Storyline: Raptors Front Office

76 rumors in this storyline

2 months ago – via The Athletic
It also includes the periphery relationship-building that is equally important, learning who matters most inside said player’s inner circle and, in essence, what makes them tick. The gray area that comes with recruiting is where it gets trickier, not only because of tampering rules that govern such matters (albeit not very well) but because of the tougher-to-define desire across the league for some professional courtesy in such matters. Yet the Raptors officials with whom I spoke, and who are hoping their mid-July trade with San Antonio to make him their centerpiece wasn’t a one-year rental, expressed no concern over the Clippers’ style. And if what transpired after that Raptors-Clippers game is any indication, it’s quite clear that this isn’t about getting Leonard to notice them or their efforts.

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3 months ago – via ESPN

“It’s been like that with Kyle since I came here,” Ujiri said of their neutral but professional relationship. “We’ve never — we don’t have a confrontation. We don’t — I’ve never done anything wrong to him. It’s just this kind of decision-making that we have to go through. And I know how Kyle is, so honestly, I love him to death. “He plays basketball the right way. He gives it his all, you know. And I’m so used to it. And you know he has a good heart. And I know that I haven’t done anything wrong to him. I didn’t trade him.”
3 months ago – via Clutch Points

Toronto Raptors guard Kyle Lowry hasn’t been president Masai Ujiri’s biggest fan since he traded his backcourt mate DeMar DeRozan to the San Antonio Spurs over the summer. ESPN’s Rachel Nichols asked the pressing question, one that Lowry’s icy response got the message across just fine. Nichols: How would you define your relationship with Masai Ujiri right now? Lowry: “He’s the president of basketball operations. That’s it. I come here and do my job.” Nichols: That answer leaves a lot of room for interpretation. Lowry: “He does his job, I do my job, right? That’s what you do.” Nichols: That’s where you stand? Lowry: “That’s where we stand.”
5 months ago – via CBSSports.com

Along with the high risk, however, comes a high reward, which is why the Raptors were willing to make the deal. Should Leonard prove to be healthy, they’ll be one of the main contenders to win the Eastern Conference this season. Plus, they’ll have the next nine months to convince Leonard to stay in Toronto and re-sign for the long term. So how does Raptors president Masai Ujiri plan on going about that? Well, he explained as much on a recent appearance on Adrian Wojnarowski’s podcast, The Woj Pod. “We are who we are. We are going to be prepared, we are going to make things as smooth… I think you want to be genuine, you want to be real. You know, this is who we are. We might not be the best ones in weather, but we might be the best ones in many other places: the diversity, the city, the uniqueness of a place like [Toronto], fans, the atmosphere. I think those things are so unique, it’s beginning to show everywhere.”
6 months ago – via The Athletic

Working in media has helped Carter become more candid over the years, and the former Raptor didn’t mince words when asked about Masai Ujiri’s decision to trade longtime franchise pillar DeMar DeRozan to San Antonio for disgruntled Spurs star Kawhi Leonard. “We all look at it like DeMar has done so many great things there, which he has,” Carter said. “He deserves to finish his career there, especially if he wanted to, like we all know he did. It’s just one of those things where the organization, I guess they saw it different. They wanted to take advantage of an opportunity and who knows if it works or not? If it works, everybody forgets about it. If it doesn’t, it blows up in their face. I think that’s how these things work, and it’s an unfortunate situation.”
7 months ago – via NBC Sports

But the way the Toronto Raptors and general manager Masai Ujiri operated in trading DeMar DeRozan to the San Antonio Spurs along with other assets for Kawhi Leonard didn’t sit well with the Wizards point guard. Wall is friends with DeRozan and can’t help but feel for the guy after how everything went down. “It was interesting. In my opinion, I don’t think there was loyalty shown on DeRozan’s part,” Wall said. “This is a business and you understand that. [But], if you talk to me man-to-man, then just be honest with me. We’re all grown men.”
7 months ago – via ESPN

