“Me, Chris Bosh and Jose (Calderon) sat down after the scrimmage (last week) and it was like, ‘Man, we have a real shot here,’ ” newcomer Jermaine O’Neal said. “We’ve got a real shot.
“Obviously, we have the talent on paper and if we mentally believe that and bring that swagger every day, that we’re the best team on the floor every time we step on the floor, we’ve got a shot at doing some great things this year.”
Turning 30 during training camp, he’s been impressive in informal workouts and scrimmages over the last week, according to teammates and coaches. He brings experience – albeit having missed most of two seasons with knee woes – and a steadying force under the basket.
“Watching the guys work out, it’s just amazing how much more confidence they have, having Jermaine O’Neal back there,” said coach Sam Mitchell. “I’m telling you man, just watching them work out, he was blocking shots and talking.
“The thing I love about him, not one time has he talked about ‘Give me the ball.’ All he’s talked about is playing defence and rebounding.”
“We just have to remind ourselves – because we’ve never been in a situation like this, where we’ve had so much help and had somebody to really depend on every night – that this is for a greater cause,” said O’Neal. “It’s about winning. At the end of the day, if I score two points and we won and I got 10 rebounds and two blocks, that’s great to me.
“I didn’t make the playoffs the last two years, had two really tough years physically and mentally, it doesn’t really matter. The personal accomplishments don’t matter. I understand what I need to do for this team to be successful and sometimes they’re not going to need me to score. They need me to bring the defensive presence.”
Transforming into Chris Bosh 2.0. Look for the relaunch of his website of the same name to coincide with the opening of the NBA season in a month or so. “The off-court stuff does take some work,” says Bosh, who is starting his sixth NBA season at just 24 years old. “Just like now: I wanted to sleep, but I’m doing this. But I enjoy the art of seeing what you can create, what you can put out there and how you can represent yourself.”
“He was way more physical than I ever thought and he did all the little things that you never expect a star player to do,” said Detroit Pistons director of basketball operations Tony Ronzone, an advance scout with the U.S. team.
“He could have started for us but he embraced his role off the bench. He took charges, he ran without the ball and he was class, on and off the floor. I can’t say enough about the guy. … I think after this summer he’s going to go to another level. He’s a warrior, flat out.”
He has his own channel on YouTube and a content deal with Internet service AOL that will soon be announced. He enjoyed a successful stint as a correspondent forThe Tonight Show at the NBA final last June, ad-libbing live with Jay Leno, and will be featured again this season in ESPN’s NBA promotional campaign, where the deadpan, off-beat tone suit Bosh’s own emerging comic sensibility nicely.
As part of the AOL deal, he will be participating in a season-long contest with Baron Davis of the Los Angeles Clippers in which fans will get to judge which player can make and post the funniest video. If you want to match wits with Bosh in fantasy football, you can check his team’s progress on Rotohog.com.
And don’t forget the synergies: Bosh is packaging his knack for viral success on the Internet in a business he founded with local friend and entrepreneur Hady Teherany called Max Deal Technologies, a company they hope will provide multiplatform media solutions in an online world. So far their best advertisement is Bosh himself.
His first big step, even before his video debut, is his full head of growing dreadlocks, now about six inches long, a project more than two years in the making.
“I can’t tell people how to interpret certain things,” he says. “But my hair, to me, is freedom. It’s being free. It’s being an individual. That’s why I did it. I’d always rolled with the even-steven all my life, and I just wanted to do something different.”
He is a computer geek who taught himself how to wirelessly stream video from his laptop to his television by way of his Xbox. His collector’s edition of Sex in the CityDVDs is out for all to see. His business partner says if Bosh had never touched a basketball he’d be a really tall guy making a name for himself in advertising, likely on the creative side.
While over the off-season I’ve voiced my concern about proven depth at the 1, Howland has been quite content to only ride into battle with the current 13. And with the training camp roster announced recently, 13 it will be.
We’ve already discussed many of these 13 this summer, so let’s now take a look at the remaining few, the bench crew that could see themselves playing 15 to 20 minutes a night, or not at all.
As Colangelo concedes: “The one question everyone wants answered” is how is O’Neal’s health now? Colangelo’s early answer is just fine based on the monitoring the team has been doing during the summer and what they’ve seen from O’Neal during the past week.
Following are some other story lines to watch as camp progresses and the Raptors gear up for their NBA opener:
The thought of Jermaine O’ Neal was automatically followed by laughter at a dinner conversation, and the realistic option seemed to be a move for players like Ben Wallace, AK47, or perhaps Corey Maggette.
It certainly seemed odd at the time that MLSE would agree to tie in nearly 40 percent of the cap on one player. What seemed even harder to comprehend was the fact that the Lakers attempted to get O’Neal a year earlier, but talks were halted because Bird wanted too much for his oft-injured star.
What could the Raptors offer that would beat a package like Lamar Odom and young prospects? Apparently, a PG to replace Tinsley, an $8 million expiring contract, and a draft pick was enough. Lamar Odom sure looks good now, doesn’t he?
If Jermaine O’Neal is as healthy as he claims and seems to be, this trade redeems this organization of the Vince Carter blunder on some levels. Raptor fans know that they probably gave up more on paper for O’Neal than the Nets did for Carter at the time—but in a way, even the loss of TJ Ford can be seen as a positive for this team as it solves a chemistry issue, and rids the team of an injury hazard who had a lot of time left on his contract.
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Only a month to go before the season starts, so we can stop focusing on:
1) Is JO healthy?
2) Is our bench deep enough?
I assume this will continue to be talked about throughout the season, but at least when games are played, we’ll have some other things to focus on.
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with only 13 on the roster, a good 4 or 5 of whom you probably wouldn’t know if you bumped into them at the gym, and a crusty coach….you can’t expect too much new news during the season. You’ll be looking at the health of your main 3 guys, Bargs’ improvement, and if they win.
Could be a pretty boring season news wise unless they move Bosh, Bargs or JO.
and you thought last year was bad…