It’s predictable seeing how vilification was the fate of former Raptors stars Tracy McGrady and Vince Carter after leaving town, and, as was the case with those, it isn’t entirely unwarranted.

Raptors president/general manager Bryan Colangelo chose his words carefully during a Monday interview with the FAN 590’s Bob McCown, but clearly is not pleased with the way things turned out with Bosh.

Colangelo intoned that Bosh took a long time to return from injury even though he had been medically cleared and that he started thinking ahead to his future to the detriment of the Raptors.

“Despite limited swelling and any excessive damage on an MRI, he felt like he needed to sit for six more games … I’m not even questioning Chris’ injury. I’m telling you he was cleared to play subject to tolerance on his part, and the tolerance just apparently wasn’t there and he chose not to play,” Colangelo said.

“The fact that our season was spiralling downward and we were hoping he’d come back sooner and we were also dealing with a few other things at that point … we were really struggling there.”

Colangelo went on to elaborate:

“Whether he was mentally checked out or just wasn’t quite into it down the stretch, he wasn’t the same guy. I think everybody saw that, but no one wanted to acknowledge it.”

“At the same time, I never felt we were quite in the game (in terms of signing Bosh to a new contract). There was too much out there, too much built up for him to take an easy out here, and he decided to do that.”

Colangelo also said Bosh was hard to build around.

“We tried in vain to put pieces around Chris. Different pieces, different styles. It didn’t work out.”

“No matter what type of player we brought in, it didn’t seem to have the right mix with him as that centrepiece.”

Other than the timing of all of this being revealed, that’s the only issue this corner has with Colangelo’s statements. If you couldn’t build around him, you should have traded him, don’t use it as an opportunity to bash Bosh. Bosh has created enough ammo in that regard by himself.

No matter how Bosh tries to spin things, it’s clear he, Dwyane Wade and LeBron James thought seriously about playing together long ago and they likely finalized those plans at the all-star break.

He was not going to be a Raptor next season, so his thinking clearly was why continue to run through walls for the team and put his $100 million-plus South Beach payday at risk?

It’s easy to see why his general manager would have issues with that as well as his recent statements which said he has “seven years to make up for,” but we’re not sure he should become Toronto’s public enemy No. 1 the way Carter and McGrady once were.

Bosh gave everything he had for six-and-a-half seasons before playing the Raptors for half-a-campaign. McGrady played them for an entire year before fleeing as fast as he could.

Carter, fed up with MLSE’s ineptness, petulantly quit, before being banished in exchange for peanuts.

None of them handled their exits well. The first two faced Toronto’s wrath as a consequence. If damning information continues to trickle out, expect Bosh to join them.

Michael Jordan led the Chicago Bulls to six titles. And while he had Scottie Pippen, there is little question the Bulls were Jordan’s team.

So what does Jordan, one of the best-ever in the NBA, think of LeBron James joining with All-Stars Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh to form a super team in Miami?

“There’s no way, with hindsight, I would’ve ever called up Larry, called up Magic and said, ‘Hey, look, let’s get together and play on one team,’ ” Jordan said after playing in a celebrity golf tournament in Nevada. “But that’s … things are different. I can’t say that’s a bad thing. It’s an opportunity these kids have today. In all honesty, I was trying to beat those guys.”

James, who played his first seven seasons with his home state Cleveland Cavaliers, was part of one of the most celebrated free agent classes in history this summer. He met with the Cavs, Chicago Bulls, Los Angeles Clippers, Miami Heat, New York Knicks and New Jersey Nets.

James let the world know he was taking his talents to South Beach in an hour-long TV special on July 8.

TNT analyst Charles Barkley said James’ decision may change his legacy.

“He’ll never be Jordan,” Barkley told 790 the Ticket in Miami earlier in the week. “This clearly takes him out of the conversation. He can win as much as he wants to.

“There would have been something honorable about staying in Cleveland and trying to win it as ‘The Man’ … LeBron, if he would’ve in Cleveland, and if he could’ve got a championship there, it would have been over the top for his legacy, just one in Cleveland. No matter how many he wins in Miami, it clearly is Dwyane Wade’s team.”

UPDATE: Jose and Reggie Evans are goners. Say this for Bryan Colangelo, he might make the odd mess, but he cleans up very well.

The Raptors general manager is on the verge of removing his two ugliest contracts from the books, though nothing is yet official.

The Arizona Republic first reported late Sunday that Hedo Turkoglu would be heading to Phoenix in exchange for guard Leandro Barbosa and that Charlotte forward Boris Diaw would also be Toronto-bound, but it was a far more advanced transaction than that.

The Raptors will also ship its longest-serving member, Jose Calderon, along with Reggie Evans for centre Tyson Chandler.

