Five things I dig and don’t dig about the Toronto Raptors
Checking in on all my tanking amigos out there. It’s probably been a tough last two weeks. All this winning. Yech! Those 2025 lottery picks odds looking smaller and smaller with each putrid win. Bittersweet stuff.
Meanwhile, in the professional, competitive game of basketball, the Toronto Raptors inch further up the standings towards the Play-In. A mere 4.5 and 6 games back of tenth and ninth – each held by, you guessed it, Chicago and Atlanta.
The Bulls and Hawks, however, have each lost their best players (Jalen Johnson to injury and Zach Lavine by trade) in the past two weeks, and may start to tumble.
There’s hope yet, Tankers. After getting the New York Knicks on the back end of a back-to-back tonight, the Raptors have a Hellish half-dozen games ahead.
So, we’ll see.
Plus, never rule out a few timely trades to dismantle this run altogether. Or, not.
It matters little anyway. What matters is the winning. I see you rolling your eyes, Tankers. For fans, for development, for good vibes. It matters.
Let’s roll.
1. Old Man Bench Bluster
Man, do I have to take a few lumps.
I was out on Chris Boucher. I had given up on Kelly Olynyk, and, to some degree, Davion Mitchell. I cared not for what Bruce Brown Jr. could, eventually, offer.
Let the young’uns play! I proclaimed.
Not solely for development. I just didn’t think there’d be all that much of a difference in who played. Not enough to justify the “old-men” minutes anyway.
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.
The lot of them have been wonderful. A significant reason for Toronto’s sudden surge from the cellar. In the last ten games, the bench is fifth in scoring and twelfth in net rating.
They’ve singlehandedly rescued games. Against Orlando and Atlanta (2nd game), Toronto started games sluggishly down 13 and 5 in their respective first quarters. By half, the deficits were quashed.
The old bench fellas – Bouchie, Olynyk, and Brown, Jr – took time to find their groove. Boucher’s minutes were sporadic (even in the last two games he’s had a DNP and played 16 minutes. Olynyk and Brown Jr. were unhealthy and unconditioned.
Now, at full strength, they – alongside Jamal Shead, Ja’Kobe Walter, and Ochai Agbaji – have culminated into a versatile, tireless backup crew: Boucher, the professional disruptor, suddenly, also shooting a coinflip from 3 (53% on 4 attempts a game in the last 15 games); Olynyk, the lumbering, passing, shooting hub forging scores (91st percentile in assist percentage for bigs); Brown Jr., the gleeful, cutting, and attacking wireless battery zooming about.
Their improved play has also enabled Head Coach, Darko Rajaković, to mix and match rotations alongside the younger bench players. This strikes the balance of development and winning. The younger guys leverage the foundation set for them. And, when things get a bit flat or hairy, the veterans step in to settle things down.
It is certainly a timely surge for the Raptors. A few convincing wins has done wonders for the team’s morale. It’s also proved wrong any contenders doubting Brown Jr., Olynyk, or Boucher’s services.
To what end? We’ll see in two days time.
2. Tanking Talk
Most know I abhor tanking. No matter the circumstances. Generational draft or not.
It’s, in my opinion, bad business.
For one, it’s too dangerous a proposition. There is no end-game, theoretically speaking. It could go on, and on, and on, and on. Until the stars align. Until a good lottery position arises and an 18 year-old phenomenon waltzes along. Sounds doable. Let’s check in with Charlotte, Detroit, Portland, or Washington on that front.
Even when it does happen, as in the case of Victor Wembanyama, it’s not sufficient. More tanking was already demanded of them. Stephon Castle, ho hum, keep tanking.
Many will argue the risk is worth it. That mediocrity is worse. Year after year of aimlessness.
Yet, some of those teams – Chicago, Atlanta, and Indiana, for example – while “competing” were still able to accumulate or restock young talent and draft picks. They, certainly, made mistakes along the way; many, in fact. But they absolved them and moved on. Their futures no more opaque nor grim than their tanking colleagues.
There are other ways to rebuild too. Accurate drafting, sneaky free agencies, good development, opportune trades. The Raptors did it once already. And, they’re starting to do it again.
The real problem in all this is tanking is losing. And, losing is cancerous. It collapses morale; inhibits progress; warps habits; rushes development and expectations. At its worst, losing, can stymy careers and infect franchises in perpetuity.
