What I remember about the rise of LeBronto is... is how quiet it was…During the waning hours of the Eastern Conference Finals..twitter was discreetly trolling Raptors fans about how this was going to be a sweep and Lebron was going to once again destroy us without trying.... Going into the Arena in Toronto with thousands of Canadians weirdly.. … It was a silent trip. We all knew what was about to happen, what we were about to do…. What was going to ultimately happen… Did we have any doubts? Any private, traitorous thoughts of being Lebron fans?….Perhaps, but no one said a word….Not on the flights to the upper sections, not when every contested Lebron James jumpshot came down, and not when he laughed and smiled during possessions… Not a word… it truly felt as if a God was punishing us … as if Thanos has came…. not a WORD… Journal Entry PTSD - Toronto Fan 2018..
501st Legion reference? Lebron ownd us forsure but you gotta consider that maybe he was on the juice because holy fu, it was insane seeing our team bow down to that guy
to be fair though, it a lot better for a city to be torched by literally a top 2 GOAT then not. Those raptors teams never had true grit culture until Kawhi came and did just that using his quiet nature. He let his game speak for itself and they won bc of that. If they never made that trade, a Derozan-led team would have went 6 games with Orlando and then lost in 5 or 6 in that Philly series guaranteed.
@@joes.2331It was an ultimately risky gambit too. That Kawhi trade was nearly not enough against Philly, and of course the threat of Golden State was still looming. Everything managed to work out, though
Lebron wouldn't beat the kawhi raptors because that's the only good team he face in the east in his career outside side of Boston even then they were the same age as lebron today so 🤷🏾♂️
It had to have been a really difficult thing to be Demar Derozan during the Lebronto era. He leads his team to the best record in franchise history and the GM tells him that he's not going to get traded, just to get sent out of Canada to Texas just to watch the player that was only there for one year do what he couldn't do in three. That's tough.
Man watching that in real time I understand why Demar can out and said him being traded hurt him a lot but it was needed. I never once thought the Raptors could beat LeBron but I thought it’ll go 6 maybe maybe 7 but after that game 3 lost…everyone knew it was over
I was there dude...GAME 1, Toronto. I can still remember the energy and the excitement as the game started and it looked like we were in control. And to this day, I still remember the anxiety every time the Cavs inched closer and closer. When JV missed the lay up and sent it into OT, we knew it was over. That missed bucket was the ONLY chance we had to make this a series. It's like collectively, we all realized that the series was over after 1 game, and to be fair, the Raptors played like that too. As embarrassing as it was, the Raptors let Lebron get in their head and I've never seen anything quite like it since. Toronto exploded when it was announced he was leaving the East and lo and behold, we won in 2019. It's almost as if a curse had been lifted
Letting Lebron at least split the away games to start the series was a death knell because at best they'd be down 3-1 by the time they got back to Toronto. You had to basically be perfect at home to beat Lebron in an Eastern Conf. Playoff series back then
@@casualenjoyer5420lol that's what people said about the Celtics the next round and they lost in 7. The only way was getting a 3-0 lead like the KD Warriors cause even a 3-1 lead wasnt safe....
Same Toronto's my hometown team but Brons my fav player but the thing is Toronto was pissing me off for getting swept to the wizards in 2015. So LeBron coming and wrecking them was actually very therapeutic. Especially 2018 lol sometimes you need a good beat down and it paid off.
LeBron took their souls after he hit that running floater going left against Toronto in the playoffs in 2018. that was the nail in the coffin 😭 also, loved the intro 😂
True Story: During game 3 in 2018, I was watching on a 10-second delay and ESPN sent me an alert saying the game was going into overtime. Lebron then proceeds to drive down the floor, we know what comes next, and I never got an explanation. Thanks ESPN!
Not to mention during that series (it could’ve been after the sweep) DeRozan said in the post game press conference that there’s nothing they could do cause he’s so good. Something along the lines of that. I mean he’s not wrong, but you don’t say that in the middle of the series 😭
LeBronto really relates a lot to your NBA rivalries video. The lack of grouped divisions in the NBA means that these type of repeat playoff matchups aren't nearly as common. A lot of drama and rivalry comes out of the NFL division setup
LeBron broke the Raptors so bad that he got the reigning coach of the year fired and, arguably, one of the best, if not most loyal player the franchise has ever known. And won the chip the same year LeBron swapped conferences.
11 месяцев назад
The Raptors didnt have any hall of famers til kawhi came
Thank you for making this video. This might be my favorite story in sports ever. As a Bills fan this is slowly starting to remind me of our rivalry with the Chiefs.
