A tale of the Toronto Raptors.

Based in Toronto, Ontario, the Toronto Raptors are a professional basketball club in the National Basketball Association (NBA). The Toronto Raptors became the lone Canadian franchise in the NBA when the Vancouver Grizzlies relocated to Memphis in 2001.

The franchise has won six division titles, eleven postseason appearances, and one NBA championship since its creation in 1995. Among the elite players in the past have been Vince Carter, Chris Bosh, Kyle Lowry, DeMar DeRozan, Damon Stoudamire, and Kawhi Leonard.

With 59 victories, the Raptors set a franchise record and won the regular season in the Eastern Conference. In 2018–19, they claimed another division title and made it to the NBA Finals, where they won their first-ever NBA championship by defeating the Golden State Warriors in six games.

Early Days

The Toronto Huskies of the Basketball Association of America, an NBA precursor, were the city’s first professional basketball club. On November 1, 1946, Toronto played home to the league’s inaugural match at Maple Leaf Gardens versus the New York Knickerbockers. That evening, the Huskies fell short against the Knickerbockers and went down the drain at the conclusion of the 1946–47 season, marked by low attendance and a miserable record of 22 wins and 38 losses. It would take almost 50 years for professional basketball to return to the city, but from 1971 to 1975, Maple Leaf Gardens hosted 16 regular season games for the NBA’s Buffalo Braves.

Birth of the Toronto Raptors

One of the two new teams to enter the NBA for the 1995–96 season was the Toronto Raptors; the other was the Vancouver Grizzlies, a Canadian team. For the NBA, it was a significant milestone because it was the first time the league had grown outside of the US.

Professional Basketball Franchise (Canada) Inc. (PBF) submitted a formal application to purchase an NBA team two years prior, in April 1993. John Bitove, the president of a financial services company, and a consortium comprising former Ontario premier David Peterson and retired Detroit Pistons player Isiah Thomas submitted the application. Thomas went on to become the first vice president of the Raptors.

When an NBA expansion committee visited Toronto in July 1993, the PBF group gave an explanation of their proposal for a downtown arena located on the subway line. PBF received a conditional franchise award for the 1995–96 season on September 30, 1993. It would pay a then-record $125 million expansion fee to join the NBA as its 28th team. As part of the deal, Toronto agreed to play its first two seasons in the SkyDome, which is now Rogers Centre, while work on its own building was ongoing.

Naming

After supporters were requested to suggest a new name for the squad in 1994, ten names were eventually shortlisted: Beavers, Bobcats, Dragons, Grizzlies, Hogs, Scorpions, T-Rex, Tarantulas, Terriers, and Raptors.

The Toronto Raptors, the team’s new name, were revealed on national television in Canada on May 15. A few days later, the corresponding logo was unveiled. The name was probably inspired by the success of the 1993 Steven Spielberg film Jurassic Park.

An aggressive dinosaur dribbling a basketball was included in the team’s logo. Bright red, purple, black, and “Naismith silver” were to be the squad colors, honoring Canadian James Naismith, the man who invented basketball in 1891.

Seasons I–VI (1995–1998)
As the team’s vice-president of basketball operations, Isiah Thomas, with former vice-president of the Denver Nuggets Glen Grunwald serving as his assistant, appointed Brendan Malone as head coach and shifted its focus to the 1995 NBA Draft. The University of Arizona point guard Damon Stoudamire, the initial face of the club, was chosen by the team with the seventh overall pick.

Although Stoudamire performed as expected, leading the squad in assists and scoring, the team had a difficult first season. Despite having a 21–61 record at the end of the season, the squad managed a few unexpected victories over some of the best teams in the league, including as the Chicago Bulls and Seattle SuperSonics. After winning the NBA Rookie of the Year Award, Stoudamire was named the MVP of the NBA Rookie Challenge during All-Star Weekend.

Thomas, though, wasn’t pleased with the club’s showing. He added Doug Christie and Sharone Wright to strengthen the team’s chances, and at the end of the season, he replaced coach Malone with Darrell Walker. In the 1996–97 NBA Draft, the team selected Marcus Camby. With Camby and Stoudamire in addition to veterans like Christie, Walt Williams, and Popeye Jones, the team’s record improved gradually. It concluded with 30 victories and 52 losses in the 1996–1997 campaign.

