Fred VanVleet Opens Up About Leaving Toronto: ‘We Weren’t Really Having Fun’
November 8, 2024
Fred VanVleet Opens Up About Leaving Toronto: ‘We Weren’t Really Having Fun’
48 comments
I wonder who was to blame for that
Ye cause you killed the fun with your get paid at all costs attitude
Inb4: Fred is Hitler, an international spy and drinks milk out of the bag.
Not trading him that season was one of Masai’s most unforgivable failures. Should have gotten something, anything, for him, and should have embraced the tank during a great draft. Instead they spent capital to acquire Poeltl, went 41-41 and got bounced in the play-in to a pathetic Bulls team. Most other GMs would have made a different decision, that was a Masai-specific fuck-up.
Chucking isn’t fun?
Playing basketball is fun!
Only wish we traded him earlier
Fred took our record with him to Houston. Miss you Fred!
Fred has a part to play in that. He’s acting like getting an extension didn’t alter his priorities.
The year he got all star is the year we should trade him. Sell high, buy low.
Masai got too attached to his players. Sometimes you gotta be ruthless like Danny Ainge and Brad Stevens
There was a clear generational divide with the pascal/fred group and the younger guys coming in.
Carried over to the start of the next season after fred left too
There’s gonna be a lot of piling on Fred in this thread, but my totally unconnected gut feeling is that Nick Nurse was the architect behind the lack of fun. Dude got more and more sour basically by the week from Tampa on down and vocally quit on the team—unprompted, in a press conference, during the stretch run towards a possible playoff spot.
I’ll stand by Fred, and I’ll appreciate Nurse’s genius forever but also… fuck that guy?
All that for the real reason, he made more money in two years with Houston. That’s basically it. Toronto offered more guaranteed money, but he wanted the higher yearly salary and hopes to make up the rest on a new deal. It’s fine, most would do the same
Fair enough,I was not having fun watch him and siakam play hero ball 24/7 . thank god they are gone
Is he having fun now, with career lows all over the place? Seems like fun to me.
It wasn’t fun watching him hijack the offence either while gambling on defence
I never liked Fred and was happy he was gone. Couldn’t stand watching him play.
It stopped being fun when he started chucking bricks.
Masai “selfish” comments becoming more understandable after every game we play
Oh Fred cmon dude have some self-awareness.
You think? Maybe look at the mirror for once that your selfish behaviour is what led to this downfall.
He is the one recent Raptor I’m glad is gone. Good riddance.
Fun or not, Raptors were not willing to pay him that kind of money.
end of the day he’s a raptor legend but i couldn’t believe the FO couldn’t see how fake/unstainable his play was.
Truthfully, I think it would be tough to be a big part of winning a championship with a franchise, and then go back to being bad/mediocre. I think that if we had re-signed Lowry (back when he went to the Heat), he would have been miserable here. We sacrificed the future for winning a championship, then sacrificed it again by holding onto an expensive roster without really being able to build around it.
I’ll bet he had a lot of fun in helping build the franchise to where it got, and then the championship defence season (up until the bubble). But yeah, in hindsight, we kind of put these guys in a position to fail. I think Fred is really underrated now as a Raptor (he had some special moments here), but I don’t really think it’s his fault it went sideways. On a really good roster, he could have still been a great piece.
“Fun” is athlete code for “winning”
FVV also said “I wish I could have had more time to stay there, to be a guy that could have made a impact (to winning basketball)”
So he didn’t necessarily want to leave, he was just going wherever the $$$ was calling and maybe get a fresh start elsewhere, which is fair as a UFA..
I still love Fred it’s all good
I guess shot chucking and not passing the ball and Trynna farm stats wasn’t fun now that u already secured ur 40mil/year contract. What a loser
He’s one of the more selfish players I’ve seen.
Watching him jacking up contested threes wasn’t much fun for me, either.
This just in, disappointing team ends up having chemistry issues.
shit wasnt fun to watch either
Fun guy left, what did you expect.
I’ve never seen a fanbase so ready to hate on players that won a chip for them. It’s actually unbelievable
Feelings mutual, dawg
It was the money lol and I don’t blame him either. That option is getting declined next season
Won’t say I felt at the time that the 22-23 year was not fun (other than losing/blowing the play in game.) But now watching this season so far, even with the losses I have realized how miserable 22-23 actually was lol.
no it wasn’t fun watching him chuck 26 shots per game and making 4 of them
Weren’t having fun because of him. Not just him but he certainly played a large part in it.
A guy in his prime, acting the way he does, shouldn’t be shooting as horribly as he did
The fans 🤝 Fred
Can’t believe how much trash u guys are talking about Fred rn. He was so good to us and so good for the franchise. U guys carry some serious vitriol for some ex players
The comments here are so lame. Everyone shitting on his character for them not having fun when the reason is obviously they were just having poor results for too long.
This dudes heads always been way bigger than his abilities. Know your role, role player
Losing isn’t fun.. What’s next water is wet?
Fred kickstarted the rebuild that the FO never wanted. I will forever be thankful to him for that
Bet on yourself era needed to be put out of its misery
What TF is he talking about? He should be doing nothing but singing the praises of Toronto until the day he dies.
