After 24 years of existence in the NBA, the Toronto Raptors are the 2019 NBA World Champions! This is our city’s biggest championship win since the Blue Jays won back-to-back World Series championships in 1992-1993. We finally have something to be proud of! And we probably had one of the most epic championship parades in all of professional sports too!
Trust the process
To be honest, the Raptors were definitely ahead of schedule (realistically a year or two) in their championship development. Much credit goes to team president Masai Ujiri for expediting this process. It was his gusty executive decisions for taking risks in trading for superstar Kawhi Leonard, veteran Marc Gasol and promoting Nick Nurse as a rookie head coach. Masai made change happen.
I can’t tell you how many years I’ve stopped supporting the Raptors since the Vince Carter era. Put it simply – they just weren’t competitive enough or didn’t have the right leadership at the helm. They had some really bad teams over the years just getting mopped by other teams. If you are a Toronto sports fan, you understand the mindset of having your expectations fall short year after year.
The shot heard around the world.
I really started becoming entrenched in this playoff run when Kawhi Leonard hit that buzzer beating, game 7 series winning shot over the Philadelphia 76ers. That probably was the biggest shot in the team’s history. It also reignited my interest in Raptors playoff basketball.
This was a complete team effort from the rest of this group, who stepped large on the big stage. We are seeing right behind our very eyes, new stars emerging on the front court. The sky is the limit for players like Pascal Siakam, Fred VanVleet to name a few.
Victory.
If you had told me back in October that the Raptors would be winning the NBA title, I would have said that you’re out of your mind and don’t know sports. But this year’s crop did it and really made a name for themselves playing basketball in June for the first time ever. At least I predicted that they would win the series in 6 games!
*UPDATED 10.22.19:
RAPTORS RECEIVE NBA CHAMPIONSHIP RINGS