Once again, the Toronto Raptors fell victim to the late game of heroics of LeBron James, watching him bank in a game winner to give the Cleveland Cavaliers a 3-0 lead in the series.
While LeBron James continues to show why he's the best player in the NBA, the Raptors continue to show that they are lacking a key ingredient necessary for them to win a championship. While losing at the hands of one of the games' greatest players isn't reason to hit the reset button, the Raptors clearly have work to do in the offseason to get themselves over the hump next year.
While some may say that DeMar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry isn't enough of a one-two punch, I don't think talent is where the Raptors are lacking. They have plenty of talent. The issue lies in them not having an irritant. Somebody who can play dirty and get under the skin of LeBron James a bit.
Nobody on this team is willing to muck things up or even so much as attempt to get inside the head of LeBron James. The Raptors are like a boy band without a bad boy. They need a bad boy. Somebody to give them an edge.
When you look back on some of the most recent teams to win NBA championships, almost all of them had a guy who qualified as a bad boy/irritant. The Golden State Warriors have Draymond Green, the Cavaliers have JR Smith, the Dallas Mavericks had DeShawn Stevenson, the Chicago Bulls had Dennis Rodman, etc. Even more recently, the Indiana Pacers were able to make things competitive against LeBron James thanks to the presence of Lance Stephenson, who isn't afraid to go off the rails and get in LeBron James' grill.
As presently constructed, the Raptors are too afraid to even so much as lay a hand on LeBron James. They don't stand up to him. They let him walk all over them and then when he hits a game winning shot, they act all stunned and surprised, expecting us to feel sorry for them. This attitude needs to change. The Raptors need someone on their team to get angry and not tolerate getting beat like this. They need somebody to start a fight, throw a punch, do something to create some competitive tension.
I'm not advocating the Raptors clothesline LeBron James or anything like that. But what I am advocating for is somebody to stand up to him and make it clear that they aren't going to back down. They need somebody to try to wrestle a ball away from him, blow in his ear, or do anything that might upset him. Winning in sports is as much about the mental side as it is the physical side and right now, the Raptors have nobody that gives them any sort of mental edge over the Cavaliers.
If the Raptors can't draft a bad boy, they need to either pick one up in free agency or via trade. They have to do it. They can keep their core together, but they need to trade a bench player or two for someone who gives them the type of toughness that I'm describing. If they go out and make such an acquisition, I think they'll be poised to make a serious run at a title. If they don't, they'll continue to be a soft team that lacks a spine.
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