A year ago, after their initial breakthrough, the Toronto Raptors were determined to keep the gang together.
This year, after a humiliating post-season collapse, you can feel the team preparing to pull itself apart.
The NBA draft is in two days. The Raptors pick two-thirds of the way through the first round – the equivalent of a talent dumpster-dive. Maybe you'll come out with a Van Gogh. More likely, it's a half-eaten box of KFC.
"If a player is being picked 20th – I hate to say it like this – there's something they lack," said Toronto general manager Masai Ujiri.
With a very few exceptions, the "thing" they're missing is the ability to be NBA starters. If this team is going to improve, the current draft is not the way to do it. And the Raptors have to improve.
A year ago, back-up point guard Greivis Vasquez begged to be resigned by Toronto. This year, he told the Venezuelan media that both Minnesota and Houston are looking to trade for him. Here's a new wrinkle on the old "Let's start a rumour that helps me" trick – actually stating it as fact in front of the cameras.
"I just heard that Greivis said that," Ujiri said, sighing. "But Greivis says a lot of things."
Which isn't precisely a "No."
Before the playoffs began, Ujiri said he was not decided on a future direction, one way or the other. He refused to commit to blowing up the team if the players couldn't get past the first round. First, he wanted to see how they lost.
They lost so badly they made it look like it was the goal, and now the direction is clear. Ujiri's natural tendency is toward disequilibrium. He likes to keep things fluid and moving. Being comfortable actually appears to unsettle him. He's gotten ahead by taking bold risks. He'll keep doing that.
This team will be turned upside down and shaken until all the loose bits fall out, and probably for the foreseeable future.
A year ago, Ujiri was also not decided on whether he would keep coach Dwane Casey. Like others around the league, his attention wandered to Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau, who was busily making himself persona non grata in Chicago.
The Raptors went so far as to do a deep background check on Thibodeau, trying to determine if he'd fit into the people-first culture they're trying to create. He didn't. Others may have arrived at the same conclusion: Despite all his success, Thibodeau is still out of work.
Having decided to pass on the one guy he rated, Ujiri recommitted to Casey.
In the past, Ujiri distanced himself from the coach, who was a Bryan Colangelo choice. The GM never said anything bad about him, he just didn't say much at all. Ujiri concentrated on the business happening off the court, and allowed Casey to take responsibility for everything on it. It was functionally two solitudes.
As part of his new outlook, Ujiri is keen to absorb a sizable portion of the blame that was placed largely on Casey's shoulders. A year ago, this was the right sort of personnel mix. This year, it's suddenly not.
"I think we got complacent a little bit. I think I messed up a little bit. Not a little bit, a lot," Ujiri said. "Maybe with the composition of the team. How we played, and the types of players we had playing around each other."
In other words, he gave Casey a square roster, then he asked him to hammer it into a round post-season hole.
Ujiri is being careful not to light up the ejection pods so everyone else in the NBA can see them. He twice used the phrase "open for business" when describing his current deal-making mindset. But he doesn't want anyone to think this is a blanket-spread-across-the-front-lawn-make-your-best-offer sort of thing.
"We've evaluated a lot of stuff; maybe [we'll] make a couple of changes here and there. Our core still remains the same," Ujiri said.
Again, that's careful wording. The core does remain the same. There is no reason it will remain the same a week or a month or three months from now. He is willing to trade anyone, but for something of immediate value.
You couldn't help but notice that, while Ujiri was talking inside the Air Canada Centre gym, forward Terrence Ross was doing fitness work behind him. A month ago, you'd have said Ross, along with centre Jonas Valanciunas, was one of the untouchables. Maybe he isn't any more. Or maybe he's going to be filling a DeMar DeRozan-sized hole next season. Either way, from a professional advancement standpoint, this is a good time for any Raptor to look busy.
Ujiri says they've narrowed down their draft choices to five or seven players. He said it won't be a rush-to-Google name, as with Bruno Caboclo. This year, you'll recognize the guy he picks.
But reading between the lines – and there is always a novel's worth of space in there whenever Ujiri is speaking – you get the sense the Raptors won't be picking 20th on Thursday. What good does another 19-year-old project or low-ceiling college senior do for them? Instead, you package the pick with someone on the roster and buy Casey a veteran who can defend.
That's what the coach badly wants. There was no point in keeping him if you're not willing to provide it. On Tuesday, Ujiri was talking to the media, but he was really talking to Casey. For the first time since they were thrown together two years ago, the two minds behind the Raptors are working in tandem, rather than on a parallel.
Given a more suitable staff, Casey will have a year to prove his way works. If not, then they start again … again.
That doesn't leave much time to remake this team. Given those pressures, Thursday sounds like a decent launch date for We The North 2.0.
Cathal Kelly