I was about to title this post, “Toronto Craptors 2010-2011″, but realized I didn’t find the joke funny. Our team is not a joke, basketball is not a comedy . . . it is more like a melodrama, a sad sad melodrama.
Instead of pondering the value of literature today, I find a greater question in pondering the value of Andrea Bargnani, or Barfnanny as I like to call him, as the savior of the Toronto Raptors. Let me explain the origin of Barfnanny. (Content Advisory: Includes Paragraphs of High Bargnani Bashing for Comic Effect.) “Nanny” invokes the image of a maternal figure and of an infant. Now what happens when your mother steps on the basketball court? She will likely get sandwiched between two six-footers and have the ball smashed back on her face. Then a crowd will start to defend her exclaiming, “Why did you do that, man?”, and “Of course that would happen, what did you expect?” The last part was an allusion to how Bargnani is often seen as misused in either the wrong position or wrong system.
Now what happens when a fifteen year old steps on the basketball court? They dribble the ball off their feet. They release the ball faster than normal for fear of getting blocked. In fact, Bargnani often plays like he is 5 feet tall, needing to one-dribble to shake off a defender.
“Barf” denotes how surprisingly bad he is at times. Like when you make a bet that he will dominate a game where he is being defended by a much smaller forward, only to shoot a jumper a foot inside the three point line, and you lose the bet, and the bet was for you to do something so terrible it makes you vomit, then the next morning you catch the replay of the game and reflexively vomit again.
I am just kidding, sorta. It is too easy to make fun of Bargnani. I side with that half of the Raptors following that seriously believes Bargnani is misunderstood. Seriously. But if this season is to be watchable, he has to become comfortable with his post-game. There have been many pre-season games where Bargnani struggles inside but then shoots a few three-pointers to get his stats into some normality. Raptor fans don’t care about stats. We have a good sense of what makes a good player. We sense Demar Derozan is not quite there yet. We sense Sonny Weems is playing out of his “role”. However, we are not seers. If Derozan suddenly found his jumpshot, he can be a second-tier All-Star. If Sonny Weems averages 15-20 points, we will have a higher chance of winning 25-30 games.
This season, I am waiting for the thing I cannot predict. That thing that is not on paper, but always happens, like the Sixth Man, or Most Improved Players that come out of nowhere. Also, bad team on paper means potentially cheaper tickets! I hope to go to the season opener and see Reggie Evans play D on Amare Stoudemire.
