Reggie Jackson complaining about refs after Raptors loss is weak

Pascal Siakam led the Toronto Raptors to their fifth consecutive victory on their West Coast road trip, taking down Reggie Jackson and the Los Angeles Clippers along the way. The Raptors have now equaled the Cavaliers’ 39-30 mark and put themselves in a position to compete for the No. 6 seed.

Despite 23 points and nine assists from Jackson, Siakam’s 31 points were enough to push Toronto to victory. Precious Achiuwa came alive in the second half, and the Raptors needed every single point he provided considering how close they came to blowing this lead.

Thanks to some missed Fred VanVleet free throws, questionable reviews, and quick whistles in the fourth quarter, Natalie Sago and the officiating played a big role in the outcome of this game. Toronto managed to overcome some odd calls, but Jackson was still bitter about the result.

In Jackson’s postgame press conference, he claimed that Sago was the “best player” for the Raptors. Jackson implied that LA was less aggressive on the glass because of the fear of getting a foul called against them. There are plenty of reasons as to why the Clippers lost last night, and Sago doesn’t even crack the top ten.

Reggie Jackson is bitter that the Toronto Raptors beat the Clippers.

If it was all the ref’s fault, does that mean 3-point ace Luke Kennard attempting two shots and scoring zero points in 22 minutes gets a pass? How about Ivica Zubac managing just two points in 17 minutes even though Khem Birch was not playing his best basketball of late.

The Clippers turned the ball over 14 times in this game, including three from Jackson himself. They were also outrebounded by a Raptors team that has been infamously poor at defensive rebounding this season. Jackson may have had a nice game, but his team wasn’t always backing him up.

Some Clippers weren’t as frosty towards Toronto as Jackson was. Terance Mann said that Nick Nurse was a great coach while insisting that the Raptors are a consistently overlooked group. Jackson might need to take some lessons in sportsmanship from his younger teammate.

What made Wednesday’s game so fun was the fact that both of these teams were playing unified, high-octane basketball in the middle of playoff races that few outside prognosticators thought they would be in at this point in time. It’s a shame Jackson tried to detract from that by claiming Toronto won due to poor officiating.