This is a story that spans seven seasons but only lasts one night. A story about one person who was supposed to start seminary school but ended up going to a basketball camp when he was 11 years old, and the 628 people who worked with the NBA team he played for for seven seasons to re-wear his jersey on one memorable night.
It was a continuation of the concept from a piece Siakam penned for the Player’s Tribune after being traded. In it, he revealed that when he initially started playing for the Raptors, he would scan the crowd for shirts with his number, 43, as the national anthem played. Siakam played an important role in the Raptors G League subsidiary, Raptors 905, winning the title in 2017, but it took some time for him to become familiar with supporters of the parent club. When he finally saw his jersey for the first time, he couldn’t control himself.
“If you ever wondered, ‘Why’d Pascal look like he’s about to fist pump during the anthem one night as a rookie?’ there you go,” he said in a blog post.
Each team handles homecoming in its own unique way. There is usually more to someone’s return, especially if they have worked for a long time. When DeMar DeRozan or Kyle Lowry return to Toronto, they spend time with arena personnel and security, catching up with nearly everyone who contributed to their city’s environment. Most public ceremonies for first-time returns include sentimental video montages shown on the jumbotron before a game’s opening timeout, and the Raptors have had their fair share of tearjerkers. For example, after seasons of returning to a chorus of boos, Vince Carter’s jeers abruptly turned to cheers in 2014, as if the fans had all decided it was enough. Carter cried, as did everyone else. As the arena’s lights went off, Kawhi Leonard received his ring and a sleek video treatment of his massive luminous footsteps delineated on the floor to resemble the ones he created for The Shot. This month, less than a week apart, the Raptors welcomed back Fred VanVleet and Siakam.
Siakam’s homecoming coincided with Valentine’s Day, and the entire Maple Leafs Sports and Entertainment (MLSE) organization participated in an homage that extended beyond the jumbotron to an orchestral pull on the heart strings.
“We saw Pascal’s comment about coming to our venue and seeing his number fade away, and we wanted him to know that he had such an impact on our team, our city, and our country, that even if the number fades over time, it’s still near and dear to our hearts,” Taylor Mansillo, Senior Brand Manager of the Raptors, said on a call the morning after the game.
Mansillo and a tiny army of departments from MLSE began brainstorming ideas for an homage within a memorial. Something meaningful for Siakam and the fans, but doable in the sliver of time available before and after tip-off. They knew there’d be a lot of people in the arena that night wearing Siakam jerseys, but it’d be impossible to highlight them all. Siakam was also unlikely to peek up at the video board during timeouts or after leaving the court at halftime.
“We thought, what if we make it one big space where he notices them all up front?” Mansillo recalls.
Section 119 in Scotiabank Arena is located in the lowest bowl of seating, directly in the centre of one of the long sides. In other words, these are the best seats. Also, what would constitute valuable emotional real estate. The Raptors wanted to make sure that everyone seated in that section, all 628 of them, wore a Siakam jersey. They also wanted to make sure the jerseys reflected Siakam’s entire time as a Raptor.
“We did jerseys throughout our years because he’s had impact for many years on this organization, from the G League to now,” Mansillo goes on to remark. “That was really our intent: how do we make sure he sees it in a loud way, to make sure he know how much he means to us, versus him searching for them in the crowd.”
“It was a little bit of working within the organization to track down the right number of jerseys, the right mix of jerseys, and making sure that we could get them into the right hands,” Terri Mattucci, Sr. Director of Strategy & Growth for MLSE, adds.
The MLSE retail staff was tasked with locating the appropriate inventory and jersey versions to create the appropriate visual mix, but once they were secured, the next step was to get them into the hands of individual fans and into their seats as soon as possible.
“One of the things we leveraged was actually the ‘Know Before You Go’ emails,” Mattucci explains, referring to an email blast sent to Raptors ticket holders before to games. The company has information on every section and seat, including who sits where and when, so it was able to target everyone who would be spending Valentine’s Day in 119. The ticketing department also made individual calls to convey the message: “Are you coming to the game?” You probably should. You should also arrive to your seat early.
“They walked into the night knowing we were going to do something fun for Pascal, knowing that they were going to be involved and had a big part of contributing to the tribute for him,” Mattucci said.
To get all those jerseys on people, a note with instructions was placed on each seat in the section. The instructions tell spectators which section of the concourse to visit to get their jersey and when to put it on. We aren’t even at the national anthems yet.
“The biggest part that we had to figure out was our anthems,” Anton Wright, Creative Director and Executive Producer of Game Presentation, adds.
This appears apparent, but just in case: because the Raptors play in Canada, two national anthems are performed before each game. As a result, anthems often begin sooner than in other areas. Anthems for a 7:30pm game are performed at 7:23pm, outside of the broadcast time. For this game, the Raptors sought approval from the NBA, their broadcast partners, basketball operations, and the Pacers to move the anthems forward.
The reason was because the first sequence in Siakam’s tribute was going to start then, with the “anthem buddies,” kids from local Toronto groups that accompany players onto the floor during the anthems, all wearing his jersey. MLSE wanted to make sure the arena was full and fans would see that first nod to their 2x All-Star, and that the broadcast captured it along with Siakam’s reaction.
At tip-off, Wright’s in-game crew crept in and around Section 119, signaling fans to don their jerseys. First timeouts, especially in a game like this, are swift.
The montage itself was excellent. It traced Siakam’s career from lanky G Leaguer, to All-Star, to NBA Champion, with off-court footage of him singing, laughing, and goofing around. As it played, photos and quotes were also superimposed all over the hardwood to compliment the tribute. When the lights were supposed to go up, with Siakam stepping out on the floor to wave to massive applause, they didn’t. Not over the entire arena, anyway.
“For the moment, we really wanted to showcase that area,” Wright says excitedly. “We don’t usually spotlight certain areas, we keep the crowd pretty dark and the focus is on the court and our flags, but we wanted to spotlight that area to hopefully have Pascal see it, [and] also all of our fans in the venue to be able to see.”
Along with the arena’s lighting and sound operators, the in-arena camera crew took special shots to showcase Section 119 and the Championship banner, with cuts back to Siakam to capture his reaction.
“To see that whole section with my jerseys, that almost got me right there,” Siakam said later, smiling in his postgame press conference. “I could never really have dreamed of that. To have that, it means a lot, so I appreciate everyone, just for everything.”
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