Raptor Red.

Vineet and I have enjoyed watching the Raptors regularly this season since we had purchased an Eastern Conference game pack. But going into the stadium for the playoffs, the atmosphere was crazy. Each person had been given free red Raptors t-shirts, so the stadium was completely red! We got in and the game was already underway and noticed something unusual though... Raptors were in white jerseys and it was the Nets that were in red. The media, care of long sarcastic quotes from the Nets' Richard Jefferson saying they had never had that much support on their away games, picked up on it in the coverage after. (arrrgh) That basically rubbed salt to the wound because yes.... the Raptors lost.

They just weren't playing the same. They're usually a quick team that moves the ball a lot. But this time, they were completely off. Shooting was bad, hardly any assists... I guess they were nervous being such an inexperienced playoffs team? the game was still fun though as they had spurts where they seemed to put up a fight... like in the 4th quarter when from a 14-point deficit, they eventually got the Nets lead down to 1-pt so the entire stadium was on it's feet cheering their hearts out. And of course, you can't help but enjoy the "BOOS" and chants of "Carter sucks" whenever the ball touches Carter's fingers. There was even a blow-up doll wearing a Carter jersey that people were passing around and beating up. It was eventually confiscated by security though. All this must have had some effect on Carter (as it usually does) cause he got 4-fouls quite early in the second half and had to sit it out for a while. Unfortunately, it didn't help the end result.

On a brighter note, we got really good seats for the playoffs! And these seats are the seats we will regularly have for next season. We shared season tickets with our friend Thad and got better seats than we had this year. The seats have a great view and we finally have cup holders! Also, waitresses come around with PDAs to take your orders so you don't have to bear with the uber-long lines at the concession stands.

Oh and before I forget... the Raptor is the cutest NBA mascot. Here is the newly launched CHOMPER RAPTOR version. He basically "argued" with a NJ Nets fan and chomped him down in his big mouth! Hehehe.