A little less on the actual game today, because the latest Eastern Conference injury news got us thinking.

TORONTO — There were will be bigger games to play, games when the stakes will be much higher, games that are do or die.

Norm Powell went from a top three scorer in Toronto in the month of December to an afterthought in January.

The NBA trade deadline is early this year, coming a week from Thursday, but teams aren’t wasting any time getting started.

Well in advance of the Feb. 8 deadline, the first blockbuster reportedly fell Monday. Five-time NBA all-star Blake Griffin was dealt to Detroit in exchange for a package that includes Tobias Harris, Avery Bradley, Boban Marjanovic and both a first- and second-round pick.

The Raptors are 48 games into their 82-game schedule and cruising along at a nice pace, but they are far from content.

No team has greater depth at point guard than the Raptors. An all-star starter in Kyle Lowry and a pair of backups as good as any reserve floor generals in the NBA.

TORONTO — There’s a term coaches often use in basketball when their teams play with a level of consistency for an extended stretch, able to regain their form when the opposition provides resistance.

Almost everyone and anyone associated with the NBA has expressed their support for DeMarcus Cousins, an elite big man whose season came to a crashing end Friday night when he tore his Achilles tendon.

  Kentavious Caldwell-Pope vs. DeMar DeRozan KCP has the size to keep in front of DeRozan and the length to contest, traits any defender needs when matched up against DeRozan; these two have a familiarity given how Caldwell-Pope played in Detroit before he made the move out West to the Lakers; DeRozan had a tough shooting game Friday night when Utah came to town and made the big plays in the game’s stretch to pull out a win; when Raptors visited L.