Chris Haynes: In that same news conference, he talked about how he gave the team a chance when he took his role. Do you think it was necessary for the organization to make that move and trade you? Why didn’t things work out? DeMar DeRozan: I mean, when you say “them,” that’s kind of frustrating. Like, who is “them”? You put the blame on just me and Casey? Because obviously we are the only two who had to suffer from the loss that we had in the Cleveland series. But it’s only one team that we lost to in the postseason — and that team went to the [NBA] Finals every single year. With an opportunity approaching itself, my mindset and the rest of my teammates’ mindset was the only guy who was in the way of making that happen leaves. Now we got a great opportunity to do something that we haven’t been able to do. At the end of the day, I gave everything I had to that team. And it showed, it showed in the progress we made as a team and me as an individual. So when you put that out there saying “gave them chances” and “I have to do something” … it’s B.S. to me.
7 months ago – via ESPN

Chris Haynes: You and Masai go way back. Did that hurt you more, the fact that you did have that relationship with him? DeMar DeRozan: No question. I mean, when you use the word “family,” “brother” or whatever, things other people use lightly … for me, once you use that term, I stick by that term. I stand by that term. So whether it’s something I like or don’t like, I’m going to accept it if you come to me and let me know beforehand. But don’t make one thing seem like another thing and catch me off-guard and do something else. That was my whole problem. I understand how the game works, how the business works. My mindset was that I was always going to be in Toronto my whole career, but I was never naive. Just let me know. That’s where my frustration came from. And I think it showed. From the fans to even myself — it just caught me completely off-guard.
7 months ago – via ESPN

DeMar DeRozan: I felt like I wasn’t treated with what I sacrificed for nine years, with the respect that I thought I deserved. By just giving me the say so of letting me know something’s going on or it’s a chance. That’s all I wanted. That’s all I wanted. I’m not saying, ‘You don’t have to trade me’ or … just let me know something is going on because I sacrificed everything. Just let me know. That’s all I asked. Everybody know I’m the most low-maintenance person in the world. Just let me know, so I can prepare myself for whatever my next chapter is, and I didn’t get that.
8 months ago – via The Athletic

Raptors​ President​ Masai​ Ujiri was emotional in explaining how​ a woman​ changed​ the course​ of​ his​​ career in basketball management. He expressed how he might not be where he is today without the help of Kim Bohuny, the NBA’s Senior Vice President of International Basketball Operations. “Kim is the reason I’m here, OK?” Ujiri said while choking up. “So, 15 years ago, I got a phone call from Kim Bohuny, and she asked me to come to be director of Basketball Without Borders. My life changed. Today, I’m the President of the Toronto Raptors. I was an unpaid scout when I got that call from Kim Bohuny, so here are some women that are changing lives, and changed this life right here.”
8 months ago – via The Athletic

Ujiri has entrusted women with roles in Toronto’s front office. When he became general manager in Toronto, his first call was to Teresa Resch, who had worked with him on the NBA’s Basketball Without Borders camps while she was at the league office. She was promoted to Vice President of Basketball Operations and Player Development in 2015. “That right there is the Toronto Raptors, right there,” Ujiri said, pointing to Resch as the audience clapped for her. “We talked about lifting women, we talked about believing in women, and when we went out and made a lot of hires, we did not hire them because they were women. We hired them because they were the best. They were the best candidates for the job, and that’s what they serve as, and they stand up tall, and they lead the Toronto Raptors. And we listen to them. Teresa is the chief of staff. Everything she says goes.”
11 months ago – via TSN

When Ujiri was finally able to take some time and evaluate what went wrong and how to best move forward, he looked beyond personnel. He spent most of May reviewing the team’s day-to-day procedures – how they practised, trained, travelled and interacted with one another – and asked himself: Can we do this better? “The culture change is about the whole organization,” Casey, who worked closely with Ujiri to reinvent the team’s philosophy over the summer, said last week. “It’s not about offense and defense. Believe me, when he mentioned that, it was about all of us. Everything we do. From scouting, training, how we go about our day in the front office, it’s included in that.”
12 months ago – via SB Nation

It’s not often that DeMar DeRozan seals a victory for his head coach by missing a game-tying shot, but that’s what happened Sunday, Feb. 18th, at the NBA All-Star Game. Dwane Casey, courtesy of Toronto holding the East’s best record, coached Team LeBron to victory, mere weeks after winning his 300th career game with the Raptors. “It was fitting,” Raptors general manager Bobby Webster said in an interview with SB Nation. “With all the things he’d done for the franchise, for him to be able to have a moment on a national stage, in L.A. and at the all-star game, and the team wins. He deserves it.”
12 months ago – via SB Nation

