Border Tax aka Big Hurt

So yesterday's morning's newspaper told me that the Toronto Blue Jays are going to be signing 38 year old slugger Frank Thomas to be their designated hitter next year.

Not a bad move I thought.....Until I saw the price tag. $18 - $20 Million dollars!! What! I mean in his prime yea Thomas aka the Big Hurt was the man in Chi-Town but at 39 years old you're telling me that he's worth 10 million a year. Come on now!

I guess Toronto continues its trend as the place where old sports stars can feather their nest egg just before retiring. I'm not happy about this one.

Why because we are overpaying to get him in Toronto and this is a trend that had been going on in every sport aside from Hockey in this town. I call it a border tax. Whenever we go after basketball or baseball players to come play in Canada these days we are always overpaying them. Its like we're begging or bribing them to come play here in our city of igloos and Eskimos which is the perception most Americans seen to have of us. Toronto is becoming the place for players to come make some big bucks and produce not a damn thing in terms of team improvement.

Well I have a question. If Toronto is such a world class city like our elected representatives keep claiming then why do we have to overpay these spoilt big kids to play here? They should be lining up to play in our city. Shouldn't they?

We do a big song and dance about over the hill or mediocre players coming here to collect a fat cheque only to see the teams they represent fail miserably year after year. Is it worth it?

We did the same overpaying thing with Raptors point guard T J Ford the other day. He is an ok point guard but he aint worth the money they gave him. Walking around giving interviews about he is an Allen Iverson type of player. Please! Brother how you going to be an Allen Iverson type of player and cant shoot the ball? You're vying for president of the brick layers association you aint no Allen Iverson. Yea you got speed but one of my favorite college players Jacques Vaughan has/had speed too and in the NBA he never became anything but a backup and journeyman.

Actually on the whole topic of the Raptors its still early in the season but I have some thoughts on the team.

(1) I think until I see Bargnani turn into the next Dirk that we wasted our number 1 draft pick. Vincenzo Esposito anyone?

(2) Colangelo make a mistake by trading Charlie V. I believe Colangelo was interested in cleaning house of all of his predecessors mistakes, starting with a clean slate and the like but Charlie V was not one of them. Trading Charlie V for Ford was a mistake. First thing they teach you in GM school is you don't trade big for small. It was a rookie mistake. I say we should have kept Charlie V, turned the point guard duties over to Calderone, traded the number 1 pick for two later picks and grabbed Marcus Williams and Rudy Gay and we would be set for the playoffs next year assuming we did point number 4. Charlie V and Bosh playing together again for a second year would have given us a consistent big man tandem and we would be contenders for a playoff spot.

(3) Demoting Mo Pete was stupid. Fred Jones aint that good. But I figure like in point 2 Mo Pete was an old regime player so he soon out the door too.

(4) We need a big bad veteran or two on the team and no Derrick Martin looking all coach like in his suit on the sidelines doesn't count. Neither does Mo Pete. Mo Pete is like the veteran on the squad now and he's not either big or bad plus he's only been around 6 years. No we need a big bad forward. Remember those two years way way way back (well if you follow a BET timeline where old school means a year and a half ago) when we made playoffs? What do you think the reason was for that? Stop right there if you want to put up your hand and say Vince Carter. No the reason we made playoffs those couple of years was veterans like Charles Oakley, Antonio Davis, Kevin Willis and to some extent a declining, sorry way over the hill, Hakeem Olajuwon. Guys with playoff experience, leadership skills and a willingness to do the dirty work and play defense. These young cats don't want to play defense and don't know how to play it either. All they want to do is make the sportscentre highlight reel.

So you see there are my early season reasons for why the Raptors will remain a crap team this year.