The Toronto Raptors are making hay in the city that never sweeps as the Franchise That Gets It Right, and Wednesday night they can take another big step forward. Vince Carter and the Memphis Grizzlies are in town and the Raptors are said to be planning a video tribute during the second timeout of the first quarter .
They are to be applauded for making such a move. Loudly, as loudly as Raptors fans ought to be when that moment arrives at the Air Canada Centre. Let there be one Toronto-based team that is not burdened by its history. Let it be the Raptors.
It is time to extend an olive branch, folks. Time to let bygones be bygones. Carter’s career is winding down; he will not likely win that elusive NBA title. The Raptors haven’t won anything, either. For all the tears shed and ink spilled when Carter left this city, it’s time to wonder now whether or not both would have been served better had Carter bided his time, whether or not these two sides needed each other more than they realized.
Carter was on Tim & Sid on Tuesday and reminisced about the days when he could “fly through the air … without worrying who was in the way.” He left the distinct sense of being a man at ease with what he is and what he was and what he’s done. That whole thing with his mother’s parking spot and Rob Babcock and the trip to Chapel Hill to pick up his degree from the University of North Carolina just hours before he’d miss a jump shot that would have put the Raptors into the Eastern Conference final? It can’t be undone. That shot can’t be brought back and neither can that meeting between Carter and Sam Mitchell after Babcock worked out one of the worst trades in NBA history to move Carter to the New Jersey Nets be held over again.
Look, I have a certain amount of empathy with the manner in which DeMar DeRozan, the closest thing the Raptors have to a star after his first All-Star Game appearance and a summer with the U.S. national team, was candid on Tuesday when he said he believed a tribute would be more fitting after Carter’s career is over. I’ve enough confidence in DeRozan to believe that’s because the ACC is the Raptors house – one with a pronounced home-court advantage these days – as opposed to any personal animus towards Carter. If that reaction stems from a brazen declaration that it is a new era for the Raptors with a new measure of success, then it’s all to the good.
But I don’t want to see the Raptors become the Maple Leafs or, in some ways, the Toronto Blue Jays – the latter of whom have, mercifully, realized in recent years that there is a fine line between honouring back-to-back World Series winners and hitting the current group of players over the head with it. It wasn’t just “Flashback Fridays,” which led to underground printing of t-shirts that read “Turn The Page Tuesdays” by players in response. It was the constant reminders on the Rogers Centre video board; the constant feting. It is interesting that it took the return of Paul Beeston as president and chief executive officer for a new balance to be struck. It was Beeston, one of the faces of those back-to-back titles, who decided to low-key the 20th anniversaries of the 1992 World Series and the follow-up 1993 win.
The Leafs, of course, are a different matter – 1967, and all that. The burden of their history is Cubs-like, all tortured souls and sweater tossing and weird occurrences and an almost pathological desire to keep taking the wrong turn just to see how wrong the turn is this time. It is unfair, of course, to lay the ineptitude of previous teams and previous administrations on each subsequent group of players or admininistrators but also a bit of a reach to claim the players wake up with visions of black and white photographs in their heads. I mean, the truth is guys like Phil Kessel can’t be bothered thinking about Nov. 7 or 2007, let alone ’67.
Yet what was one of the first things Tim Leiweke did when he took over as president and CEO of MLSE? He reached into his satchel and shoved aside all the jars of snake oil to make room for the black and white photos he wanted to strip from the walls at the ACC. Faced with a backlash, he reneged, and now in addition to all that black and white history, the Leafs also have a cool tribute to their past: the collection of statues of Leaf greats positioned as if on a players’ bench outside the ACC.
I believe in statistical analysis as much as anybody – more than most, in fact — but I also believe in organizational karma. Don’t thumb your nose at history, just be proactive when putting it in context. Find a balance and run with it.
But beyond that, I think there’s something else for the Raptors and their fans to understand: They are the best show in the city right now and are on the verge of something very, very special. They are fun to watch, fun to cover and easy to cheer for and take pride in. They are also in the process of engaging a whole new group of fans as that rarest of Toronto occurrences: an emotionally accessible and embraceable team. Making peace with their past – making peace with Vince Carter in this their 20th anniversary season – is another way for the Raptors and their fans to show that they’ve all grown up, that they are comfortable with their missteps as well as the things they did right. Plus, when you’re having this much fun and feeling so good about yourself, why screw around? Why not be magnanimous.