? OK, maybe it's all a coincidence? Does the league care that they would get a major TV market in Chicago and not have to worry about a market where the TV ratings don't register on their radar because they are outside of the US? Maybe, maybe not but I know what I think.

But it the end, this still falls on the Raptors. They need to play better, specifically better defense and had they won a few of those game that got away, they would not be in this predicament. So once again, it comes to the bottom line and in the words of the aging owner of the Oakland Raiders Al Davis, "just win baby!"