the wait is “almost” over… Season Countdown Observation #1…
Yea i know… it’s still early October and the season isn’t for another month but with training camp finally “over”… it’s time to see how the team matches up with other teams… Pre-season starts tomorrow and guess who’s going to be court-side in London… 
…
I made it a point not to blog during training camp or media day or anything of the sort. This mostly because I don’t want to throw out predictions and apart from what I can see/hear from the fan590 or raps.com I don’t really know much of what else is going on… and maybe I’m just saving myself from saying/”predicting” something that will end up biting me in butt later on in the season. I had a hunch about Jamario’s rookie season, I’ve got the same hunch with DMDR… I think Belinelli will blow up this year and is a younger and more offensively efficient AP… I see Bargs and Bosh’s bulking up giving us a HUGE upside… but I didn’t have anything much more than a hunch for those points… Well if you don’t mind I’m going to call those “Season Countdown Observations” (SCO) and now that I can watch pre-season games and have first hand look at the action I’ll hopefully have some data/info to back up my hunches and hopefully through out this month I’ll be stopping in to blog about those SCOs…
Speaking of upside. Here’s my SCO #1: Reggie Evans! I read a while back, from a very negative blogger, that we’re not going to be a better rebounding team by adding one person (Evans). I beg to differ… Reggie Evans brings muce more upside than his rebounding IN GAME. All that I’ve been hearing about Evans and training camp is the intensity that he brings and it’s effect on the other players. Evans is going to make Bosh and Bargnani work for boards in practise… Evans is going to bark at his team when the intensity level is down, not only in game but during practises. IMHO, the Raptors’ biggest problem last season was their lack of intensity, I think this was worse than their lack of defense or rebounding (both could/would improve with more intensity). This was mentioned countless times by bloggers, tv and radio personality, beat grunts et al. SCO #1 is the fact that Reggie Evans’ value is not only his in game presence, rebounding and intensity but also in practise. Reggie Evans will make the team, and the players on this team, better by not letting anyone slack… Hard work all day, every day… I can’t wait for this upcoming season!
P.S. I think Reggie Evans’ may arguably be BC’s best move this summer…
-astro