The Raptors take back almost $5 million US extra right away in the deals than they send out, but the numbers work under the CBA and they save substantially long-term.

Evans’ contract expires next summer, like Chandler’s, but Turkoglu and Calderon were owed more than $73 million (four years left for Turkoglu, three for Calderon). Diaw makes $9 million both this season and next, while Barbosa is owed $7.1 and $7.6 million.

The arrival of Chandler and Diaw would create a logjam up front. They are both capable of playing centre, which would push Andrea Bargnani – now the longest tenured Raptor – to his natural power forward spot, but that would cut the minutes available to play Amir Johnson and promising rookie Ed Davis.

Chandler has been hampered by injuries for several years, but maintains his bothersome toe is fully healed. He confirmed his move to Toronto to Yahoo! Sports, while Steve Nash confirmed Barbosa’s Phoenix exit via Twitter.

Barbosa is a shooting guard with the size of a point guard, but is not capable of running a team effectively. —

The Phoenix Suns are responding to the free-agent departure of Amare Stoudemire with two trades, according to multiple media reports.

The Arizona Republic reported on its website Sunday night that the Suns are acquiring Toronto’s Hedo Turkoglu and former Atlanta swingman Josh Childress in separate transactions that will dramatically change the look of a team that made a surprising run to last season’s Western Conference finals.

The Suns, according to the Republic, have agreed to send guard Leandro Barbosa and forward Dwayne Jones to the Raptors for Turkoglu, who badly wants a move after a rough first season with Toronto. The Raptors then plan to use the trade exception it created in their Chris Bosh sign-and-trade deal with Miami to acquire Boris Diaw from Charlotte, with Jones heading to the Bobcats.

Barbosa and Diaw are players who were brought to Phoenix by current Raptors president of basketball operatons Bryan Colangelo.

In the second deal, Phoenix will acquire Childress in a sign-and-trade with the Hawks, who still hold Childress’ rights after the restricted free agent spent the last two seasons in Greece. The Republic reported that Childress has agreed to a five-year, $34 million contract with the Suns, who will use a portion of the trade exception created in Friday’s Stoudemire sign-and-trade with New York to absorb Childress’ contract.

The Hawks, who had no financial flexibility to even consider matching offers to Childress after signing Joe Johnson to a six-year deal worth nearly $120 million, will get a 2012 second-round pick from Phoenix to complete the transaction.

The moves are intriguing for a variety of reasons, starting with the fact that Turkoglu will serve as a very different starting power forward than Stoudemire, with ballhandling ability that could potentially lessen the wear-and-tear absorbed by Steve Nash in running the Suns’ offense.

Another reason: Turkoglu is a current client and Childress is a former client of longtime player-agent Lon Babby, who appears destined to replace Steve Kerr as the Suns’ new head of basketball operations.

ESPN.com’s Marc Stein reported Saturday that Suns owner Robert Sarver — increasingly interested in succeeding Kerr with a revamped structure that includes non-traditional personnel voices as well as traditional basketball executives — is giving Babby strong consideration to lead the Suns’ revamped basketball department.

Sources close to the situation told Stein on Sunday that Babby’s hiring has been agreed to in principle, with more hires to come to assist him.

Turkoglu wanted out of Toronto following a miserable debut season. It was the first year of a five-year, $53 million contract that Turkoglu received last summer after initially telling the Portland Trail Blazers that he’d sign with them.

The 10-year NBA veteran averaged 11.3 points last season on 40.9 percent shooting, his lowest scoring average and shooting percentage in six years. As recently as the 2007-08 season, Turkoglu won the NBA’s Most Improved Player award by averaging 19.5 points, 5.7 rebounds and 5.6 assists with Orlando, then helped the Magic reach the NBA Finals in 2009 by averaging 16.8 points, 5.3 rebounds and 4.9 assists.

According to the Republic, Turkoglu is waiving roughly $5 million of a trade bonus in his contract and reducing the guaranteed money in the final season — which was worth $12 million in 2013-14 — to facilitate his move to the Suns.

Childress had an NBA out in his contract with Greek power Olympiacos that he had to exercise by Thursday if he wanted to return to the States for next season. He signed a three-year, $20 million deal with the Greek team in 2008.

Drafted No. 6 overall in 2004, Childress averaged 11.1 points over four seasons with Atlanta, shooting 52.2 percent from the field and 36 percent on 3-pointers.

If Turkoglu starts, another recent Suns acquisition — free-agent signee Hakim Warrick — would likely join Childress, Channing Frye, Jared Dudley and Goran Dragic on Phoenix’s second unit. In addition to Barbosa’s departure, Phoenix is also expected to lose popular forward Louis Amundson this summer.