If I got a ring already, and I’m not some superstar, of course I will chase the $
Scottie was trying to take over point spot and he didn’t like that.
48 comments
I wonder who was to blame for that
Ye cause you killed the fun with your get paid at all costs attitude
Inb4: Fred is Hitler, an international spy and drinks milk out of the bag.
Not trading him that season was one of Masai’s most unforgivable failures. Should have gotten something, anything, for him, and should have embraced the tank during a great draft. Instead they spent capital to acquire Poeltl, went 41-41 and got bounced in the play-in to a pathetic Bulls team. Most other GMs would have made a different decision, that was a Masai-specific fuck-up.
Chucking isn’t fun?
Playing basketball is fun!
Only wish we traded him earlier
Fred took our record with him to Houston. Miss you Fred!
Fred has a part to play in that. He’s acting like getting an extension didn’t alter his priorities.
The year he got all star is the year we should trade him. Sell high, buy low.
Masai got too attached to his players. Sometimes you gotta be ruthless like Danny Ainge and Brad Stevens
There was a clear generational divide with the pascal/fred group and the younger guys coming in.
Carried over to the start of the next season after fred left too
There’s gonna be a lot of piling on Fred in this thread, but my totally unconnected gut feeling is that Nick Nurse was the architect behind the lack of fun. Dude got more and more sour basically by the week from Tampa on down and vocally quit on the team—unprompted, in a press conference, during the stretch run towards a possible playoff spot.
I’ll stand by Fred, and I’ll appreciate Nurse’s genius forever but also… fuck that guy?
All that for the real reason, he made more money in two years with Houston. That’s basically it. Toronto offered more guaranteed money, but he wanted the higher yearly salary and hopes to make up the rest on a new deal. It’s fine, most would do the same
Fair enough,I was not having fun watch him and siakam play hero ball 24/7 . thank god they are gone
Is he having fun now, with career lows all over the place? Seems like fun to me.
It wasn’t fun watching him hijack the offence either while gambling on defence
I never liked Fred and was happy he was gone. Couldn’t stand watching him play.
It stopped being fun when he started chucking bricks.
Masai “selfish” comments becoming more understandable after every game we play
Oh Fred cmon dude have some self-awareness.
You think? Maybe look at the mirror for once that your selfish behaviour is what led to this downfall.
He is the one recent Raptor I’m glad is gone. Good riddance.
Fun or not, Raptors were not willing to pay him that kind of money.
end of the day he’s a raptor legend but i couldn’t believe the FO couldn’t see how fake/unstainable his play was.
Truthfully, I think it would be tough to be a big part of winning a championship with a franchise, and then go back to being bad/mediocre. I think that if we had re-signed Lowry (back when he went to the Heat), he would have been miserable here. We sacrificed the future for winning a championship, then sacrificed it again by holding onto an expensive roster without really being able to build around it.
I’ll bet he had a lot of fun in helping build the franchise to where it got, and then the championship defence season (up until the bubble). But yeah, in hindsight, we kind of put these guys in a position to fail. I think Fred is really underrated now as a Raptor (he had some special moments here), but I don’t really think it’s his fault it went sideways. On a really good roster, he could have still been a great piece.
“Fun” is athlete code for “winning”
FVV also said “I wish I could have had more time to stay there, to be a guy that could have made a impact (to winning basketball)”
So he didn’t necessarily want to leave, he was just going wherever the $$$ was calling and maybe get a fresh start elsewhere, which is fair as a UFA..
I still love Fred it’s all good
I guess shot chucking and not passing the ball and Trynna farm stats wasn’t fun now that u already secured ur 40mil/year contract. What a loser
He’s one of the more selfish players I’ve seen.
Watching him jacking up contested threes wasn’t much fun for me, either.
This just in, disappointing team ends up having chemistry issues.
shit wasnt fun to watch either
Fun guy left, what did you expect.
I’ve never seen a fanbase so ready to hate on players that won a chip for them. It’s actually unbelievable
Feelings mutual, dawg
It was the money lol and I don’t blame him either. That option is getting declined next season
Won’t say I felt at the time that the 22-23 year was not fun (other than losing/blowing the play in game.) But now watching this season so far, even with the losses I have realized how miserable 22-23 actually was lol.
no it wasn’t fun watching him chuck 26 shots per game and making 4 of them
Weren’t having fun because of him. Not just him but he certainly played a large part in it.
A guy in his prime, acting the way he does, shouldn’t be shooting as horribly as he did
The fans 🤝 Fred
Can’t believe how much trash u guys are talking about Fred rn. He was so good to us and so good for the franchise. U guys carry some serious vitriol for some ex players
The comments here are so lame. Everyone shitting on his character for them not having fun when the reason is obviously they were just having poor results for too long.
This dudes heads always been way bigger than his abilities. Know your role, role player
Losing isn’t fun.. What’s next water is wet?
Fred kickstarted the rebuild that the FO never wanted. I will forever be thankful to him for that
Bet on yourself era needed to be put out of its misery
What TF is he talking about? He should be doing nothing but singing the praises of Toronto until the day he dies.
If I got a ring already, and I’m not some superstar, of course I will chase the $
Scottie was trying to take over point spot and he didn’t like that.