Raptors Legend: DeMar DeRozan

 Happy Monday! It was a great weekend of football, albeit without my Steelers, but we'll get to that after the Monday nighter tonight when Baker hands KC and Mahomes their first loss of the season. Today is about something near and dear to me. As many of you may have seen, the Raptors hung Vince Carter's jersey in the rafters, retiring number 15, the first jersey retirement in franchise history. The ceremony was awesome, and even better that it happened with franchise legend DeMar DeRozan in the building playing for the visiting Kings. Somewhere in the 4th quarter, Drake hopped on the broadcast, as he frequently does. Drake, feeling betrayed by DeRozan appearing in the Not Like Us music video, said that if the Raptors try to retire DeRozan's jersey, he'll climb up there and tear it down himself. This really didn't sit right with me. Real ones know DeMar's impact on the city and fanbase and won't pay much attention to these comments, but I've already seen a couple Drake diehards now claim they hate DeRozan. DeRozan is an icon in Toronto and should always be. Driving a wedge in the fanbase because of personal drama should not be tolerated. With that in mind, I wanted to just pour my heart out talking about a few of my favorite DeMar memories from his time here. Beef with Drake or not, DeMar will always be a fan favorite to me. 

Growing up as a kid in Toronto, the Raptors were bad. A poorly run franchise who had season after season of mediocrity. I would say they were similar to what the Charlotte Hornets are today, nobody took them seriously and nobody should have. I remember watching mostly Leafs games with my dad at home. If the Raptors were playing and there was nothing else on we'd tune in just for him to call them the Craptors, and I couldn't really argue with that assessment. Still, a budding love for basketball was there for kids in the city. I remember gathering around a TV on All Star weekend with my cousin just to watch them announce Raptor Chris Bosh, our very own all star. Still, even with Bosh, the Raptors only ever topped out as a slightly above average team at their peak, and a straight up bad team at their trough.  Things looked extra bleak in the summer of 2010 when Chris Bosh, the Raptors lone All-Star and best player since Vince Carter, announced he would leave to join the Miami Heat in free agency. Coming off a rookie season where he averaged 8.6ppg, DeMar DeRozan famously tweeted that day: "Don't worry, I got us..." I don't think anyone truly understood at the time how much he meant it. 

The next couple of seasons were definitely not helping DeRozan's case for "getting us." The Raptors went 22-60 then 23-43 in a shortened season before swinging a major trade for fringe star Rudy Gay. The end of the 2012-2013 season the team showed some promise stringing together wins and playing around Rudy Gay as a volume scorer. Then came the 2013-2014 season. The Raptors started the season 6-12, Rudy Gay banned stat sheets from the locker room, mostly to hide how inefficient he was, and things in general were not working. Now president of the Raptors Masai Ujiri traded Rudy Gay to the Sacramento Kings for John Salmons, Chuck Hayes and Greivis Vasquez in a move that many thought was going to spark a rebuild. Little did we know, DeRozan's got us. The Raptors finished the season going 42-22, DeRozan averaged nearly 23ppg and was named an All-Star and the best era of Raptors history had begun. 

DeRozan was, and is, a weird player in the NBA. A shooting guard who didn't take 3s was just beginning to lose its appeal. The Golden State Warriors began to take over the basketball universe and the book was out, 3 > 2, maximize this in every facet of the game. DeRozan didn't feed into that, instead he continued to work on his footwork and change of speed until he became one of the best mid range scorers in the league. DeMar would artfully get to his spot using footwork reminiscent of his idol Kobe Bryant, spending large portions of the game hitting tough shots. He had a pump fake that seemed to bait opponents into a foul at least once a game, despite using it for years. DeRozan would frequently explode to the rim for angry dunks, firing up his team and the fans in the process. There was never a season with the Raptors that DeRozan didn't come back better than the last. I remember vividly in 2018 DeRozan kicked his playmaking up to a new level when Kyle Lowry had to miss time due to injury. DeRozan had his shortcomings on defense and they were well covered throughout his career, but there was no denying that in his peak and still today, DeRozan is a bucket getter. 