But the next season, Thomas severed his connection with the team due to internal conflict. Thomas’s departure led Stoudamire to want a trade. Eventually, as part of a six-player trade, he was sent to the Portland Trail Blazers. After winning just 16 games in the 1997–98 campaign, the team was guaranteed a spot in the NBA Draft lottery once more.

Era of Vince Carter (1998–2004)

One of the biggest turning points in the franchise’s history was the 1998 NBA Draft. The team was able to re-enter the NBA Draft lottery, which is intended to provide the lowest-performing teams in the league with the best opportunity to acquire elite college players, because of their 16–66 record from the previous season.

After the Raptors won the fourth overall pick in the NBA Draft lottery, new general manager Glen Grunwald took advantage of the situation by trading it to the Golden State Warriors for the fifth pick, which resulted in Vince Carter, a swingman from the University of North Carolina.

During his rookie season, Carter, who had been a scoring star in college, electrified the NBA. He was the first Raptor to win Player of the Week twice and Rookie of the Month twice in the NBA. Carter achieved the same feat as Stoudamire, winning Rookie of the Year after averaging a team-high 18.3 points per game and thrilling spectators with his assortment of gravity-defying dunks. He rose to popularity among Torontonians and others in the league.

The Raptors had their best season to date in 1998–99. Due to an NBA labor lockout, their season was curtailed, and they only won 46% of their games. While Carter played a significant role in this development, other selections made by Grunwald, such as bringing in veterans Charles Oakley and Kevin Willis, also proved to be wise choices. Butch Carter, the new coach, inspired the team as well. Carter stood forward to address the crowd following their season-ending game, securing a postseason berth for the next year.

To help bolster the starting lineup of the team before the 1999–2000 season began, Grunwald signed future All-Star Antonio Davis. Additionally, he kept bringing in seasoned players like Dell Curry and Muggsy Bogues to deepen Toronto’s bench.

Carter was the team’s premier player, but Tracy “T-Mac” McGrady, his cousin, was also starting to gain recognition. Isiah Thomas and the Raptors had selected McGrady in the first round of the 1997 NBA Draft, right out of high school. McGrady was an athletic swingman with a strong all-around game, just like his cousin.

At the season’s All-Star game, when Carter made history by being the first Raptor to start and play in an NBA All-Star game, the team’s potential was demonstrated. Up until then, he had collected the second-highest number of fan votes in NBA history. Alongside his cousin T-Mac, he participated in the NBA Slam Dunk Contest, where he destroyed the opposition by doing a wide range of previously unheard dunks.

In addition to Carter’s ascent to NBA superstar status, the club achieved several other significant firsts during the 1999–2000 campaign. It debuted on US television and started performances at the recently built Air Canada Centre (now Scotiabank Arena). The Raptors’ inaugural postseason run was the most noteworthy of them, despite their three-game losing streak against the more seasoned New York Knicks.

The following two seasons, the squad returned to the postseason. In the 2000–01 season, the Raptors advanced past the first round before losing to the Philadelphia 76ers in the Eastern Conference Semifinals. Between Carter and point guard Allen Iverson, another NBA legend, the series was an incredible struggle.

The Raptors lost the seventh and final game (88–87) after both teams were tied at three victories. Both Carter’s performance and his choice to travel to his college graduation ceremony in North Carolina that morning drew criticism after the defeat. Carter didn’t score as many points as he had in previous games, and his game-winning shot at the buzzer hit the rim, even though he had once again led Toronto in the game. Under Coach Carter, the Raptors never made it that far again.

The team’s fortunes had started to decline by the time the 2002–03 season got underway. The Raptors were unable to field a 12-man team due to many injuries, which set a questionable NBA record in one game. Due to a mounting injury list, important players like Antonio Davis and Vince Carter missed significant portions of the season.

The team lost ground in the standings and ended with a 24–58 record, which put them back in the NBA Draft lottery. Supporters started to doubt Carter’s fortitude. Lenny Wilkens, the club’s successful playoff run guide for the previous two seasons, was fired as coach.

Making the switch from Carter to Bush

Chris Bosh, a forward selected in the 2003 NBA Draft, would become a future building component for the Toronto Raptors, but it would take some time before the team would contend for a postseason berth. Carter remained the team’s leader in the majority of statistical categories.But a lot of the guys who had supported him throughout the Raptors’ postseason runs were no longer there. Under new coach Kevin O’Neill, the team’s offense sputtered, while injuries remained a big problem. O’Neill and his group were only around for one season. Grunwald, the general manager, was also relieved of his responsibilities in the spring of 2004.

