I don’t have much of a preview to write here. The Raps just played the Bulls last week, and lost at home, so I don’t imagine they have much hope of winning in Chi-town.

As I wrote last week, Derrick Rose is better than any player on the Raptors (and he’s just a rookie), the Bulls winning simply depends on how much support he gets from his teammates. The Bulls have a lot of shooters, and if they’re on, they’re tough to beat; They’re also athletic so when they get out on the break, look out.

Since the Raptors give up more open looks than any team in the league and offer up some of the worst transition D you’ll ever see, it’d be pretty easy for the Bulls to run them off the floor.

The Raps were in last week’s game because Andrea Bargnani caught fire and they fed him the rock for three quarters (and proceeded to ignore him down the stretch). They also hit the glass when Gordon, Deng and Hinrich were missing shots.

That’ll be tougher tonight because the Bulls will have Drew Gooden back; their best rebounder missed the last game and although the Raps were without Jermaine O’Neal, his contribution is expected to be pretty minor.

Early word is that Jose Calderon is gonna try and play tonight. Not sure if this is a good thing or not; if he’s not 100 per cent then what’s the point? Heck, 100 per cent or not, he’s going to get destroyed by Rose.

As for the rest, well, the deal is still the same. The Bulls offer the sort of shooters and athletes that that give the Raptors trouble. If their shots are dropping and they’re getting out on the break, the Raps are in trouble. But because jump-shooting teams are always vulnerable, the Raps can steal this one - they get a few misses, hit the glass well, keep the bigs involved, slow things down some, and get solid contributions from Parker and Calderon… well, I guess there’s a chance.

But not much of one.

Bulls by 11.

Moving on, the All-Star Starters were announced last night, nothing too crazy happened (like T-Mac making it ahead of Chris Paul or even worse, Yi making it ahead of Kevin Garnett). I agree that Allen Iverson isn’t having a great year but he’s always been a fan favourite, and he’s still a very good player; remember the starters should be a combo of player talent and popularity. Devin Harris and Jameer Nelson are having good years but they haven’t reached their ceilings and they’re not that popular… yet. Let them join the team as bench players this year, pay their dues that way, and in the next year or two - assuming they continue to get better - they’ll get the votes.

I assume Chris Bosh will get selected by the coaches, and although the team sucks and Bosh has been up and down, I definitely believe he’s one of the best forwards in the east. And, although I was hoping he’d make it this year, I have no doubt that Jose Calderon will miss the cut. He’s missed too much time and, either because of the injury or some other reason, hasn’t played quite as well this year as last year. He just doesn’t deserve it, not with Harris and Nelson having the seasons they are. Even Derrick Rose is more deserving right now. Calderon’s turn is going to have to wait until next year - assuming he ever gets healthy.

Anyway, that’s about all I have to say for today. It’s an unfortunate time to be a Raptor fan, our team sucks and there’s a chance we won’t even have an all-star. Sigh. Hopefully we’ll get a couple of good, exciting games this weekend to keep us entertained.

This entry was posted on Friday, January 23rd, 2009 at 10:15 am and is filed under Game Previews, General NBA, Toronto Raptors.You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.