Why Did The Raptors Draft Scottie Barnes Over Jalen Suggs? | Instant Analysis - SPORTSNET

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2021-07-30 03:54:24Z
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NBA Draft 2021: Toronto Raptors select Scottie Barnes with the 4th overall pick - RaptorsHQ

The Raptors have upended consensus in the 2021 NBA Draft, opting to select Florida State forward Scottie Barnes with the fourth overall pick. To say this was a complete shock is not entirely true — there was buzz the Raptors were at least somewhat intrigued by Barnes’ potential — but it also felt like Toronto would not take the gamble (e.g. it felt like Jalen Suggs at no. 4 was a lock).

Barnes joins the Raptors just before his 20th birthday. He’s listed at 6’9” and 227 pounds, which puts him in the small forward category, by my math. Barnes spent one season at Florida State during which he averaged 10.3 points, 4.1 assists, and 4.0 rebounds per game across 24 contests. Admittedly, the numbers don’t exactly pop — Barnes only started seven games — but Toronto must love his potential.

Said potential is what our guy JD got at in his column here. Barnes has serious defensive skills, a player who can already guard almost every position via his strength, speed and know-how. The broadcast compared him to Draymond Green, which is not a bad place to be — particularly for a Raptors team that obviously values defensive ability and versatility. Like Green, Barnes has flashed an advanced play-making game for a forward, and he also has a limited offensive arsenal. Few are looking at Barnes, who shot 28 percent from three and 62 percent from the free-throw line, to be a lights-out gunner. Maybe he gets there in time, or maybe his skill-set is less dependent on his shot.

So then the risk: did the Raptors just get a player who can’t start for the current squad with OG Anunoby and Pascal Siakam locked in at the small and power forward position? Could it be that Barnes only tracks as another second or third-ranked player on a championship calibre team? (If that; some are worried he’s the next Stanley Johnson.) In all, the question remains: will Toronto regret missing on Suggs?

Or do the Raptors have something else planned with regards to their roster construction? Right now it’s unclear, but we do know one thing for now: Toronto has selected Scottie Barnes in the 2021 NBA Draft.

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2021-07-30 00:30:00Z
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Canada's women's eight rowing crew captures Olympic gold for 1st time in 29 years - CBC.ca

Canada's women's eight crew captured gold on the final day of Olympic rowing at the Sea Forest Waterway in Tokyo on Friday, winning the event for the first time in 29 years.

New Zealand claimed silver, finishing ahead of bronze winners China.

The only other Olympic gold for Canada in women's eight came at the Barcelona Olympics in 1992, their first time reaching the Olympic podium. Canada's crew enjoyed continued success with silver in 1996 and bronze in 2000.

Canada claimed silver in the women's eight event at the 2012 London Olympics before missing the podium in Rio with a fifth place finish.

The men's eight final wraps up the rowing competition at 9:25 p.m. ET.

More to come.

Bring on the cheers

Find live streams, must-watch video highlights, breaking news and more in one perfect Olympic Games package. Following Team Canada has never been easier or more exciting.

More from Tokyo 2020

WATCH l CBC Sports' The Olympians feature on women's eight rowing:

Watch CBC Sports' The Olympians feature, on Women's 8 Rowing. 2:37

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2021-07-30 01:13:00Z
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First three NBA Draft picks prior to Raptors leaked: report | Offside - Daily Hive

The Toronto Raptors’ NBA Draft decision is looking like it’ll be a lot more straightforward.

The Raptors hold the fourth overall selection tonight, but it appears that they might actually be the first team to have some level of suspense about their pick.

Oklahoma State’s Cade Cunningham, NBA G League Ignite’s Jalen Green, and USC’s Evan Mobley are looking like they’ll be the first three picks in tonight’s draft, per ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.

Cunningham is set to join the Detroit Pistons, the Houston Rockets are set to take Green, and the Cleveland Cavaliers will be adding Mobley to their mix.

With Cade Cunningham a solid No. 1 to Detroit now, Houston and Cleveland continue to trend toward Jalen Green and Evan Mobley with the second and third picks, respectively, sources tell ESPN.

— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) July 29, 2021

Wojnarowski and Shams Charania of The Athletic have a long-standing friendly rivalry when it comes to leaking top draft picks. Woj’s reports aren’t necessarily set in stone, but barring anything wild, it appears far more likely than not that the first three draft picks have already been spoiled.

For the Raptors’ front office and their fanbase, this offers a bit more clarity ahead of time about who their own pick will be.

Gonzaga guard Jalen Suggs appears to be the most likely choice for the Raptors, though Florida State’s Scottie Barnes or the Ignite’s Jonathan Kuminga are other possibilities.

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2021-07-29 19:00:00Z
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Nationals Trade Brad Hand To Blue Jays - MLB Trade Rumors

The Blue Jays have added another arm to their bullpen mix, announcing the acquisition of veteran lefty Brad Hand from the Nationals in exchange for catcher Riley Adams. Hand, who signed a one-year, $10.5MM deal with the Nats this past offseason, will be a free agent at season’s end.

Hand, 31, has been one of the game’s most effective left-handed relievers in recent years, but his results in 2021 haven’t been as dominant as they were during his time with the Padres and Indians. There have been some signs that his stock had dipped in the eyes of those around the game; Cleveland put him on outright waivers at the end of the 2020 season, hoping a club would claim him and pick up his $10MM option — thus sparing the Indians the $1MM buyout. He went unclaimed and was ultimately bought out. Hand did eventually land a greater guarantee, signing at that aforementioned $10.5MM price point.

Some of the reservations regarding Hand when he was placed on waivers were simply due to financial uncertainty following the absence of fans in 2020, but there was also concern that the lefty’s fastball had dropped by two miles per hour from its peak level. He’s alleviated those concerns in 2021, tacking two miles back onto his heater and averaging 93.3 mph on the season. But Hand’s 23.3 percent strikeout rate is his lowest since moving from the rotation to the bullpen back in 2016, and his 9.9 percent walk rate is a career-high (as a reliever).

Those ungainly strikeout/walk trends notwithstanding, Hand has been a solid reliever for much of the season in Washington. He’s pitched to a 3.59 ERA, upped his ground-ball rate to its highest level since 2018 (39.5 percent) and generally limited hard contact and barreled balls quite well, per Statcast.

It’s been a tough go more recently, as Hand has served up eight runs in his past nine innings — three of which came on an Andrew McCutchen walk-off home run that proved to be something of a backbreaker for the reeling Nationals. Not long after dropping that pivotal game, rumblings about the Nationals perhaps engineering a rare (for them) summer sell-off began to pick up steam, and Hand’s departure (plus the persistent rumors on Max Scherzer and other prominent Nationals players) now make that speculation a reality.

For their half-season investment in Hand, the Nationals will acquire Adams, a 25-year-old backstop who’s already made a very brief MLB debut. That didn’t go particularly well, as he hit just .107/.167/.179, but he also received only 30 plate appearances with the Jays, so it’s impossible to glean much of anything from that limited sample. Adams has spent the remainder of the 2021 season with the Jays’ Triple-A affiliate, drawing plenty of walks and hitting for good power but struggling with strikeouts. In 143 plate appearances, he’s hitting .237/.371/.487 with an 11.2 percent walk rate but a lofty 32.2 percent strikeout rate.

Adams ranked 20th among Jays prospects heading into the season over at MLB.com. He’s already been bumped to No. 15 among Nationals prospects over at FanGraphs, where Eric Longenhagen calls him a bat-first backup option behind the plate. Adams, listed at 6’4″ and 246 pounds, is quite large for a catcher, but the Jays have been committed to developing him there. He’s appeared in just one professional game at first base, where he logged only three innings. If Adams proves he’s capable of sticking behind the dish and providing passable defense, he’ll greatly outperform many of the more modest value projections most scouting reports have placed on him due to concerns over his size and glovework.

