Losing seasons may be the best time to lock in as a Toronto Raptors fan

What other time could you see Jamal Shead fly for a bargain? Scotiabank Arena has been loud this week...

The Toronto Raptors played the Washington Wizards for the second time in a row Monday night, a mini-series between two teams out of the playoff race. With Toronto’s injury list ever-growing with injuries like Mogbo’s broken nose, Dick’s bruised knee, or Jakob Poeltl’s rest — the Raptors aren’t exactly deploying their best lineups this week.

Raptors games are still worth the watch though, and honestly, now may be the best time to get tickets to watch the team. Don’t worry, this isn’t a paid advertisement for Ticketmaster, I have morals — but the Raptors may have the best game atmosphere for a tanking team in the entire league.

On Saturday, Darko Rajakovic called the Toronto Raptors fans “the best in the league” — I won’t be so biased as to outright agree with him. Yet, he has a point. In the big scheme of business and capitalism, NBA teams often fail to prioritize the everyday die-hard fan. Two scenarios bring out the best in fans — Championship contending teams and tanking teams.

Championship teams are an obvious one — winning is fun. Winning Championships is the most fun, as the Raptors proved in 2019. Fans are in the building no matter what the price is in order to witness history. If they can’t get into the building, they are right outside on the street. The city comes alive around a team and everyone is on the same page.

So how could a tanking team then also provide the most authentic fan moments? As inflation rises, so does the price of game tickets. Last spring, Raptors President Masai Ujiri called it “the way business works” — yet it doesn’t always sit right with fans how much it costs to sit even in the cheapest seats. This creates a crowd filled with what the average Toronto folk will call “suits” — aka the people who can afford the tickets. The “suits” aren’t gonna scream “ref you suck!” or participate in the wave or elbow each other during the t-shirt toss.

When the team plays the Washington Wizards — a team with 13 total wins on the season so far — it’s hard to justify an increased price point for tickets. Naturally, tickets get cheaper, which means more fans can come to the game, and they can sit in better seats. No matter the Raptors record, Scotiabank Arena is usually full (and loud) these days — especially so during this mini Wizards series.

Authentic fans, a lot of kids and a packed crowd means NOISE. When the Raptors and Wizards were in a late-game tussle for the win on Saturday, the arena felt alive and the noise was deafening. When Jamal Shead FLEW into a putback dunk on Monday night, the fans were loving it. It’s, dare I say, fun?

That atmosphere is good for culture building as well, something we talked about after Saturday’s one-point loss to the Wizards. The players feed off of the energy of the crowd — it’s a live relationship and conversation between player and the group of fans surrounding them.

Getting these real, die-hard fans in seats while this team is rebuilding is essential. The goal of course is for this group to become a playoff bound basketball team, with players like Barnes, Barrett and Quickley of course — but also with the Sheads, Walters, Ingrams, and so on of the team. It’s great for fans to be building that essential relationship with these players now, so that when it’s a playoff team, the players are even more so motivated to play better for this city, these fans. So that they want to stay here in free agency to play for these fans.

If you don’t want me at my losing by one point to the Wizards, then you can’t have me at my Kawhi buzzer-beater series winning shot — or whatever the exact saying is.

People who can bear to show up and scream for a team winning a quarter of their games in a season, will be the most supportive when the team is winning. Hey, maybe you’ll get to see the team win a near 20-point blowout against the Wizards, maybe you’ll see them lose a 1-point game to the Wizards. Either way the tickets won’t bankrupt you.

Plus for kids, in 20+ years when you say “wow I remember my first Raptors game,” you probably won’t remember that it was in a losing season and most of the adults around you wanted the team to lose in order to draft Cooper Flagg. Unless we end up actually drafting Cooper Flagg.

So yeah, we joke about the team being bad, and about tanking — but ultimately this is the time to rally around the team. Once they get good again, you probably won’t be able to afford to go.