A senior executive at Maple Leafs’ parent company Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment has resigned and five other employees have been fired after the company learned of ticket irregularities.
Jim Edmands, Maple Leaf Sports director of sales and service, resigned from the sports holding company, "even though he did nothing wrong," the company’s executive vice-president and chief operating officer, Tom Anselmi, confirmed to the Star yesterday.
Edmands had also been director of business operations for the Toronto Marlies, the farm team for the NHL’s Leafs.
News of the scandal comes in the wake of an already sour week for MLSE. The Toronto Raptors are struggling and may miss out on the chance for home-court advantage in the NBA playoffs, while the Leafs will miss the playoffs for the third straight season. Both developments could cost the company hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Outside of costly defensive lapses, careless turnovers at crucial times and a lack of intensity in the beginning, middle and end of games, the Raptors are ready for the NBA post-season.
In what has to go down as one of the more bittersweet nights in franchise history, Toronto clinched a playoff berth despite coughing up an important game at home against one of the weakest teams in the league. With a lot on the line, a victory was frittered away by a series of mental and physical blips in the final two minutes.
And no matter what happens between now and the start of the playoffs in two weeks, Toronto’s stay in the post-season will be short and not sweet if the Raptors don’t start doing everything better.
Trying to rally in the last 90 seconds, the Raptors gave up three offensive rebounds and T.J. Ford committed a horrific turnover – carelessly losing the ball to Charlotte’s Earl Boykins – that led to a crucial three-point play for the Bobcats that sealed the game.
"I don’t think that one play dictates the whole game," said Ford, who had 14 assists, six points and two other turnovers.
"We’ve just got to do a better job in fourth quarters. We’re going into the fourth quarters with leads and then we’re not doing a good job of protecting them.
"It’s something as a group we just have to find a way to get it done."
The play came with the momentum in the game shifting and the Raptors looking like they might steal a win. Toronto trailed by one with 45 seconds left when the tiny Boykins stripped Ford.
"T.J. relaxed and I went for it," said Boykins.
"We are going to practise Monday and Tuesday (after playing tonight in New Jersey and taking Sunday off) and we’re going to have to buckle down," said Mitchell. "It’s just going to have to be done to win basketball games."
It was a disturbing sign, particularly at this time of year. Given the opportunity to punch their own ticket to the playoffs, the Raptors instead left it up to someone else to do the job for them.
"We just have to play better," a short and to the point Chris Bosh said after the game. "We have to do a better job, plain and simple."
How bad was the Raptors franchise player feeling about his team’s play right now?
Asked if there was enough time left to fix the problems that have been dragging the Raptors down this past month, Bosh wasn’t ready to acknowledge even that.
"Shoot, I have no idea," he said. "We’re not acting like it to be honest. We have to play like the time is now and I don’t think we’re doing a very good job of that. It’s intensity and urgency. That’s what it takes sometimes to put a team away or compete a little bit better."
Raptors coach Sam Mitchell said the Raps had better find their defensive game and soon or it could be a very short post-season.
"We are not executing on defence when we need to execute," he said. "We have stretches when we play good defence and then we have stretches when we just don’t and you can’t do that trying to make the playoffs or going into the playoffs, you just cannot do it."
The league has been telling the Raptors there is no point in filing an official protest over the T.J. Ford basket at the buzzer that was not counted on Wednesday night. The Raptors grudgingly finally agreed not to lodge the protest, but that doesn’t mean Bryan Colangelo is fully in agreement with it.
Colangelo spent a good part of the 48 hours (the time period allowed to file a protest) between Wednesday night’s loss and last night trying to argue his point but to no avail with the league.
Consecutive nights of professional sports competition at the ACC, consecutive nights that concluded with the hometown fans lofting boos in the direction of the playing surface.
Back at .500 on the season, it’s a return to navel-gazing time for this club, which seemed to lack energy at times last night, and at other times just seemed inattentive when it came to interior defence or defending the three-point shot.
A season that began with many locals bleating that the Raps weren’t receiving enough credit from NBA analysts has thus turned into a struggle.
Jose Calderone’s unselfish request to return to the bench in order to let Ford start seemed to inject a new spirit temporarily, but now that has gone and this team suddenly can’t beat some of the NBA’s least successful squads.
For MLSE, this is troubling, for the Raps are their crown jewel at the moment, given the state of the Leafs and the fact the corp’s sophomore soccer squad declined to aggressively improve itself after a predictably awful debut campaign.
The Raps, then, only need to have more success than the rudderless Leafs or the soccer beginner boys to be the pride of the ACC, but that responsibility seems to have suddenly become a heavy one.
“We didn’t make enough shots, we did not get to the free throw line, we didn’t get the stops we needed and when we got stops we did not convert and make them pay at the other ends,” said Mitchell. “When Rasho gets 23 points and 10 rebounds , you think you’ve got a good shot to win the basketball game and we also had 29 assists. We jut did not get enough good play from enough people.”
After limiting Charlotte to two offensive rebounds through three quarters, they gave up three in the last two minutes, wasting the Raptors’ defensive efforts. On the whole, the Bobcats had easy access to the paint off dribble penetration, making rebounds easier to get.
These Raptors, losers three of their last four games – all of which came against teams that were below .500 – are playing poorly heading into the playoffs.
In other words, if the season ended today, they would have a first-round date with the battle-tested Detroit Pistons.
And if the Raptors do not figure out how to exert the intensity that Bosh talked about, or to solve the fourth-quarter problems that Ford discussed after the game, Detroit is exactly where the Raptors will end up.
