This year the Toronto Raptors were either the 20-win team you thought they would be at the start of the season, a bunch of underachievers and you can pick your own reason, or a team that could have been competing with the Pacers for the eighth and final playoff spot in the East except for all of the injuries.  In many ways, all of the above descriptions are correct.

Like a lot of general managers who find themselves with a team in transition, Raptors President and General Manager Bryan Colangelo attempted to rebuild his team while keeping playoff aspirations alive and that is a formula few are ultimately successful with.  However, whether it was deliberate or not, Colangelo did effectively blow the whole thing up after losing All-Star Chris Bosh to free agency and those wanting this team to start over got most of what they wished for.

Now the question outstanding comes down to what the next steps should be in fixing the Raptors.

1. New Ownership

After early season rumors that Rogers Communications, who own the Toronto Blue Jays, wanted to buy Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment, who own the NBA Toronto Raptors, NHL Toronto Maple Leafs, AHL Toronto Marlies, MLS Toronto FC, the Air Canada Center, and various other entertainment properties for a billion dollars were quietly squashed, the Ontario Teacher’s Pension Plan formally announced that they were seeking a buyer for their two-thirds interest in MLSE for $1.5 billion.

In Toronto, the recent inability to field contending professional sports teams has been linked by the media to the comfortable and significant profits their institutional owners have been able to enjoy without investing heavily in players or overhead.  An effective market of well over six million people with three all-sports networks and four national TV broadcasters ensures high ticket prices can be maintained and every game is televised.

Many fans are hoping that new ownership more willing to spend can be found in time for next season, but in the meantime significant or risky investments in their professional sports teams are probably on hold.

2. Extend President and General Manager Bryan Colangelo

As in several other recent examples around the NBA this past season, once a team is put up for sale, long-term decisions like the hiring or extending of the general manager and coaching staffs are often put on the back-burner.  However, with the NBA Draft less than two months away, the Raptors can ill afford to risk wasting another high draft pick by switching general managers at this late date.

Since Colangelo arrived in Toronto on March 1, 2006, only Jose Calderon remains on today’s roster and Colangelo almost traded Calderon last summer.  No one could say Colangelo has not been active in trying to improve his team.

After losing Bosh to free agency, Colangelo set about acquiring young athletic talent and moving high-dollar, long-term contracts off the Raptors books.  He was mostly successful.  The Raptors have just $45.3 million in player salaries committed to next season and seven of the 10 players under guaranteed contract are 25 years old or younger.

Colangelo has put his team in a good position to take advantage of any opportunities that evolve after a new collective bargaining agreement is reached with the players union, but his own contract with the team expires in July and is still waiting for the right time to discuss an extension.

3. Make a Coaching Decision

At the start of this season Colangelo let the media know head coach Jay Triano was progressing as expected.  Triano was Colangelo’s hire, even if it was widely assumed that part of the reason Triano got the job was the team still had to pay their former head coach Sam Mitchell for another couple of years.

Under Triano, the Raptors have gone 25-40, 40-42, and will finish this season with less than 25 wins, and while much of the blame for missing the playoffs last year and this year’s poor showing can be attributed to injuries, a coach always owns his record.

The easiest move the Raptors could make this offseason to improve the fans’ perception of the team is to hire a veteran head coach known for getting the most out of young players. But, one easily overlooked factor in Triano’s favor is despite the losing season his players haven’t quit on him.

Much of the Toronto media wants Triano gone, and if Colangelo is not extended they will almost certainly get their wish. Even if Colangelo stays, now is time to assess if Triano is the right man to lead the Raptors.  

4. Lower the Player Turnover Rate

The Toronto Raptors have undergone massive change under Colangelo as the GM tried to build on his unexpected 2007 Atlantic division championship and turn the Raptors into instant legitimate Eastern Conference contenders.  Probably the best argument for keeping Colangelo around now is the team can ill afford to change direction again.

The impact of continuous player turnover can be seen on the floor.  It seems the Raptors get off to slow starts every season as most of the rotation changes from year-to-year and the players struggle to find any rhythm or chemistry with their new teammates.

The current Raptors seem to have found a possible rotation with the veteran Jose Calderon leading a core of young players including DeMar DeRozan, James Johnson, Amir Johnson or Ed Davis, and Andrea Bargnani with the other veteran Leandro Barbosa coming off the bench to look after Jerryd Bayless.  

{AUTHOR_BOX}Restricted free agent Sonny Weems (should they issue him a Qualifying Offer by June 30th) seems to be the odd man out when Linas Kleiza returns from injury thus ending the brief "Young Onez" marketing campaign, but in the interest of continuity, Weems is someone the Raptors should keep around.  Injuries do happen.

Free agent Reggie Evans is an intriguing player who can rebound better than anyone on the Raptors, but has played in so few games during his two years it is difficult to determine if he has carved himself out a spot on next year’s roster.

The draft and free agency will ensure that there are a significant number of changes to the Raptors lineup again next season, but if the team is to progress, they need to start developing a core of players that stick around for a few years.  The current crop of young players would make a good starting point.

5. The Bargnani Decision

The Toronto Raptors had the first overall pick in the 2006 draft and Colangelo’s first big, long-term move was to select the highly-skilled offensive-minded Italian seven-footer Andrea Bargnani and later signed him to a five-year, $50 million extension.  It has not been a smooth first five years in the NBA for the Raptors’ center.

The pick was questioned almost from the moment it was made even though most in the know would tell you that there was no clear cut choice for first overall that year.  

In his first season without Bosh, Bargnani was asked to take on a major scoring role for the Raptors and score he has, averaging just under 22 points per game on the season.  Unfortunately with Bargnani focused on scoring, his rebounding and blocks took a significant step backwards, and the Raptors really needed to see his all around game improve if the team was to move forward immediately without last year’s All-Star.

Bargnani has been looked to as someone the Raptors should be able to build their team around and takes a considerable amount of criticism in the media for his slow help-side defense and poor rebounding statistics.  However, the Raptors recognized Bargnani was a finesse player when they drafted him and have been trying to acquire the toughness and rebounding needed at the two forward spots for him to be effective with the acquisitions of Linas Kleiza and James Johnson and the attempt to acquire Tyson Chandler last summer being the most recent examples.

The decision the Raptors have to make is whether the team can afford to lose the obvious scoring punch of a player like Bargnani - who only one season ago averaged 1.4 blocks per game and played solid man-on-man defense - or would they be better off trying to acquire a more traditional center and trading Colangelo’s guy?

Bargnani has not developed in a straight line but rather seems to swing towards the direction his coaches are currently pushing him while the other aspects of his game stagnant or slide until he has figured it out.  There is a better than even chance that Bargnani will recover to or pass his rebounding and block numbers of a season ago while keeping his new scoring average next year.

This decision could well define the franchise for the foreseeable future and if they get it wrong, this could be a move Colangelo can’t live down.  Keeping the 25-year-old Bargnani is the safe decision unless Colangelo receives an exceptional offer.

The Fix

The Toronto Raptors need to get their ownership situation resolved as quickly as possible.  Failure to get Colangelo’s name on a new contract gives teams like New York the opportunity to poach the Raptors President while they dither.  Without a GM in place for next season, important decisions about coaching, the draft, and which players to build around or trade become unnecessarily ponderous and inaction can become as devastating as actually making a mistake.

More than anything after five seasons of change the Raptors need some stability.  Keeping their young core together and extending Colangelo would be a good place to start.  A rebuilding program requires patience.