June 1995: Fans boo Damon Stoudamire pick
When David Stern selected Toronto as the location for the 1995 NBA Draft, the marketing-savvy Commissioner must have had second thoughts. After all, how could an obsequiously polite north of the border crowd possibly measure up to the entertaining Bronx cheers of Draft Day in New York? Not a problem. On June 28, Canadian fans bravely stepped up to the challenge, and proved that we too could be every bit as rude and ignorant as any grits-stained Yank.
When Isiah Thomas selected Damon Stoudamire with the expansion teams first-ever draft pick, the Toronto crowd erupted into an orgy of boos. Devoted fans of a team that had yet to play a single game were outraged that the 5'10" University of Arizona guard was chosen over UCLA forward and NCAA Champion Ed O'Bannon. Not since a multitude of Passover celebrants in an ancient Jerusalem courtyard pleaded for the selection of Barabbas, has a crowd been so vocally and unanimously off-the-mark. Stoudamire would go on to average 19 points and 9.3 assists to win Rookie of the Year, and remains a starting NBA point guard. Ed O'Bannon, on the other hand, averaged 5 points and 0.8 assists in the two years he remained employed in the NBA, and currently works as a Las Vegas-area car salesman.
So how, you ask, can The Flagrancy so freely throw stones at the Raptor organization when we clearly live in a glass house? Because this is the Raptors. We all have blood on our hands.
Maybe it's a curse: The NBA Gods have punished us for that sad display and we are fated to one dubious moment for every person who heckled the pick. (That part of the article where O'Bannon can't even recognize himself in the kid winning the championship is very sad. But life does go on...long after the stands have emptied).
Posted by: arsenal | October 27, 2006 at 12:59 PM
I was at the Skydome on that fateful day, visiting from NB. I still have the NBA Draft 1995 t-shirt. This was a big deal for me, as I was entering my grade 12 year, and as a huge basketball fan, was excited to see the NBA coming to Canada. I'm sad to say that I was caught up in the boos myself. Turns out that we Canadians didn't know as much as we thought we did about basketball. But of course, we still knew waaaaay more than Rob Babcock.
Posted by: Mark | October 27, 2006 at 03:42 PM
The talk that day was that Zeke was going to trade up to take, the then unknown, Kevin Garnett. Too bad the talk was wrong.
Posted by: AJ | October 27, 2006 at 08:38 PM
I was there, I ripped on Isaiah, I was wrong
Posted by: K.Wright, Toronto | March 17, 2008 at 02:53 PM