The question, then, is quite simple: Why are the Raptors having these problems so late in the season?
"I’m not sure," Ford said. "I don’t have an answer."
If the University of Toledo wants to fill its men’s basketball coach opening with a highly regarded assistant coach from a top program, plenty around the country have shown interest.
Craig Neal, New Mexico’s associate head coach who is from Indiana, is an applicant.Neal was on Steve Alford’s staff for three years at Iowa before going to New Mexico with him last season. He was a scout and assistant coach for the Toronto Raptors for nine years. Richardson had a 54-64 record in four years at Illinois State and has been at Vanderbilt since 2003.
This wasn’t so much basketball as improvisational theater.
Gerald Wallace was on the bench with a groin pull. Nazr Mohammed showed up shortly before tipoff, off a plane from a funeral in Kentucky. The Toronto Raptors had every incentive, with a chance to clinch their playoff spot.
And the Bobcats — through a complicated mix of tiebreakers — knew they were already eliminated.
Surprise: The Charlotte Bobcats beat the Raptors 105-100 at Air Canada Center on Friday.
It’s not just the losses; it’s the way we’re losing. We don’t look together. We switch on everything and give them their mismatches, we look out of sorts down the stretch, and we don’t know what line up we want, it just hasn’t been good. BC’s going to have some tough decisions to make in the off season.
To even suggest the Raptors need to play gritty defense is frankly absurd. They haven’t displayed that all season. It’s not something you can turn on, it is part of your makeup. The only gritty guy we have is Smitch, and he’s wearing a suit on the sideline.
In the aftermath of Toronto’s controversial loss at Atlanta, the Raptors (-9) need to take Charlotte seriously and ensure that (i) Offensively, Chris Bosh is the focal point of their attack, abusing the individual match-up advantage he has vs his Bobcats’ counterpart, Emeka Okafor (C), and (ii) Defensively, not allowing Jason Richardson & Matt Carroll to light them up from behind the arc, and Gerald Wallace to take the ball hard to the rim unimpeded.
If the Raptors attend to their business earnestly, this should be a hard-fought W for the Dinos.
If not, this is the type of home game that could very easily slip out of Toronto’s grasp.
Getting into the playoffs by backing in is sort of like showing up for a party that you weren’t really invited to, but everybody there knows you and they know that you crashed the joint. We’ve been saying it for a while, but along with getting tougher, the Raptors have to have some pride. When you have your team’s fate in your own hands, you have to step up and show everyone that you’re ready for the playoffs. The Raptors clearly aren’t.
If this keeps up, whichever club gets the Toronto Raptors in the first round of the Eastern Conference playoffs is going to be rubbing its collective hands in glee.
The Raptors were an anemic four-for-17 from three-point land — normally a highly effective part of their game.
Which one is more equipped to pull off an upset and send ‘Bron home early? The Raptors honestly haven’t shown me they have the heart — or the defense or the rebounding — to win a series where they don’t have homecourt advantage. Plus, it looks like some guys who were ballin’ out for them a few months ago, namely Jose Calderon and Jamario Moon, have almost disappeared lately. And they don’t have anyone who’s shown they can handle LeBron defensively: Moon is athletic enough but he’s still a rookie, and Anthony Parker gets torched whenever he faces off with LeBron.
It could be argued that, for the Toronto Raptors, the question of who they face is moot. The team’s shaky play of late – particularly the one step forward, one step back development of Andrea Bargnani and TJ Ford’s bizarre late-game behaviour – makes the choice of playoff opponent a case of simply picking their poison. It could also be argued that each potential opponent seems as likely as the next to expose the Raptors’ fatal flaw – a complete disinterest in rebounding.
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I guess we all had high hopes for the team. They will make the playoffs but major changes are on the way. Off the record I would love to hear Bosh’s take on what needs to change. If his knees are sound I would suspect BC would be an eager listener. Unless they draft better then they have recently, Chris will be leaving sooner then later. Then it is back to being a legit lottery team.
Hopefully the next bunch of players will bring a higher level of intentsity. I can take the losing if they leave everything on the court !!
Here’s what TJ had to say after his stellar play in the last minute of the game:
“Ford said the turnover wasn’t the reason they lost.
“I don’t think that one play dictates the whole game. We just got to do a better job in the fourth quarter,” Ford said.”
He just doesn’t friggin get it… bone-headed plays at crucial moments DO lose games, in the same ways that great plays at great moments do win games. Michael Jordan wasn’t the best player ever because he made his first-quarter free throws, it was because he could get buckets at crucial times. An otherwise solid outing for TJ, once again soiled by a game-changing brainfart. WTF
it’s not all on tj, bosh didn’t step up, in fact he usually doesn’t in crunch time. ap missed a couple good looks, kapono and delfino were 0-for…lots of blame to go around!
Raps Fan’s last blog post..Sam Mitchell/Sam Vincent – Raps/Cats – Apr. 4/08
sure… but TJ got careless with the ball, and much worse, coasted for a few steps after the turnover allowing the quick boykins to beat him downcourt for the and-1. (kinda like TJ played lazy D on bibby the other night, even after he closed out to him in the corner… it’s just a general lack of urgency in key situations on his part) That sequence changed the game from a might-win to a certain loss.
I agree, Scott. Even just the ill advised foul on Boykins cost us a point that potentially could have taken the game out of reach. Every point is important at that stage.
Bosh did have an off night. I still contend something is bothering him. He just looks out of sorts.
Still think they win in Jersey tonight just to shake the monkey off their back.
Scott’s last blog post..Linkage – April 5