Raptors sign Canadian forward Anthony Bennett

Anthony Bennett is now a Raptor. But nothing was as remarkable as the new and improved Lowry, who had teammates and media alike marvelling at his off-season metamorphosis.

“I feel like it’s a new beginning here”, Joseph said. “I’m like ‘Seeing you like this, it’s like the evil twin brother or something”. He’s coming in, I don’t know where he is in the rankings of the players with the coach.

“From when I came here in day one, all I heard [about the Raptors] was iso, iso, iso”, Carroll said (last season, the Raptors ranked second in isolation frequency). The Raptors set a franchise record with 49 wins, and won the Atlantic Division title. – Patterson about what happened in the playoffs against Washington.

Lowry went into the off-season vowing to turn things around. For his part, Carroll is saying all of the right things as well. Most returning players said Monday they’d put that disappointment behind them, but the sting of an early exit was still palpable.

The 29-year-old, who’s listed at six foot one and 196 pounds, hired a nutritionist, and said he changed the way he ate. It’d been obvious how much the Raptors wanted him. “Dead serious”, he said.

“I got abs now”, he said with a wide grin.

His wife is a fan. “It’s be better if I walk but I have a auto now”.

The 6-foot-8, 245-pounds Bennett averaged 5.2 points, 3.8 rebounds and 15.7 minutes in 57 games last season with the Timberwolves. Clearly, though, this isn’t quite what he had in mind two years into his National Basketball Association career. He’s the one who had his own trainer. “Father time is a great teacher and developer of those kind of situations”, Casey said…

DeMar DeRozan mentioned that skinny Lowry is a lot more “aerodynamic” now and it will be beneficial for him.

“I like it so far, besides the traffic”, said the 23-year-old guard from the University of Utah. “That’s big. That takes a lot of discipline, when you play at a certain size your whole career in the league, to be able to drop that much weight”. I think the experiences he’s gone through will help him. But he did it.

“It has been something I’ve been thinking about growing up, watching Vince Carter play”, Bennett said. Other moves will, too: even after a Sixth Man of the Year-winning campaign, the Raptors let Lou Williams go in the offseason without making him a contract offer.

Added GM Masai Ujiri: “He’s going to have to work, but I think he’s up for the challenge”.

Bennett will join fellow Toronto native Cory Joseph along with the rest of the Raptors as they begin training camp on Tuesday at Fortius Sport & Health in Burnaby, British Columbia.