Toronto Raptors vs. Cleveland Cavaliers: Who Wins?

LeBron left Cleveland. Chris left Toronto. Who is left with the biggest loss?

Chris Bosh and LeBron James left these two teams respectively this year to go to South Beach. These two teams are the Toronto Raptors and the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Obviously the team’s have declined in talent, but I dared to ask which is the better team. My answer? The Toronto Raptors. For a number of reasons of course.

First of all, Toronto has better talent. No, I am not judging the Cav’s talent, but it’s true. Without LeBron, their engine doesn’t run properly. Now that Mo Williams has to run the show, it’s clear that the Cavs are in desperate need of help.  With key pieces of Delonte and Shaq both going to the Celtics, they are in quite in a dispute. They lost their superstar, their engine, their best player, their coach, their GM.. what else could go wrong?

Meanwhile, Toronto still had it’s core pieces. Sonny Weems, DeMar DeRozan, Amir Johnson,  Jarrett Jack and Andrea Bargnani. There were other good pieces as well including Leandro Barbosa, Linas Kleiza, Jose Calderon, Joey Dorsey, Reggie Evans, David Andersen, Julian Wright, Ed Davis and Solomon Alabi. This team is still is very close knit and has quite a good chemistry forming and growing. Jarrett Jack seems to be the vocal leader, Sonny & DeMar seem to want to carry this team together and Andrea could emerge to be an all-star. Losing Chris Bosh was and is still a significant loss, but Bryan Colangelo did a very good job picking good pieces up. This team could surprise people this year.

As for the matchup, I still believe Toronto would win. Toronto has better talent, better chemistry and didn’t lose as much as Cleveland did. The matchups seem kind of unfair as well. Usually Cleveland would bully away Toronto with their size and toughness. They lost both of that, and now it could be a problem for Cleveland to keep up with Toronto.

In my opinion, NO team should focus their team on one superstar. Last year, Miami tried it with just D. Wade and Cleveland tried it with just LeBron James, and Toronto tried it with just Chris Bosh. All three teams did not win the championship.

So what is the conclusion? Toronto Raptors over Cleveland.

Who Should Start For The 2010-2011 Toronto Raptors?

Jay Triano has a LOT of "young" pieces in his roster. What will be the starting lineup?

The Toronto Raptors are really good. Umm.. kinda.

Well, Toronto has a deeper roster, better than some of the previous ones, which lights up a question.. “Who Should Start?”. Ultimately, it comes down on matchups, chemistry and the will to start or stay on the bench.

As of today, the roster is as follows:

PG – Jarrett Jack/Jose Calderon/Marcus Banks

SG – Leandro Barbosa/Demar DeRozan

SF – Linas Kleiza/Sonny Weems/Julian Wright

PF – Amir Johnson/Ed Davis/Reggie Evans/Joey Dorsey (?)

C – Andrea Bargnani/Solomon Alabi/ David Andersen

The lineup of Jack, Barbosa, Kleiza, Johnson and Bargnani is very good offensively, but defense could use some improvements (unless they do improve).

If my predictions are correct, the bench will look like Calderon, DeRozan (he could replace or not replace Barbosa in this starting job, but for now let’s keep him here), Weems, Ed Davis and Solomon Alabi. Very strong and young group (except for Jose), but none the less this is a great and strong, young bench. Watch out NBA, this team could be strong.

And of course, the pieces such as Julian Wright, Joey Dorsey, Marcus Banks, and more will be there to contribute good minutes as well.

Jay Triano has a lot of pieces in his hands, and if you know Bryan Colangelo, this 2010-2011 Toronto Raptors is NOT finished.