Meet and Greet with Bryan Colangelo, Full Report for RaptorBlog Options

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I attended a Meet and Greet with Bryan Colangelo for season ticket holders before yesterday's game. He spoke for awhile, then took some Swirsky-filtered questions, then pressed palms in the crowd and took individual questions. I lurked, queried, and noted, and now report back to the raptorblog masses:

1. The Draft. BC was asked about who he likes in the tournament so far. His first 4 mentions: Tyrus Thomas, Glen Big Baby Davis ("if he proves he can stay in shape"), LaMarcus Aldridge, Adam Morrison (a bit of a rave, sorry to alarm you scott. talked about seeing him at the maui invitational, where AM "went for 48"). He later went on at some length about Denham Brown, how he thinks he was the glue on UConn's team, and though he wouldn't be a 1st round pick, he could be available for one of our 2nds.

2. International Players. He spoke at some length about making international players a priority for this franchise, because, get this, "when they look down at a twenty dollar bill and it doesn't look like an american twenty dollar bill, it won't bother them, because they are used to different-looking currency..." Hm.
Speaking of international players...

3. Uros Slokar and Roko-Leni Ukic: BC said that everything he's heard about Slokar's ongoing development is that he's going to be a player who can help us here. As we've heard before, he was considered the best player on our summer league team last year.

As for Ukic, he said that he's been high on Ukic since the draft workouts 2 years ago, when he "gave Devin Harris fits with his length". Said he's not the best defender, but that his length makes him an interesting player. He announced that he is working right now on getting him out of his contract with Tau Ceramica "sooner than expected". That being over there is not helping his development, and getting him here soon will be the best thing for him. It's been a frustrating season for Ukic with injuries, and also his personal disappointment at not being drafted in the 1st, despite assurances from several teams. Reading between the lines, we can expect to see Ukic here next season, which is news to me of the good variety.

4. A Bryan Colangelo Player, particularly when asked what he looks for in a point guard: "I like playmaking players, whether they are a 1 or a 5... I look for guys who can dribble, pass, and shoot, which is kind of a lost art these days... I like athletic players, versatile players..." Oh, and also a Babcock flashback, when he said he likes "character guys"

5. Are we getting a traditional centre? "There are not really any traditional centres in the draft, and there are really only one or two in the league. Guys like Amare Stoudamire and Chris Bosh are changing the position." He went on to talk again about the importance of athleticism and versatility, and that he thinks CB and CV both have this, and bring a lot to the table as a 4/5 and a 3/4 respectively.
Reading between the lines, I think we're more likely to see a Boris Diaw-type centre than waste time with a big stiff.

6. What about needing a defensive presence inside? "Last year in Phoenix, we recognized the need for that, and went and got a veteran in Kurt Thomas who can hurt you from mid-range." He mentioned many times the importance of bringing in veterans to this team. He said our pick could be leveraged for this.

7. What about bringing in Jamaal Magloire? - No comment.

8. The Mike James question. Obviously BC didn't say what he was planning to do, but a number of things he said makes me believe that James won't be back, at least not as our starting PG. First was his repeated emphasis on playmaking players, and he also said he likes a pass-first point guard. Later in the night in front of only a few of us, he said that he sees James as a combo guard rather than a PG. He also said that there's no way he'd be paying insurance so James can ride motorcycles and jump out of planes.
So.. before last night, I felt that we'd likely bring James back. Now I have doubts. At minimum, he's not BC's ideal future point guard.

9. Alvin Williams and the old regime. In talking about whether to re-sign Mike James, he brought up Alvin Williams' contract, and said that the past GM maybe had offered that kind of contract to Alvin to keep us, the fans, happy. He said that those times are gone, and he will be conscious of not allowing fan feelings to influence his decisions about who to keep.

10. Steve Nash. "The best player in the NBA, and probably the best player in the world."

11. Matt Bonner. BC looked at bringing Bonner into Phoenix last year. The sense he got from Matt's agent was that Matt wanted to stay in Toronto, so he let it go. Hang on now, is Bonner a Colangelo-type player? Versatile, nope. Athletic, nope. Dribble, nope. Pass, nope. Shoot, check. Hm...

12. Bench. Getting a versatile bench where 10 players can play a night is a priority. No big news there.

13. Lucky 13, Sam Mitchell's future with the Raptors. Despite asking every inch from sideways about his lack of X's and O's experience, our closing-game fall-aparts, BC said nothing but positive things about Mitchell. He went on about how hard it is to get young guys to work hard every night, and that Sam has done an amazing job motivating them. When pressed about late games, he said it came down to inexperience. Which is interesting because he didn't say is that it comes down to inexperienced players, just "inexperience". So one conclusion is that he considers Sam an inexperienced coach as well, and thus some of the late-game problems.
My read-between-the-lines prediction, Sam is safe for one more season.

14. BC himself. Impressive. Good guy, smart guy. Likes to talk. Tendency to wear Don Cherry collars continues. Made time for some random guy with white powder on his lips and a motivational book tucked under his arm. (This was not me.) My favourite non-raptor-intelligence moment of the night was when when some guy reached into the scrum to ask BC to autograph a ticket, and passed him a pen too. The pen was black felt tip, and in passing it, it drew a small line on Bryan's hand. His reaction was hilarious. He stopped talking and stared at the mark on his hand, then stared daggers at the guy who had passed the pen, then stared back at the mark. Then happy Bryan returned, and he continued answering a salary cap question. When BC passed back the autographed ticket and pen, Bryan said thank you to the guy, then watched him walked away out of the corner of his eye. He then stared back at the mark on his hand, and -- clearly very aggravated -- started conscientiously rubbing at it while answering another question. This tiny glimpse of the evil obsessive hand-washing Bryan somehow made me very happy. With Bryan, we're in good hands. Really clean good hands.