A Day, A Week, Hemant, A Year

Before I make my Raptors conspiracy theory public, I just want to make clear that there is no evidence to substantiate what I am about to say. In fact, once you read this you will probably have a strong sense that I suffer from Paranoid Schizophrenia. But based on the recent behavior of Raptors management, there is clearly no other viable explanation for what we have seen. I believe that there is a massive conspiracy between the NBA and Maple Leaf Sports and Enterainment to sabotage the Toronto Raptors basketball club as to get them out of Canada and into the United States.

You may be thinking this is crazy, but let’s take a look what has happened in the last few years.

1) Rob Babcock is hired as Raptors General Manager despite major objections by team superstar, Vince ‘Air Canada’ Carter. This may not seem like a huge deal, but keeping a team superstar happy is a big priority. I mean if they are not happy, they are not going to stick around. Not only did they hire someone VC objected to, they really stuck it to him by not even interviewing his first choice - Julius Erving.

2) Rob Babcock drafts Rafael Araujo 8th overall in the 2004-2005 NBA draft. Anyone who knew anything about basketball knew this was an insane draft. Araujo wasn’t expected to go before 17 and there is no logical reason for this pick. As a centre, ‘Hoffa’ has averaged 0.70 points per game and 0 blocks per game. In short - a waste of a good draft opportunity.

3) Rob Babcock trades Vince Carter to the New Jersey Nets for Eric William, Aaron Williams, Alonzo Mourning, and 2 first round draft picks. This may sound like a lot, but VC is in his prime, and the 3 guys the Raps got are on their way out. And to top things off, Mourning was thrown in with the intention that he would never play for the Raps. Well, trading the one good reason anyone watched the Raptors was definitely not going to help the team. Even though the Raps were losing, the Air Canada Centre still filled just to see what VC may do. I don’t think people are going to show to watch the two guys we got for him sit on the bench (which they do).

4) Rob Babcock says that Alonzo Mourning is in no health to play for the Raptors and buys his contract out for $10 million. Mourning signs with the Miami Heat, the team he had been wanting to finish his career with and possibly win a title since Shaq was now there. Mourning is far from being of bad health as he plays a major role in getting the Heat to the western semi-finals.

5) Rob Babcock let’s Donyell Marshall’s contract expire without making a trade, even though his worth had increased big time due to his recent play. Marshall made it clear he was not going to re-sign with the Raps, yet no trade is made. Instead he is kept for the entire season and a good trade opportunity is lost.

6) I believe Babcock thought he was sabotaging the Raptors’ 7th pick in the 2005-2006 NBA draft by picking Charlie Villanueava, a ‘potential cancer’ as many analysts were calling him. Again the Raptors’ choice was not supposed to go until around 15. However, Babcock’s pick may backfire since Villanueva’s performance has been impressive. We’ll have to wait for the season to progress a little more before we make a call on this one. Note - I personally didn’t mind this pick and was looking forward to CV on the Raps.

That’s my six top reasons for my conspiracy theory. Many of you may just think this is the work of a really bad General Manager. I don’t claim this to be impossible. But you have to ask yourself this question - if everyone in the known universe can see how bad Rob Babcock is doing, why does he continue to work for the organization. The reason my friends is that the NBA wants out of Canada. With their experiment failing miserably on the Canadian west coast, and the inability to keep or attract any stars to Canada’s biggest city, I think the NBA brass has cut some sort of deal with MLSE to get the Raptors re-located ASAP. So Babcock may actually not be as atrocious as he looks - he may just be the NBA’s patsy.