The Raptors started a rebuilding process when they appointed veteran NBA player Sam Mitchell as head coach and general manager Rob Babcock. However, the squad rotated players and won less than 40% of its games over the following two years. Morris Peterson, a fan favorite, was still there, but the majority of the Carter era players were now on the rosters of other teams.

When Babcock selected center Rafael Araujo eighth overall in the 2004 NBA Draft, it was arguably the most questionable draft selection made by the team in its history. Though promising at first, it soon became clear that Araujo lacked the necessary quickness, physicality, and offensive repertoire to have any meaningful impact in the modern NBA.

Early in the 2004–05 season, Babcock traded Vince Carter to the New Jersey Nets in response to the Araujo draft selection. For the Raptors, it proved to be a bad trade. Two seasoned players who only played a few seasons and two draft picks that later turned out to be disappointing were included in the exchange. Alonzo Mourning, the former All-Star center who was the main participant in the trade, was let go by the team after he refused to report to Toronto. Bosh was the only bright point for the team during the 2004–05 campaign. In his sophomore year, he averaged 16.8 points and 8.9 rebounds and was selected as an All-Star for the first time in his career.

Bosh put on a great show, but Babcock, who was fired toward the end of the 2005–06 season, could not turn the team around. Bryan Colangelo, a previous NBA Executive of the Year, was then appointed general manager by the team. Colangelo made a spectacular debut for the Raptors. After choosing Andrea Bargnani with the first overall pick in the 2006 NBA Draft, he set about restructuring the team’s squad right away. One of the biggest surprises of the 2006–07 NBA season was the outcome, as the Raptors advanced to 47 wins from 27 the year before.

They also made their first-ever postseason trip after five seasons. Ironically, Vince Carter and the New Jersey Nets, his new team, were the ones that defeated them in the postseason. But with new leadership and new players, the Raptors’ fortunes appeared to be improving.

In the 2007–08 season, the Raptors returned to the postseason under Chris Bosh’s leadership. However, they were eliminated in the first round by Dwight Howard and the Orlando Magic, so they were eliminated once more.

Between (2008–13)

Following back-to-back losses in the first round of the playoffs, Colangelo kept switching things up with regard to Bosh and Bargnani. The team attempted a number of other well-known NBA players, including Rudy Gay, Hedo Türkoğlu, and Jermaine O’Neal, but none of them were successful, and Bargnani kept disappointing. For the next five seasons, the Raptors finished below.500. Before the 2010–11 season, Bosh finally departed to join Dwyane Wade and LeBron James in Miami, where he played a crucial role in the Heat’s subsequent championship teams.

Similar to Babcock, Colangelo was ultimately let go. Masai Ujiri, his longtime assistant, took over as general manager and president during the 2013 off-season.

GM Masai Ujiri’s Road Back to Success (2013–17)

The first major move made by general manager Masai Ujiri was the trade of Andrea Bargnani, then Rudy Gay was traded shortly after. Supporters and the media projected that the transactions would push Toronto to the bottom of the league, improving their chances of obtaining the first selection in the 2013 NBA Draft—which was predicted to go to Canadian swingman Andrew Wiggins, who grew up idolizing former Raptor Vince Carter.

The transactions, however, energized the team. The Raptors surprised everyone by finishing the 2013–14 season with a 48–34 record, setting a franchise record for wins at the time. It was evident that the Raptors were back on the right track even if they lost to the Brooklyn Nets in a closely contested seven-game series to miss out on the playoffs once more.

The 2014–15 season saw a new record for wins in a season (49), as well as a second trip to the playoffs. However, the team was destroyed once more in the opening round, this time by the Washington Wizards, who won four games in a row. Louis Williams, the recipient of the NBA Sixth Man of the Year award, helped Toronto’s offense remain strong throughout the regular season, but the defense struggled. It was obvious that general manager Ujiri required off-season improvements in this area.

Renowned defensive swingman DeMarre Carroll, backup center and shot blocker Bismack Biyombo, seasoned forward Luis Scola, and the team’s first Canadian, backup point guard Cory Joseph from Pickering, Ontario, were all added by Ujiri in an attempt to strengthen the defense. Star players DeMar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry, along with young center Jonas Valanciunas, made the Raptors appear to have the best squad ever heading into the 2015–16 campaign.

The last three players were holdovers from the Bryan Colangelo era, but Ujiri’s coaching was the first to surround them with players who would best utilize their abilities. Furthermore, another holdover from the Colangelo era, head coach Dwane Casey, became better with every season and discovered the ideal balance between patience and intensity when leading the squad.