Jesse Dougherty of the Washington Post first reported Hand had been traded to the Jays (Twitter thread). USA Today’s Bob Nightengale reported Adams was going back to the Nats.

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2021-07-29 15:48:59Z
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2021 Olympics: Rory McIlroy 'very impressed' that Simone Biles put herself first - Golf Channel

KAWAGOE, Japan – Right after COVID-19 and the intense safety protocols that made these Summer Games possible, the most talked about topic this week in Tokyo has been mental health.

Simone Biles’ decision to withdraw from the women's gymnastics team final, citing mental health concerns, ignited the conversation, and many Olympic athletes, including swimming great Michael Phelps, could empathize.

It’s a conversation that also found its way to the men's golf competition.

“You have to put yourself in the best position physically and mentally and to be at your best, and if you don't feel like you're at that or you're in that position then you're going to have to make those decisions,” Rory McIlroy said. “I'm certainly very impressed with, especially those two women [Naomi Osaka and Biles], to do what they did and put themselves first.”

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'Live From' reflects on mental health in sports

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Full-field scores from the Olympic Men’s Competition

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McIlroy also said that Biles’ decision, which he "100%" agreed with, has helped move the conversation forward and cast a light on mental health for athletes at the highest levels.

“There's been a few athletes that have really spoken up: Michael Phelps, Kevin Love, Naomi Osaka, Simone Biles. I mean the conversation, it's not taboo anymore, people can talk about it just as somebody has a knee or elbow injury, if you don't feel right 100 percent mentally that's an injury, too,” he said, before elaborating more.

"I think in sports there's still this notion of just like powering through it and digging in and you're not a competitor unless you get through these things. So I think that's probably part of it. But then when you hear the most decorated Olympian ever talk about his struggles and then probably the greatest gymnast ever talk about her struggles, then it encourages more people that have felt that way to come out and share how they felt."

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2021-07-29 11:13:12Z
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Tokyo Olympics: Penny Oleksiak could become Canada's most decorated Olympian tonight - The Globe and Mail

Penny Oleksiak doves during a training session at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre ahead of the start of the Tokyo Olympics. She's since won six Olympic medals, and is up for a seventh in the 100 m freestyle.

Melissa Tait/The Globe and Mail

Latest Olympic highlights

OLYMPIC EVENTS FOR JULY 29

• Swimming: Penny Oleksiak had the fifth fastest time of the 16 swimmers in Thursday’s two semi-finals for the 100m freestyle (9:59 p.m. ET), swimming another season-best time of 52.86 seconds and finishing third in her race. She’ll compete in the final tonight, and if she reaches the podium, she’ll become Canada’s most-decorated Olympian ever. That feat was almost reached last night when Canada came in fourth at the women’s 4 x 200m freestyle relay along with Summer McIntosh, Kayla Sanchez, Rebecca Smith. Meanwhile this morning, Kylie Masse and Taylor Ruck swam the third and sixth fastest times overall in the 200m backstroke and moved onto the semifinals tonight (10:35 p.m. ET).
• Rowing: Caileigh Filmer and Hillary Janssens – a duo of Olympic rowers from B.C. – have brought home Canada’s fifth bronze medal of the Tokyo Games in women’s pair. They finished with a time of 6:52:10, behind the gold medal team from New Zealand and the Russian silver medalists. Tonight, Canada’s Women’s Eight competes for a medal (9:05 p.m. ET).
• Russia (but not Russia): For a country that’s not at the Olympics, Russia sure is winning a lot of things here. Barred from competing under their country’s flag or its name by the World Anti-Doping Agency over a doping scandal, Cathal Kelly explains how the 335 Russian athletes at the Games are still thwarting the IOC’s plan to humiliate them. Aslo, Cathal joined Tamara Khandaker this morning on The Decibel podcast to discuss why these Games are a dud.

