PORTLAND, Ore. — Matt Devlin began his tenure as the television play-by-play voice of the Raptors in October 2008, 10 months after I became a full-time reporter on the team. While that means we cannot share our memories of the Raptors deciding to start Andrea Bargnani at small forward in the first game of the playoffs in 2008, we do share a general sense of time when it comes to the franchise.



It also means we shared a certain fatalistic thought at the beginning of our careers, although the amiable Devlin would never put it in such negative terms: What if the Raptors never make the playoffs again? What if they become the Sacramento Kings or Minnesota Timberwolves of the Eastern Conference, where it is infinitely harder to become a consistent outsider because of the dearth of quality teams?



Devlin’s first five years marked the first time the Raptors had missed the playoffs in five successive seasons. Pro-rating the 66-game lockout-shortened 2011-12 season,...