3 Quotes from Raptors Media Day that reveal the team's plan - and their failures

Masai Ujiri, I do not think that word means what you think it means.

Toronto Raptors Team President Masai Ujiri spoke to the media as the kickoff to the Raptors' Media Day on Monday, answering questions and digging into both the team's offseason and what lies ahead. In the process, he tried to describe the team's plan - and in the process, made clear he doesn't exactly understand the words he is using.

Let's look at three quotes from the day that highlight the team's plan for the season, but at the same time highlight how the Raptors didn't execute this summer to make that plan a success.

Quote No. 1: Rebuild

Masai Ujiri was asked early in his press availability to use an adjective to describe this season for the Raptors. That's a wonderful question because it doesn't limit the scope of the potential responses. Rather than use something positive or intentionally generic, Ujiri was direct: "rebuilding."

He explained how they were building a team around a 23-year-old in Scottie Barnes, and that the team therefore had to be patient. He said "you play to win" but that this season was "a rebuilding year" for the Raptors. Later he defined success as "The growth and progress of all our players."

That's an extremely telling word choice by Ujiri, but it appears he may not be using that word the same way the rest of us do. "Rebuilding" is an approach where a team moves off of its veterans, accumulates prospects and draft picks, and tries to maximize their own draft position. You don't have to commit at the severity of the Process 76ers, but you are going to do a poor job of rebuilding if you never have a Top-5 pick.

Unfortunately for Ujiri and the Raptors, they are expensive and way too good to tank this season. Scottie Barnes, Immanuel Quickley and RJ Barrett are young, but they are also good and established. Jakob Poeltl is a stout shot-blocking tree in the paint. Bruce Brown is a proven player. It's reasonable for the Raptors to conclude they are not in position to make a playoff run, but they are also too good to have reasonable odds at a top pick.

If the Raptors were supposed to be "rebuilding" this year, they aren't doing a great job of it thus far.

Quote No. 2: The Draft

This is going to continue the conversation from the quote before, but later in his media time he made the statement that "the draft is a way to shape teams." Reading behind his statement you would conclude that the Raptors likely want to prioritize losing this season to secure that team-shaping draft pick.

Yet again, they are not in a position to do that. The Raptors lost their Top-10 pick last season because they traded for a veteran center, a center who may have netted them a good first-round pick in return if they had moved him at the draft or beginning of the summer. Instead, Jakob Poeltl is entrenched as the veteran starter on a team that is "rebuilding" and values the draft. This year they have too much veteran talent to do anything short of winning 30 or more games.

The 2025 Draft Class is absolutely loaded, with names such as Cooper Flagg, VJ Edgecombe and Ace Bailey awaiting the winners of the 2025 lottery. Obviously, drafting a player such as Flagg would completely change this team's trajectory - Ujiri is not wrong at face value.

The problem is that they are not positioning themselves to prioritize such a draft pick, and if the Raptors neither make a real playoff push nor land a Top 10 pick, their season has to be viewed as a failure. Why didn't the Raptors pick a direction this offseason?

Quote No. 3: Not the focus

Veteran center Jakob Poeltl has been on winning teams and on badly losing teams, so he understands some of the differences between a team going all-out to win and one playing out the string.

During his media day appearance on Monday he made the statement that "we're capable of winning some games" but that he knows "that's not the main focus for us...I think the focus for us is on getting better as a team. That has to be a long-term project."

If even the players are saying that it's a "long-term" projects and that the franchise is not focused on wins is extremely telling, and it's somewhat sad. Not only will Raptors fans not get to root for a good team, but they have to know that Toronto is making a too-little, too-late attempt to "tank" and rebuild around a top pick as Barnes' running mate.

The team has their veteran players repeating the company line about positive change, about taking a long-view and being patient, but they haven't committed to the plan. That likely means past failures will seed future ones. Toronto can break out of the cycle, but they have to want to.