DeRozan had so many moments with the Raptors that will be ingrained in the fans memories for a lifetime. I remember coming home to Scarborough from Waterloo for the holidays in 2017/2018. New Years Day 2018 I hit up my friend and asked if he wanted to watch the Raptors game at a bar with me. We watched DeRozan score a franchise record 52 points in overtime, every one of which was needed to defeat the up and coming Bucks with new young star Giannis Antetokounmpo. A highlight video I still go back to at times was a game against the Bulls, who at the time in 2017 had Jimmy Butler and Rajon Rondo. The Raptors were wearing their throwback blue Toronto Huskies jerseys, those in the know understood that DeRozan always showed up when wearing blue. Butler and DeRozan battled into overtime where DeRozan emerged victorious with 33 points and a clutch bucket to seal it at the end. Another one that nobody will forget is down a point with time running out against the Detroit Pistons, DeRozan takes a rebound the length of the court and rises up for a huge poster dunk on Anthony Tolliver to give the Raptors the lead. This still might be the best dunk in Raptors history (not including Vince cause that's unfair.) On the court, DeRozan was so fun to route for. Often underrated by the media and underappreciated by fans outside Toronto, we knew we had a true #1 scoring option who got it done in an artful, unconventional way. 

Off the court, DeRozan was even more fun to route for. Teammate Kyle Lowry bonded pretty quickly with DeMar and the two formed the best bromance in NBA history. You can give me all the bromance candidates you want, none come close to the bond Kyle and DeMar had. In interviews, Kyle always played the goofy brother role, cracking jokes and trying to throw off DeRozan's rhythm. DeRozan was always the straight man of the duo, trying to keep a straight face while he fought off Kyle's antics. DeRozan also always wanted to be in Toronto. After years and years of having stars leave the city, DeRozan was the first one to say loudly that he wanted to be here. DeRozan considered Toronto home genuinely, and the fans loved him for it. In the summer of 2018 when the Raptors made a blockbuster trade to send DeRozan to the Spurs for Kawhi Leonard, fans were excited for the new star, but also heartbroken for losing our guy. It took winning the championship for some fans to get over trading the one guy who truly loved Toronto. Nobody before and nobody since has loved the city like DeMar DeRozan did. 

You can't talk about DeRozan without bringing up the playoffs, at least for a little bit. As fun and easy to route for as DeRozan was in the regular season, he never failed to come up short in the playoffs. As a fanbase we learned that a shooting guard who doesn't shoot 3s or play defense is just not going to get it done when the lights get bright. Still though, DeRozan was the leading scorer on the Raptors first ever conference finals team in 2016. As much as it hurt every time we lost, I've long said that it is a privilege to be hurt in sports. DeRozan made the team good enough to have the fanbase believe in something. For the longest time, the Raptors were the craptors, it was embarrassing being a fan of the team. If you thought the team had playoff aspirations you were a lunatic. DeRozan's rise along with Lowry made the team fun to cheer for again. You can't have your heart broken if you don't get your hopes up, DeRozan raised the hopes of everyone in the city. 

I was thinking yesterday, in 2016 the Leafs drafted superstar Austin Matthews, kickstarting their ascension into a perennial playoff team. Imagine if DeRozan didn't become a great scorer, if Lowry didn't become the leader the Raptors needed. The Raptors spent the better part of their glory days battling a Leafs team going through a similar period, if they sucked who knows how many now Raptors fans would be hockey fans first. In my high school, all the boys watched the Raptors. The halls were littered with chatter about DeMar DeRozan, he became must see TV in Toronto. DeRozan to this day is the Raptors franchise leader in games played and points scored, records that will take a long time to surpass. He's undeniably one of the best players in franchise history and a major cornerstone of the best stretch of Raptors basketball we've ever seen. I truly believe that the number 10 should hang in the rafters along side Lowry's 7. DeMar never won the final game with the Raptors like other legends now have, but his place in history will forever be cemented. An entire generation of Canadians became basketball fans forever because DeRozan could get buckets.