I remember, Watchung lebron hit that fading floater game winner, then going to the gym to practice that shot for weeks until I got it down. So unguardable
I distinctly remember standing on the platform at Union Station after Lebronto contemplating how hard it would be for Go Train staff to clean me off the front of the train.
The 2019 Raptors championship was great but if LeBron stayed in the east and they somehow beat him that year in the playoffs it probably wouldn’t erased all them years he dominated them
What’s crazy is that a lot of people liked to downplay the raptors from 2016-2018. They had really good teams. Lebron just stomped all over them. He ruled over a whole city, scratch that, A WHOLE ASS COUNTRY for a solid 3 yrs straight. And Demar Derozans response was “if we had Lebron, we would have won.” And people try to say players didn’t fear Lebron🤣 CANADA FEARED LEBRON
Honestly, obviously it was a given that any team that came across lebron would lose and it’s a testament to the city that no one could eliminate us but then once we got the ball rolling
i got into the NBA when LeBronto was a thing. every year the Canadian sports media would declare that this was the year that they would go all the way and win. and every year they would get the shit kick out of them by LeBron. the Raptors ware overhyped every year and it made me hate them even as a Canadian
What Lebron did in this entire playoff run is just ridiculous. He took a team that had no business even being in the playoffs all the way to the finals
No further evidence of a player breaking an entire team than that 😂 And KG said they broke LeBron. When they had a squad and LeBron didn't, meanwhile when LBJ got a squad they ain't do shit but talk about they wish they were younger lol This is breaking a team
You guys missed a lot on the Raptors side: -we not only got Ibaka at the 2017 deadline, but we got PJ Tucker for two second round picks to be our “LeBron stopper.” Funny thing is it didn’t stop him. -the next year we did a whole culture reset. Straight out of Masai’s mouth. Revamped offence, more 3s, instead of the defensive route of pj tucker we got cj miles, even demar started shooting 3s. -also after bosh left and we were trash, we traded for Rudy gay which kinda helped but we were kinda mid. Demar and Rudy didnt co exist well. After that colangelo stepped down and brought in masai ujiri. He cleaned house and fleeced the knicks by giving them bargnani for picks, and traded Rudy to the kings for a bunch of role players like Patrick Patterson and greivis Vasquez who helped turn our season around to win 48 games. It was the turning point for the franchise where we won 50 plus for 6 straight seasons. So if you’re gonna talk all about the cavs side then at least do your homework to cover our side too, thanks.
Raptors fan here Nice video Lebron had our number. He also had Boston's number. I think Toronto will win another championship before Cavs win one or Celtics win one (even though I'm aware Celtics are scratching at the surface/knocking on the door right now but trading Smart was a bad bad decision and Celtics fans know it !! 😂😂)
Not saying Lebron PLANNED the floater but coming from a guy who’s watched every year of Lebrons full season highlight tapes on RU-vid he has hit that exact same floater different times if you comb through enough of his buckets you’ll find him taking that same shot from the same spot on just a different day using that exact floater
There's an alternate universe where LeBron doesn't suffer the groin injury and leads the Lakers to the Finals to face the Raptors and I want to live in that universe just to see what would happen.
I can excuse the Raptors losing to the Cavs in 2016 and 2017 because they ultimately could not compete with those rosters, but 2018 was INEXCUSABLE. The Cavaliers were the weakest they had been since LeBron returned roster/talent-wise. LeBron was giving less effort on the defensive end; their defense as a whole had severely regressed from their championship year, and their offense was basically LeBron iso ball. The Raptors, however, were the #1 seed in the East, won a franchise record number of games, and were top 5 in both offensive and defensive rating. They had more youth, depth, length, size, athleticism, and they had some experience. Getting swept by a team that had your number in previous years when you FINALLY had damn near every advantage over them was just shameful.
LeBron leaving the East gave the Raptors a chance for a ring - in which they got. But it pales in comparison to what LeBron did to Toronto for those years
Lebron tortured the entire east during his 9 year straight finals tenure. Unlike every other team Raptors are the only team to recover in a sense that won a championship before Lebron did!
Aye The Merkins is up there too. Max was funny. But the Brons Plan was perfect. Really, the internet had multiple legends at the top of their game for this one. Also "turn the 0-2 into a 0-3" ...Mmwah!... just beautiful timing😂😂😂 drake was such a meme for that series. Damn near got E40'd 5 years before E40😂😂
Bruh how many vids we need on this exact same subject? I swear this gotta be like the 10th vid Ive seen on Lebronto and everyone says the same shit. We get it.
Can still remember how for 3 years, one single player absolutely dominated a single team and when he left, they were able to find true success. That and trading for Kawhi Leonard.
