Raptors announce legendary Chauncey Billups to have jersey retired
As part of the celebrations of the 30-year anniversary of the Toronto Raptors, the team announced early Tuesday, April 1 that it will retire the jersey of Hall of Famer Chauncey Billups.
“He played for Toronto for 29 spectacular games,” said an unnamed source in the front office. “We’ve now surpassed that in terms of years. Sure, he had a brief career here. But we’ll take the wins we can get.”
Billups had a minimal tenure with the Raptors in 1997-98. The team opened the season 1-19 as Damon Stoudamire wanted off the roster. Toronto finally found another home for Stoudamire in the middle of February, and it swung another trade for Billups a few days later. He first suited up on Feb. 20, scoring a sublime 12 points off the bench to lead the reserves (which included Tracy McGrady). He led them to victory in only the next contest, scoring 27 in a start against the Vancouver Grizzlies.
The Raptors finished the season 5-25 with Billups in the lineup, yes. There was a 13-game losing streak in there, sure. But he gave the team hope and pride in a time when that was in short supply. And, as a result of Toronto’s tragic season, the Raptors left the following draft with one Vince Carter donning the purple.
“The 30-year anniversary season hasn’t been as exciting as originally hoped,” a scalper in front of Scotiabank Arena told Raptors Republic. “The hope is to retire some more jerseys of Hall of Famers, get the crowd going, and get a little bit more of a party atmosphere in the Big Bank Arena. Vince night was fun, right?”
He didn’t respond to questions about price hikes for the jersey retirement game.
Toronto traded Billups to the Denver Nuggets before the following season began. Billups went on to win the 2004 Finals MVP and enter the Hall of Fame. Some of his other Raptors teammates, Marcus Camby (2006-7 Defensive Player of the Year) and McGrady (Hall of Fame) especially, went on to have storied careers. Perhaps there are more jersey retirements in the future.
Oh, it’s April 1? Right. Happy April Fools’ Day!
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