The Toronto Raptors have been one of the most successful franchises in the NBA during this modern era.
Only founded in 1995 as an expansion outfit – one of two to be born in Canada – the Raptors have gone on to win the 2019 NBA Championship and seven Atlantic Division titles in the Eastern Conference.
As well as success on the court, the Toronto Raptors franchise has shouldered the burden of being the only NBA team in Canada for more than two decades following the demise of the Vancouver Grizzlies.
But with the Canadian Elite Basketball League (CEBL) enjoying its own popularity, why is there a team from Canada in the NBA? Or, on the flip side, why is there only one team from Canada in the NBA?
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Reaching Out
In the early 1990s, NBA chiefs wanted to expand the reach of their brand and elite basketball as a sport.
The most obvious target for expansion was Canada, which had a small but passionate band of basketball fans – both of their own domestic teams and their ‘adopted’ NBA franchise of choice.
The NBA decided that two new teams was the right amount for their expansion, which would ensure that franchises in the United States wouldn’t have too many more air miles to cater for each season. Toronto and Vancouver were chosen as the cities of choice, and so the Raptors and the Grizzlies were born in time for the 1995 season.
It should be noted that the Raptors didn’t pre-date the expansion – they were created from scratch, with the NBA barely heading north of the border to Toronto beforehand. The Huskies, who turned out in the NBA’s predecessor the Basketball Association of America, folded as long ago as the 1940s, while the Buffalo Bills set up temporary home at the Maple Leaf Gardens during the 1970s.
But that was the limit to the exposure of NBA basketball in Toronto and, for the most part, Canada as a whole. Accepting two franchises from the country into the NBA family, therefore, was a huge risk to take. And the results were mixed…
A Grizzly End
There can be teething problems for new franchises in the blue-riband sports of North America, and top-tier basketball was still very much a new thing for the people of Canada. Both the Raptors and Grizzlies struggled to adapt to the pace of play in the NBA, although the Raptors started to make headway at the turn of the millennium thanks in part to the efforts of the eight-time All-Star Vince Carter.
As for the Grizzlies, life in the NBA was far more challenging. They finished bottom of the standings in each of their first five seasons, which in turn caused attendance to plummet – it’s generally hard to entice people to part with their hard-earned money to watch a losing team.
With commercial revenue hard to come by and the Grizzlies becoming something of a laughing stock out on the court, the franchise’s owners – Orca Bay Sports & Entertainment (known today as Canuck Sports & Entertainment) had a tough decision to make.
With the value of the Canadian Dollar weakening in 2001, it was decided that the time was right to sell up. Orca handed the keys to the Grizzlies to American entrepreneur Michael Heisley, who in turn felt that it was wise to relocate the team to the United States – Memphis ultimately his destination of choice.
NBA basketball in Vancouver was no more… and is yet to return.
To the Future
With the Raptors proving to be a more than worthy addition to the NBA ranks, the question is will there ever be another expansion franchise from Canada?
It’s been more than 20 years since the demise of the Vancouver Grizzlies, which would suggest that NBA officials have been reluctant to consider the introduction of a new Canadian franchise since.
There’s only one Canadian team in Major League Baseball and absolutely zero in the NFL, which suggests that the appetite to expand top-level sport across North America is minimal, to say the least.
It has long been rumored that Las Vegas and Seattle will be the next cities to gain an NBA expansion team, with San Diego and Louisville also thought to be on the shortlist.
As for Vancouver, would the NBA want to have their fingers burnt twice if any such franchise failed to take off? More likely, from a Canadian perspective, a franchise outfit in Montreal would be realized, but even then that would require offers from Vegas and Seattle to fall through – or an existing owner to relocate their team to Canada.
Whichever way you slice and dice it, the chances of another NBA franchise being established in Canada seem remote to say the least. The Toronto Raptors will continue to carry the torch for Canadian basketball long into the future…
