TORONTO — On a day generally highlighted by hype and zaniness, Masai Ujiri brought moderation and solemnity.
There was no blaming the Toronto Raptors president for that on media day, the unofficial start of the franchise’s 30th season, held on Monday at Scotiabank Arena. Less than an hour after he finished speaking about professional matters, the news of Dikembe Mutombo’s death surfaced. Mutombo, perhaps the most well-known philanthropist in the basketball world and a Hall of Famer on the court, was 58. Ujiri is 54. Both have devoted time and money to Africa, their home continent.
To see and hear Ujiri speak was to witness something foreign for the typically light occasion. There were tears, a smile as he recalled when Mutombo told him how to dress for his new job after getting a promotion, disbelief and more.
“He set a path for us and I don’t know many people who (could) do it,” Ujiri said. “I’m proud that I knew Dikembe Mutombo. I’m proud that I worked with him. I’m proud that he mentored me. I’m proud that I did a lot of work with him, that we traveled around the continent of Africa. This one hits home. Don’t mean to dampen the day, but this one really hits home.
“That guy was the biggest giant you could ever find, with the biggest heart.”
It was Mutombo, who put $15 million of his own money into a hospital named after his mother in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, who showed Ujiri a way to make a difference in Africa within the context of the NBA. For longer than the 11-plus years Ujiri has been in the top basketball role with the Raptors, the weight — the responsibility — of helping Africa evolve and improve has been his top priority. Sure, the Raptors’ goals have consumed him, but behind Ujiri’s hyper-optimism is a surplus of realism. Ujiri is aware of the impermanence of a job like his; Ujiri’s work in Africa through his organization, Giants of Africa, could make a bigger difference for a longer time than any trade he might make.
With all of that said, Ujiri isn’t done trying to help the Raptors flourish. Before the news of Mutombo’s death changed the tone of the morning, Ujiri wasn’t coming with his usual swagger or fire. He kept his version of “Free Bird” — “We will win again in Toronto!” — off the setlist. Ujiri the realist was at the forefront.
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When given a chance to define the season with a word, he chose “rebuilding.” When asked about the grand goals of this season, hinting at the possibility of selectively doing something less than devoting all resources to winning this year, Ujiri was careful with his words.
“When teams go through this, you go out and set the tone of how you play and how you want the culture of your team to be set,” Ujiri said. “You hope for the best, but we know, we all know, what reality is in this league. And the draft is a way for us to build teams and to acquire players, especially in a market like our market.”
In other words, those devoted to watching excellent NBA basketball might want to pass on the post-All-Star break portion of the season. That isn’t a simple balance for the Raptors to strike, and Ujiri leads the Raptors in that journey.
He has to make sure the Raptors’ most important players, who happen to be some of their youngest players, learn to win, but he also has to make sure he creates a path to add to the team’s core of keepers, which might just be Scottie Barnes and Immanuel Quickley at this point. (You can be hopeful about others, but Barnes and Quickley are the only players who have shown enough that you can project major contributions to a winning team years into the future.) Ujiri has to nurture his young players and coaching staff’s desire to win, but he also has to address the obvious need for more young, bankable talent.
That won’t be easy; Howard Beck of The Ringer wasn’t wrong when he classified the Raptors as one of the most confusing teams in the league. The NBA’s worst teams are truly miserable, and 21 (eight in the Eastern Conference, 13 out West) are trying to do some legitimate winning this year. That leaves teams such as the Raptors, Atlanta Hawks and Chicago Bulls as the league’s likely ‘tweeners. At least the latter two teams are bringing 2024 lottery picks to camp.
Ujiri must clarify the picture, a process that started with last year’s trades of Pascal Siakam and OG Anunoby, who combined to lock into $400 million this offseason with the teams that acquired them from the Raptors. It is not as if Ujiri was penny-pinching this summer, as he spent about $400 million of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment’s money, depending on some potential season honours for his players, on retaining Barnes and Quickley. And MLSE’s money, increasingly, is Rogers’ money.
With the news from two weeks ago that Rogers is in line to become MLSE’s controlling party, Ujiri has to navigate a new power structure in the organization. Mercifully, it’s a clear picture; unlike the previous incarnation of MLSE, this one will be led by just one company, and that company is led by one man. Unfortunately for Ujiri, that man, Rogers Communications boss Edward Rogers, is the same person who found fault with Ujiri’s five-year deal agreed to in 2021, the one that made him one of the highest-compensated executives in the league.
Ujiri saved his most enthusiastic vigour on Monday for addressing that particular relationship. He said those 2021 negotiations were difficult, like most negotiations, but the awkwardness between him and Rogers has long since vanished.
“Let’s get this whole narrative (out of the way). Every time something comes up: (MLSE doesn’t bid for a team in the) WNBA, whoa, it’s Masai versus Edward. Any small thing that comes — clear that,” Ujiri said. “There’s nothing. There’s zero. Zero going on. OK?
“They’ve treated me well. I will keep going like that till we (cannot). For me, that’s my job. Guess what: I know I’m going to be judged on the way I do this job. And that’s that’s the way we’re going to be judged — on what happens on the basketball court.”
There is a circular element to that, with Ujiri admitting the team is likely to lose more than it wins in the short-term and his contract coming up in 2026, according to Sportsnet. If Rogers bristled at Ujiri’s top-of-market deal two years removed from a title, what will he think seven years after it?
That question looms, more weight that Ujiri carries.
(Photo: Richard Lautens/Toronto Star via Getty Images)
