The Toronto Raptors
The Toronto Raptors are a Canadian professional basketball team based in Toronto.
The Team
The Toronto Raptors compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) in the Eastern Conference. They won their first NBA championship in 2019 when they acquired Kawhi Leonard and Danny Green for the superstar Demar DeRozan. Canada had one of the largest parades for the Raptors when they had brought home the first championship to the city. It was estimated that over 2 million people had attended the parade of a country population of around 36 million. Their home games are played in Scotiabank Arena and there have been 710 games played at that arena since 1999.
Records
In the current season as of right now, they have the 2nd best record in the Eastern Conference and the 3rd best record in the entire NBA. They currently have a home record of 21-7 and an away record of 19-8 which overall adds up to 40-15. They have a good record considering how many of their starter players have gotten injured early into the season. At this rate if all of their players can remain healthy, they can maintain the 2nd seed in the playoffs. And have a very good chance of making the Eastern Conference Finals.
Why I Follow the Toronto Raptors?
At first, when I used to play basketball back in middle school, I never really watched the NBA games until recently. Since I’m from Canada, obviously the team that I support is the Toronto Raptors. I have always loved the duo of Demar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry back when they both were on the team as their chemistry was always amazing to watch.
The whole team always had amazing chemistry. I was quite upset when I realized the star of the Toronto Raptors, Demar DeRozan, was getting traded to the San Antonio Spurs for Danny Green and Kawhi Leonard. However, Kawhi Leonard had played so well with the Raptors and in the playoffs as well that he won Finals MVP of the playoffs and brought the Raptors their first championship. However, both Kawhi Leonard and Danny Green had signed deals with another team right after they had helped Toronto Raptors win their first championship.
Now, Danny Green had moved to the Los Angeles Lakers to join LeBron James and Kawhi Leonard moved to the Los Angeles Clippers and teamed up with Paul George. My favorite player from the Toronto Raptors is Pascal Siakam who is going to be playing in the all-star game on team Giannis facing against team LeBron. Two of the Toronto Raptors starters are going to be playing the NBA all-star game with Spicy P as a starter and Kyle Lowry as an all-star reserve. He wears a jersey number of 43 His nickname is “Spicy P” which to me is a creative and cool nickname. Pascal Siakam won the award of “Most Improved Player” in 2019 and has improved even further by shooting better and averaging around 23.5 points per game and around 7.5 rebounds per game as of the 2019-2020 season.
The Moment
During the NBA finals, I went to celebration square to watch game 6 against Golden State Warriors when the Toronto Raptors were up 3-2. There was a huge crowd and anytime the Toronto Raptors scored, the crowd would cheer loudly. A lot of people were wearing their Raptors jerseys and related accessories. When they had won that game in a best of 7 series, the crowd went wild and nobody slept that night as everyone was honking with their cars and partying after they had won. Shortly after, it was all over the news and that was when they had made history for the city that night.