The team concluded the 2015–16 season with the fourth-best overall record in the league after opening the season with five straight victories. The Raptors set a team record with 56 wins, qualified two players (DeRozan and Lowry) for the All-Star game, which was held in Toronto for the first time ever, and started the postseason as the second overall pick in the Eastern Conference of the NBA. They defeated the Indiana Pacers and Miami Heat in their most successful season to date, advancing to their first-ever Eastern Conference Finals. But they fell short against the eventual winners, the Cleveland Cavaliers, led by LeBron James.

Ujiri’s term as president was extended in September 2016, and Jeff Weltman was appointed general manager. The Raptors were third in the Eastern Conference and won 51 games in the regular season of 2016–17. The squad won four games in a row against the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference semifinals, but they fell short against the Milwaukee Bucks in the first round of the playoffs.

New Dawn (2017–19)

It was clear that adjustments were required after the team’s expectations were not met by another playoff performance. Ujiri mentioned a “culture reset” at his news conference following the season. Many questioned if that meant overhauling the coaching staff or moving around important free agents like Kyle Lowry and Serge Ibaka on the squad.

Coach Casey was still in charge, despite rumors to the contrary, and Ibaka and Lowry were signed back. Casey and his staff implemented a completely new offensive scheme, emphasizing ball movement and three-point shooting, more in line with the strategies of successful modern offenses like the Golden State Warriors. Lowry and DeRozan led the Raptors in embracing the new approach, and they quickly shot to the top of the Eastern Conference with an 11-game winning streak in February and March 2018.

Once more, Lowry and DeRozan were selected to play for the Raptors in the annual All-Star Game, with DeRozan being selected as a starter by the crowd. On January 1, 2018, DeRozan also created franchise history by defeating the Milwaukee Bucks and tallying a team-high 52 points. After Terrence Ross (51) and Vince Carter (51) in a single game, he was just the third Raptor to score fifty or more points. The Raptors led the Eastern Conference in regular season play after winning 59 games.

The Raptors struggled in the postseason once more even though they had the best seed in the conference going into the tournament. In the first round, defeating the eighth-seeded Washington Wizards required a fierce six-game series.

The team lost to the Cleveland Cavaliers in four games in the conference semifinals, where they swept the Raptors. Even though LeBron James’s heroics played a major role in the Cavaliers’ victory, Toronto was once again unable to build on an outstanding regular season showing. Despite being a finalist for NBA coach of the year and winning the award a month later, head coach Dwane Casey’s time with the Raptors came to an end as a result of this setback.

One of Casey’s assistants, Nick Nurse, was appointed head coach. In exchange for star player Kawhi Leonard and guard Danny Green, the Raptors dealt fan favorite DeMar DeRozan, backup center Jakob Poeltl, and a 2019 first-round draft pick to the San Antonio Spurs in July 2018. In 2014, Leonard was voted MVP of the Finals after winning an NBA title with the Spurs.

In 2014–15 and 2015–16, he was also named the NBA Defensive Player of the Year. However, in the off-season, there were rumors circulating that he refused to report to training camp and had no interest in playing in Toronto.But across 60 games, he averaged a career-high 26.6 points per game, helping the team win the division with a 58–24 record.

With a buzzer-beating, rim-bouncing field shot in the seventh and final game against Philadelphia, Leonard entrenched himself in Raptors mythology after the team upset Orlando in five games in the opening round of the playoffs. The Eastern Conference Finals would provide even more heroics. After dropping the first two games against Milwaukee, Toronto overcame the deficit to win four straight and advance to the NBA Finals for the first time ever.

The first two games between the Raptors and the Golden State Warriors, the reigning champions, were split in Toronto. Before barely losing game five (105–106), the Raptors subsequently easily won games three (123–109) and four (105–92). However, the Raptors won their first-ever NBA championship, becoming the first team outside of the US to do so, with a thrilling 114-110 victory in game six in Oakland.

After Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and LeBron James, Kawhi Leonard became the third player in history to earn the Finals MVP award while playing for various clubs with his second career MVP victory. Words cannot express how I feel, said Kyle Lowry, the longest-tenured player on the Raptors, following the victory. Lowry scored the team’s first 11 points in the sixth game. 13 years of NBA basketball have passed. It feels amazing to be able to declare oneself a world champion—it’s been a long time coming.

The future is here! keeps notes for the future Raptors!