Arsenalist

The thing about TJ Ford is you never know which one will show up. In case you haven’t noticed, there are too kinds of TJ Fords, one is a true point guard that can break the defense down with unstoppable dribble penetration and find open teammates when help comes. This TJ Ford also has the ability to drain the mid-range jumper keeping defenses honest while providing a scoring punch so unexpected from that position that it almost seems like a bonus. This is the TJ Ford that everybody loves and raves about and the one Bryan Colangelo traded for in the off-season.

But alas, there also lies another TJ Ford - he is dark, twisted and even disturbed. He is the man (thing?) that the Bucks traded to the Raptors in the off-season. On the surface, he resembles the good TJ Ford but he suffers from many a curse, including bad shot-selection, dribbling until there’s 2 on the shot-clock and a horrid jumper. Whenever this TJ rears its ugly head, Raptors fans quickly call for his head and the chants of Calderon for starting PG gain even more fervor, and rightfully so.

There are even times when both these Ford’s show up in the same game. Sometimes the cursed Ford shows up only for a brief spell but does enough damage to waste all the efforts of the noble Ford and render his accomplishments useless. But for the past two games against Seattle and Milwaukee, it is the noble and productive TJ Ford that has showed up to guide, nay, rescue the Raptors and correct the ship after a brief three game losing streak, putting an end to any talk that the Raptors were a flash-in-the-pan contender. TJ exacted revenge on the Bucks with merciless quickness and a deadly 15 foot jumper which resembled a rock going into an ocean. It must be satisfying to beat the team that traded you, right TJ?

“They don’t motivate me at all, what motivates me is what’s in front of us and that’s the playoffs.”

Aah, spoken like a true liar. Every time he scores he practically glares at the Bucks bench and why not, he was absolutely dominant with 19 points and 9 assists, most of them in the first half which is where the game was decided. Terry Stotts, what do you think of Ford?

“Any time you have six assists in a quarter, you are doing something right, he is a very good NBA player. He really got in the lane and gave us a lot of trouble.”

Stotts is saving face here, what he really means to say is that TJ owned his backcourt and nobody could keep up with him in terms of quickness and agility. As long as that other TJ Ford doesn’t show up, this one’s got the starting point guard job in Toronto for the next five years.

Chasin from RealGM is staying up late to upload all the highlights, check them out here. He’s even uploaded the noble TJ’s post game interview where he talks about some of the physical/dirty aspects of this game: