Blake Murphy Sports Writing

Title: Raptor Recalibration, Game 2: Managing Leonard’s foul trouble, shooting regression, heavier switching and more
Date: April 17, 2019
Original Source: The Athletic
Synopsis: In my latest for The Athletic, my new playoff day-after playoff column looked at a Raptors bounce-back win against the Magic in Game 2, some minor adjustments, managing minutes through foul trouble, and more. Read an excerpt!

Title: ‘What are you gonna do? He was great’: Raptors make statement in Game 2 as Kawhi Leonard’s star shines brightest
Date: April 16, 2019
Original Source: The Athletic
Synopsis: In my latest for The Athletic, I wrote about the Raptors bouncing back in Game 2 against the Magic, evening the series and looking like the Playoff Raptors they initially expected. Read an excerpt!

Title: How The D.J. Augustin Game unfolded, and halftime changes the Raptors made that could influence Game 2
Date: April 15, 2019
Original Source: The Athletic
Synopsis: In my latest for The Athletic, I broke down D.J. Augustin’s big Game 1 performance against the Raptors and how they may look to avoid a repeat. Read an excerpt!

Title:Raptor Recalibration, Game 1: The final minute, the D.J. Augustin matchup, playoff interpretations and more
Date: April 14, 2019
Original Source: The Athletic
Synopsis: In my latest for The Athletic, I introduced a new playoff day-after column where I’ll look at key plays, statistical trends, matchups and more from the Raptors’ playoff run. The first looks at a Game 1 loss to the Magic. Read an excerpt!

Title: ‘New’ Raptors suffer all-too-familiar loss in playoff opener, but Siakam offers chance for change
Date: April 13, 2019
Original Source: The Athletic
Synopsis: In my latest for The Athletic, I wrote about the Raptors’ Game 1 performance being all too familiar but Pascal Siakam offering a glimpse of change to the narrative. Read an excerpt!

Title:Murphy Mailbag: Playoff rotations, Kawhi Leonard’s future, Okada’s tights and much, much more
Date: April 12, 2019
Original Source: The Athletic
Synopsis: In my latest for The Athletic, I brought back the mailbag in excessive fashion, answering 40 questions about Raptors-Magic, playoff rotations, the future of a few Raptors, and a whole lot more. Read an excerpt!

Title: Deep Dive Series Preview: How do the Raptors and Magic matchup? A study of playing styles, rotations and more
Date: April 11, 2019
Original Source: The Athletic
Synopsis: In my latest for The Athletic Toronto, I performed a deep dive into the lineups, rotations, key matchups, playing styles and more for the first-round playoff series between the Raptors and Magic.
Read an excerpt!