To be honest, I nearly forgot that we’re fast approaching the end of the decade. That being said, I’m glad it’s coming to a close. So you can sort of see that I started writing this before the new year, but I’ve been busy and there are more important things to do on new year’s eve. What’s another day or two anyways so I’m going to review how Toronto fared this decade. We had our share of good moments and lots of bad moments so I’ll go over our sports franchises, other than the Argos, cause I couldn’t care less about them. This past decade has shown us the franchise draining powers of our friends at MLSE and lacklustre performance by the Jays.
Leafs
Without a doubt, the first half of the decade was a lot better than the latter half. At least we were somewhat competitive. We even had a 100 point season way back in 2000 if anyone still remembers. Also, I loved watching the Leafs beating those damn Senators every year despite the odds. The turning point of the decade though has to be the NHL lockout. In addition to missing out a whole season, the new rules destroyed our now illegal defence. We haven’t made the playoffs in four years now, soon to be five unless you believe in some sort of miraculous surge. We’ve also been missing a captain for more than a season but on the plus side, we seem to be trending up under Burke and making the playoffs next season doesn’t seem too farfetched.
Grade: C
Raptors
It seems that the Raptors also peaked early, with the team getting to the second round of the playoffs in 2001, and almost the third round against the 76ers. Of course, in 2003 we ended up drafting Chris Bosh, our current (and hopefully future) franchise player. The thing that still haunts the Raptors though, is the trade of Vince Carter and his play towards the end. He played without motivation and effort, and the same could be said our GM in trying to trade him. We received two very average players and a washed up pro that didn’t even show up for arguably the best player in franchise history. The past few seasons have been up and down, Bargnani was an ok pick and we won in the Atlantic Division title in 07 but lost to the Nets led by Vince Carter and then Orlando the next year. Missing the playoffs last year was disappointing, but this season looks somewhat promising at least.
Grade: C+
Jays
I’ll be honest, I don’t know much about baseball, but no playoffs in 10 years even with baseball’s screwed up playoff system is a disappointment, even though we had one of the best pitchers in the game for several years. Of course, we ended up trading him to the Phillies and we seem to like letting some of our other better players run off, such as Burnett and Lilly. We also liked signing some terrible contracts as evidenced by the contracts to Frank Thomas, BJ Ryan and Vernon Wells. I think the Wells contract is one of the worst of the decade, he’s now a below average player making over 20 million for the next 4 years. In fact, I might have to mention this again at the end of this decade.
Grade: D
The Rest
As I mentioned earlier, I didn’t really want to grade the Argos, but there are still other Toronto teams, like the Rock and Toronto FC. I haven’t been paying attention, but I will assume there is a reason for that, and assign a grade appropriately.
Grade: F
Id have to say, a C for the Leafs there is quite generous . . . considering Burke has a history of winning AFTER inheriting GOOD teams . . .doesnt look like this will end well. . .
ReplyDelete