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Toronto Raptors: Teams
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Even with another losing season, the Toronto Raptors are on the rise. During the season, they named Bryan Colangelo team president and general manager. He was previously with the Phoenix Suns and is responsible for the arrangement of the team and its run-and-gun offense. Chris Bosh ... added to the good news as he signed a contract extension keeping him there for another six season removing the chance for the Los Angeles Lakers to sign him.
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The Toronto Raptors are a National Basketball Association Team based out of Toronto, Ontario Canada.. The Raptors are currently a member of the Atlantic Division in the Eastern Conference and are owned by the Maple Leafs Sports and Entertainment Company. Sam Mitchell is currently the head coach of the Raptors and they play their home games at the Air Canada Centre in downtown Toronto. The Air Canada Centre was opened in 1999 and is ... home to the Toronto Maple Leafs of the National Hockey League. The Air Canada Centre currently seats over 19,000 Basketball fans.
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The Toronto Raptors used their first overall pick in June 2006 to choose Italian prodigy Andrea Bargnani. He became the first European drafted number one overall. Later, the Toronto Raptors hired Benetton Treviso to be the team’s General Manager and European executive guru Maurizio Gherardini as the club’s vice president and the assistant general manager. In June, Colangelo traded the 2006 NBA Rookie of the Year Charlie Villanueva to the Milwaukee Bucks for TJ Ford. In July the Toronto Raptors acquired Anthony Parker from the Maccabi Tel Aviv, and later picked John Salmons from the Philadelphia 76ers, though Salmons scraped the agreement and did not join the Toronto Raptors. Fred Jones signed to a three-year contract worth $11 million.
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To top it all off, the Toronto Raptors claimed the first overall pick in the 2006 NBA Draft giving them numerous options to fill needs on the team. Colangelo and the Toronto Raports selected Andrea Bargnani from Italy. For days he was locked in as their guy as they ... signed his team manager from Italy. Now only one question remains, he has been compared as a smaller Vladimir Radmanovic, but can he live up to the hype and be the next Dirk Nowitski, or another Darko Milicic.
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Canada’s only NBA team, the Toronto Raptors, have been through a bit of a roller coaster ride since being hatched as an expansion team in 1995. Just like any new team, the Raptors struggled for a few years but by their fifth year they were a consistent winner and they made it all the way to Game 7 of the conference semifinals before falling to the 76ers. But instead of building on that, the team lost its star player, Vince Carter, and slipped a bit and missed the playoffs in four straight years. That streak ended last season, as the Raptors finished 47-35 and qualified for the postseason. Toronto fans have always supported their team, and the recent improvement has caused a surge in sales of Toronto Raptors basketball tickets.
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The Toronto Raptors started the season on a bad note going 1-15. By getting off to such a horrible start, any chance the Raptors had at making the playoffs were eliminated before Dec. 1. It took them months to recover and, while there were some highlights in the middle of the season when they played near .500 ball, it wasn’t enough because the start was just too tough to overcome. The situation didn’t get better when Kobe Bryant of the Los Angeles Lakers dropped 81 points on the team in January. It was the most points scored in a game since Wilt Chamberlain and his 100-point game.
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