Last season, after enduring another sweep, this time at the hands of the Cavaliers, Masai Ujiri infamously announced the Raptors needed a “culture reset.” It read like the final nail in the coffin for Casey’s tenure in Toronto. Bobby Webster has an alternative explanation. “We felt like we were better than a 4-0 sweep,” Webster said. “It was really just Masai’s challenge to all of us. Let’s take a look at what we’ve done, and let’s be proud of how we’ve gotten here, but if we really wanna be a championship contending team, we need to make some changes.”
12 months ago – via SB Nation

In the days following that low point, the Raptors’ internal braintrust burned the midnight oil to put Ujiri’s “culture reset” into action. When Webster and Ujiri asked Casey what he saw, they were, in Webster’s words, “exactly on the same page.” The league was passing the Raptors’ plodding, isolation style by. And so the mandate was born: more ball movement, more spacing, more running, and an increased focus on developing their young talent. “[Culture reset] suggests that change is coming. But that doesn’t mean you have to change personnel,” Webster said. “People can change.”
1 year ago – via SportsNet

Related: the 31-14 Raptors they are just 2-4 in games decided by three points or less. Would some more knock down three-point shooting around DeRozan help come clutch time? With the trade deadline coming into view it would seem that the Raptors would be wise to comb the rosters of teams that are likely punting on the playoffs in a search for additional shooting if they’re going to shoot as much as they do from three. But it’s not a turnkey solution and the organizational philosophy seems to be to look beyond a short-term fix in favour of longer-term, internal development.
1 year ago – via Yahoo! Sports

DeMar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry knew this season would be different the day after the Toronto Raptors’ latest ignominious postseason departure — a second-round sweep to LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers that prompted team president Masai Ujiri to say the organization needed a “culture reset.” The Raptors’ All-Star duo and potential buddy-cop movie tandem didn’t exactly know what that meant nor to what extent. “He said we needed a culture change, and I didn’t know if I was a part of that culture change or not,” Lowry, who was entering free agency last summer, told Yahoo Sports. “I wanted to be here, but you never know. You’re kind of like, ‘[Expletive]!’ ”
1 year ago – via NBA.com

Make no mistake, though—this is all by design, part of the “culture reset” that GM Masai Ujiri insisted upon after the Raptors were clubbed by the Cavs in a four-game second-round sweep in last year’s playoffs, and that Coach Dwane Casey has implemented, seemingly seamlessly; after a middling start, Toronto has roared toward the top of the East standings. All the attention has been on the Celtics, but the Raptors are just a game behind them in the loss column, in second place in the East with a very favorable schedule in front of them. And they’ve done it with an emphasis on ball movement and threes that has improved what was already a pretty potent offense.
1 year ago – via New York Times

Change, in other words, would need to come from within. Enter Nick Nurse, a 50-year-old assistant coach who was charged with shaking up the offense. After a recent practice, Nurse was explaining the general importance of passing the basketball when he motioned to Jonas Valanciunas, the team’s starting center. Valanciunas, Nurse said, was no longer tethered to the low post. “This guy loves it,” Nurse said. “He’s touching the ball a lot more.” He added: “I think for a lot of the roster, it’s a lot of fun. It might not be as much fun for the guys who aren’t quite used to it yet.”
2 years ago – via Yahoo! Sports

LeBron James has ruled the East for seven straight springs – and will still be favored to make it eight, regardless of how the Irving saga ends. Kyle Lowry expressed the helplessness of the conference’s other 14 teams while the Cavaliers were in the midst of their second-round sweep of Toronto when he stated, “nobody is closing the gap on him.” DeMar DeRozan said after the series that the Raptors would’ve won – if they had James. Ujiri is approaching the challenge from another perspective. “Our job is to beat him,” Ujiri recently told The Vertical. “You have to figure it out. If not, then go play in some other league or something. Go play in Greece. Our jobs, and the jobs of the players, [are] to figure out how to beat those guys. If not, you might as well give them the championship before it starts. I understand how good he is and I understand how good those teams are, but those things end. At some point, somewhere, somehow, we as leaders of our group, we have to figure out a way and motivate our players and give them the confidence to go out there and compete.”
2 years ago – via Yahoo! Sports

