Toronto Raptors getting more exposure south of the border

It's not as if the Toronto Raptors needed any more validation this season, what with them having the second-best record in the NBA's Eastern Conference and all. But getting the nod from American television will only add to their emergence as a budding basketball power.

When TNT announced last fall that they were airing a Raptors game, it was greeted with proof that Toronto was now on the basketball map. With ESPN turfing the woeful New York Knicks this week in favour of two Raptors games, that map will now feature Toronto in capital letters. Maybe even red ones.

ESPN will ditch the Knicks-Brooklyn game on Feb. 6 in favour of a Clippers-Raptors game. In addition, it will show the Raptors game against Chicago on March 25, tossing a Clippers-Knicks game into the dumper.

Even taking into account the Knicks woeful record, and their current 13-game losing streak, this move says a lot. American networks aren't keen on showing Canadian teams in any sport, mainly because they lose the ratings generated by the hometown audience. Since Canadian viewers aren't counted in the ratings, there's a potential loss of at least half the audience.

And the Knicks, being in the largest TV market in the U.S., bring with them built-in ratings.

Add in Americans' general indifference to all things foreign and ESPN's decision to show a Canadian team makes a bold statement.

In other words, the Raptors can truly say that ESPN likes them, really likes them.

The move follows TNT's decision to carry a regular-season Raptors-Bulls game nationally earlier this year. Prior to that, the last TNT broadcast involving the Raptors was in 2013 -- but that was a last-minute fill-in after the Boston bombing forced the postponement of a Celtics game.

The last time the Raptors were actually scheduled to be on TNT was in 2002, back when Vince Carter was an international draw.

This time around, there is no one of Carter's stature, which says something about how seriously the Raptors are being taken south of the border.