OFF THE FIELD

• COVID-19: U.S. pole vaulter Sam Kendricks has been ruled out of the Olympics after testing positive for COVID-19. Tokyo has been seeing record COVID-19 numbers as the games unfold in Tokyo, with two more Olympic-related COVID-19 cases landing people in hospital.
• Withdrawals: After injuring his Achilles tendon during the individual men’s triathlon, Tyler Mislawchuk has withdrawn from the mixed triathlon relay. Jessica Phoenix has also withdrawn from the eventing competition after her horse Pavarotti sustained an injury during a training session on Tuesday.

Get the Olympic highlights in your inbox every day with our newsletter, or follow @globeandmail on Twitter for breaking news. Here are yesterday’s Olympic highlights in case you missed them.

Situation in Tokyo, by numbers

WHAT IS THE OLYMPIC MEDAL TALLY IN TOKYO SO FAR?

JAPAN’S LATEST COVID-19 DATA

WHAT TIME IS IT IN TOKYO RIGHT NOW?

More Olympic updates for July 29

• Beach volleyball: Canadians Sarah Pavan and Melissa Humana-Paredes remain undefeated after their first three games in Tokyo. The pair of medal contenders will move on to the knockout rounds which kick off on July 31.
• Gymnastics: Canada’s Brooklyn Moors placed 16th in the women’s individual all-around, with a score of 53.299.
• Golf: Canada’s Corey Conners and Mackenzie Hughes are tied at 2-under 69 after the first round of men’s golf at Tokyo Olympics.
• Judo: Canada’s Shady El-Nahas lost the bronze-medal judo match to Jorge Fonseca, finishing fifth overall.
• Basketball: Canada pulled off a victory over South Korea in basketball, with Bridget Carleton, a Minnesota Lynx WNBA player, bringing in 18 points and seven rebounds for the women’s team. The team will play Spain on Sunday to close off the group stage.

The Olympic experience

Keep up with the latest behind-the-scenes stories and images from the Olympics in our reporters’ notebook from Tokyo.

Nathan VanderKlippe spoke to bronze medalist Caileigh Filmer after her podium finish with teammate Hillary Janssens in women’s pair rowing. Filmer discussed “going internal” with Janssens to maximize their performance on the water. It’s not a bad analogy for a Games characterized by isolation.

TOKYO OLYMPICS: THE DAY IN PHOTOS

From The Globe’s Olympic Team

Brent Hayden is back for his fourth Olympics after finding new perspective in the pool

Rachel Brady: “Hayden doesn’t have a lot of miles on his body like many athletes would at 37. That’s because he took seven years off from the sport after he made the podium at the 2012 London Olympics, before deciding to plunge back in and try to make a comeback for Tokyo – his fourth Olympics.”

For Hong Kong, Tokyo Olympics are its best Games in history, at a time when it needs wins more than ever

James Griffiths: “The bitterness and anger left over from the protests that rocked Hong Kong in 2019 have not faded. While public unrest is not seen today, that is only because the Chinese government imposed a national security law on the city last year, not because any of the issues which sparked the protests have been solved.”

A dispatch from Tokyo 2020: Simone Biles, extreme heat and Canada’s performance so far

Tokyo Olympic events to watch tomorrow, July 30

• Diving: Pamela Ware and Jennifer Abel compete in the 3m springboard (2 a.m. ET)
• Soccer: Canada’s women’s soccer team takes on Brazil in the quarter final (4 a.m. ET)
• Athletics: Mohammed Ahmed will race in the men’s 10,000 m final (7:30 a.m. ET)
• Swimming: Friday morning the heats for the men’s and women’s 4 x 100m freestyle relay begin (7:48 a.m. ET) with teams from Canada in both. Friday night, Kylie Masse hopes to race in the finals for women’s 200-metre backstroke. (9:37 p.m. ET).
• Check the full Olympic schedule for the latest event times and competitors.

The Tokyo Olympics: Essential reads

What athletes and teams should Canadians look out for? Consult our guide.

Penny Oleksiak bears the hopes of a nation in Tokyo – and that’s just fine with her. Rachel Brady spoke with the now six-time medal winner before the Games began

How did Canada’s swimmers use data to get stronger? Grant Robertson and Timothy Moore explain.

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2021-07-29 09:39:13Z
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