“To me, sports is all about expectations. You play to win. Nobody should be afraid of it. If you are expected to win, win. It’s that simple. The people that believe in it, that are expected to win, we must win,” Ujiri told The Vertical. “I think we gave ourselves a two-, three-year window, but I think a couple of teams decided to go the other way. I know people say the East is bad, but every NBA team is good. Even the teams that are rebuilding, that’s a game every night. We lost a bunch of games last year to teams that supposedly you’re supposed to beat. Everybody thinks that the East is going to be weaker. I think it’s because of the teams rebuilding.”
2 years ago – via The Undefeated

Do you worry about Raptors president of basketball operations Masai Ujiri departing for the New York Knicks? DeRozan: I don’t worry about that. I think [he stays]. I look at it like, if I’m New York who is the next best guy you could go after? It’s Masai. Why wouldn’t they want to target him? I don’t look at it like it’s a bad thing. Masai has that reputation because he is great at what he does. That organization wants to be great so they can feel like they can compete. So, what is the first thing you do? You go look for the next great person.
2 years ago – via USA Today Sports

Dolan’s interest in Toronto executive Masai Ujiri is real, not to mention the preferred choice of the folks inside the NBA’s league offices who want nothing more than this Knicks machine to run smoothly one day. There’s already a built-in connection as well: Tim Leiweke, the former CEO of Maple Leafs Sports and Entertainment group who hired Ujiri as Toronto’s general manager in 2013, is serving as a Knicks consultant. He’s the CEO of the sports and entertainment consulting firm, the Oak View Group, as well as a partner of Irving Azoff, the longtime friend of Dolan’s who played a significant role in bringing Jackson to the Knicks.
2 years ago – via NBA.com

And when I told Don Nelson – my roommate in Boston – that he was going to take over, he said “I’m not ready to coach.” I told him, “Nellie, you’re the coach. So let’s go for it.” He grew with the team and became obviously a Hall of Fame coach. That’s the reward, when you make decisions like that and they turn out well. That’s the pleasure I get now in an advisory capacity with Toronto. I tell the team when I speak to them before the season, my greatest joy is seeing others succeed.
2 years ago – via SportsNet

With Toronto already boasting one of the best records in the league, Ujiri stressed he and his staff would not settle for a bad deal. If the right trade doesn’t present itself, the Raptors will not force anything just for the sake of making a move. “We find ourselves in a special place, which is second in the East,” Ujiri said. “There is a window with Kyle Lowry, DeMar [DeRozan] and DeMarre [Carroll] with those kind of guys in their prime and we will take advantage. But we’re not making bad deals. It doesn’t help business, it doesn’t help your future. Trust me, if a deal is not made just know there was nothing on the table for us that would really enhance our team.”
2 years ago – via NBA.com

Masai Ujiri gets contract extension

The Toronto Raptors announced Friday they have signed President Masai Ujiri to a multi-year contract extension and promoted Jeff Weltman to general manager and Bobby Webster to assistant general manager/vice-president basketball strategy. Ujiri will continue to oversee basketball operations as president of the club. “I am grateful to the Board and Mr. Tanenbaum for the opportunity to continue our progress to build the Raptors into one of the top franchises in the NBA,” said Ujiri. “I’m also excited that Jeff and Bobby are being rewarded for their hard work and valuable contributions to our program. My family thanks the NBA, Raptors players and coaches, staff, Raptors fans, the city of Toronto and Canada for this opportunity. Toronto is home for us.”
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February 23, 2019 | 8:52 pm EST Update
Karl-Anthony Towns remains in concussion protocol and will not play for Minnesota against Milwaukee, a night after missing a game for the first time in his career. The All-Star forward was in a car accident Thursday and didn’t play Friday in New York, ending his streak of 303 consecutive games started. He traveled with the Timberwolves for the game in Milwaukee on Saturday, rather than return to Minnesota, but hadn’t been cleared to play again.
4 mins ago – via ESPN

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Storyline: Karl-Anthony Towns Injury
Being unable to play has troubled Towns, coach Ryan Saunders said. “People asked me if he cared about his [consecutive games] streak,” Saunders said. “He hasn’t and didn’t mention one thing along those lines. It was all about being there for his teammates and contributing. He even had somebody run out and make sure he could get a sport coat so he was dressed properly on the bench so he could be there with his teammates. That says a lot about Karl.”
4 mins ago – via ESPN

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