Originally Posted by The Altraps Blog

I absolutely love social networking. It is absolutely breathtaking watching reactions unfold right before your eyes about subjects people feel passionate about and as I said in my Downward Dog post, Raptors fans are a passionate lot.

So, while news of Hedo’s decision to hang with his Turkish brethren in Toronto rather than the .. um .. non-Turkish people of Portland hit the online universe, it was incredible to watch reactions from both sides of the fence. Twitter alone was spazzing out and a few of us were waiting to see if Hedo would hit the trending topics along with boobies and fireworks. From the Portland side of the ledger, we had both indignation and relief. They were wondering how the Turkoglu’s could thumb their collective Jackie Christie type noses at a beautiful city (and it is indeed beautiful) to move to Canada but as that wore off a sense of possible relief came rolling in like a fog. They now have their $9mill back to play the stragglers on the market and they no longer have to worry how a 30 year old man will hold up over the course of a 5 year contract (not to mention you’ve seen better defence from a barn with its doors removed).

Now we turn to my favourite creatures: the online Raptor community. Twitter has, so far, been home to cool level-headed Raps fans. Being able to choose who you follow helps, of course, but I don’t get the sense that the Real-GM type jackasses have permeated the Twitterverse yet. This fact alone had me anticipating what was to come. Support? Shock? Awe? Intense debate on what number he should wear and the best pizza joints in Toronto? It should come as no surprise that the answer is all of the above.

You could almost taste the shock. A real honest-to-goodness free agent said no to a team and actually wants to come to Toronto? Shaddap. The virtual high-fives and chestbumps were heard around the world. We is gonna be a contendah, ma! This was followed closely with what truly makes us Canadians: “what’s the catch?”. The answer: 5yrs and upwards of $56million and the fact that we have to renounce the rights to Marion, Parker and Delfino, as well as lose our $5mil mid level. As you can imagine, we went from having a woman-having-sex-with-young-Brad-Pitt type euphoria to a woman-having-sex-with-Carrot-Top type gag reflux. Later still we had people realizing that the Raptors bench could potentially be thinner than the hair on a 40-year old mans head. As the night wore on and as more people stumbled across the news, the overall feeling went from acceptance to WTF just happened to acceptance to Colangelo is a jackass to refusing to accept the future of this franchise being held in the hands of Bargs and Hedo, two players that don’t exactly scream consistency. You know you have to worry when two die hard Raptors bloggers (Dino Nation Blog and RaptorsHQ) hammer out middle of the night tomes that absolutely tear the franchise (no pun intended) a new one. The social network spies at MLSE won’t be printing those pages off for BC’s bathroom reading, that’s for sure.

My take on the trade? First, I’m taking my own advice and chilling. It’s still not a done deal and won’t be until July 8. These next 5 days are now the days that will show Raptors fans what Colangelo is made of. It has to be difficult for him to let Marion go and even more difficult for him to work out a sign and trade. We need to use Marion’s value to help salvage any bench depth on this team. I believe Colangelo will get it done and I believe Marion will actually help facilitate it. Marion owes the Raptors franchise nothing, but he also knows that they can help either get him a payday or help dictate where he ends up.

July 7 at 11:59pm is now the new deadline day for Colangelo. He either gets something in return for guys he will have to give up or he watches them walk away with nothing coming back. We all know that is not likely to happen. So, if the Turkoglu’s decide to call Toronto home as of July 8th, let’s wait until that day to start judging Colangelo and this trade. We all know how important this summer is to this franchise and that alone should give us reason to be patient and let transactions transpire without losing our collective minds.

Originally Posted by babyface

patience... there's gonna be like 30 pages on the Hedo thread by July 8th

Originally Posted by babyface

patience... there's gonna be like 30 pages on the Hedo thread by July 8th

Originally Posted by 'trane

everyone should read this paragraph a few times and settle in for a few days to wait and see.