There is no way to empirically prove that “competing” is better than “tanking”. Nor the inverse. Too many variables to track.
A recent article by Andy Larsen of the Salt Lake Tribune discussed this very quandary, wondering how difficult intentional tanking has been on the Utah Jazz’ “veteran” players.
The Utah Jazz are in the throes of the most shameless tank in team history.
Multiple players are sitting with injuries that they’d normally play through — Lauri Markkanen with “back spasms,” John Collins with “hip bruise management.” Walker Kessler is 23 years old, and sitting (official reason: “rest”) after the Jazz have two days off. Collin Sexton is 26, and has done the same.
…
I’ve also been curious about the toll it’s taken on the Jazz’s veteran players, who have played years of serious NBA basketball in which winning is actually the goal. In particular, at the Jazz’s practice in between their two games against the New Orleans Pelicans, I went up to Markkanen and just asked him frankly: “What do you think about tanking?”
He paused — he didn’t want to say the wrong thing — but he had thoughts to share.
“I don’t think losing, or purposefully losing, should be part of professional sports. I feel like athletes always want to compete. I understand why some organizations around the NBA are doing it, but I feel like it sucks, in my opinion,” Markkanen said. “There should be a better way to build rosters. That’s the way it’s been, so I understand it, but that’s my opinion.”
I went up to Patty Mills — 36-year-old Patty Mills, NBA champion Patty Mills — and asked the same question.
The same pause followed.
“I don’t know. I don’t know. I’ve always played for purpose. I play for purpose, that’s for sure. So when purpose isn’t there, it’s definitely hard,” Mills said. “It’s obviously a business, and everyone realizes when you get to this stage. There are situations that will happen that will remind you of that. At the end of the day — it’s a business call for sure — our job is to go out there and help develop, help teach, especially these young guys, how to be professionals.”
This is the risk.
Sure, we can’t measure how trying to win and winning affects positive change – though, at some level, the intangible goods of morale, momentum, purpose, etc. do contribute. But we, certainly, can see how losing negatively impacts players.
How difficult is it to train, practice, and compete knowing your efforts in-game are in direct contradiction to your employer’s three-year corporate strategy? That your contributions – albeit a small part of a greater entity – are lost in the void of tankdom, to the point that one must be “rested” like a lame, overzealous dog.
Utah and Toronto run similar timelines. Their rosters comprised of a single, young All-Star surrounded by a cluster of promising prospects with a few veterans sprinkled about.
For Utah, that’s not enough. And it isn’t, to be fair. Despite having tanked these last two years, they still stink. And with little – in the way of a budding Superstar – to show for it. Their dedication to the tank unrelenting.
(Will it work? Mayyyybeee. They might get the second pick, draft Ace Bailey, and then have four years of figuring out “how he fits in the NBA”. Or, they get Flagg, and they’re off to the races. Or, they get Flagg, and he shatters his foot. You catch my drift.)
For someone like Markkanen, who is 27 and in the prime of his career, it’s an insult. The precious years of his prime wasted for the betterment of a team’s future he might not even be a part of. A faithful employee must see the forest through the trees. But would the franchise afford the same? Absolutely not.
There was/should be an unspoken agreement in professional sports that both parties – team and player – will do their utmost to enable winning. Otherwise the concepts of team and sport fall into existential shambles.
That agreement can never wholly be unadulterated. This is, after all, a business. But when either fail their side of the bargain – i.e.: the Jimmy Butler versus Pat Riley saga or The Process in Philly, distrust and malcontent fester. (Arguably, Philly has never fully rid itself of the rot.)
Would guys like Scottie Barnes and RJ Barrett, both also entering their primes, feel the same as Markkanen? Sorry, you’re not good enough. You’d have to ask them.
But when the core of your franchise is before your very eyes, opting to hard tank is not only risking what you already have, but doing so with little certainty of future success. Any analytics department would tell you, that’s bad math.
3. Illegal Screens Drawn
Time for a new data point.
You’d think for a league full of complex analytics, there’d be a few more specific individual statistics. I suppose Synergy may gatekeep a bunch us frugal laypeople can’t access. The NBA could go outta their way. That’d be nice.
A few years back, I advocated for the addition of ghost steals. An ode to Fred VanVleet’s on-ball pestering. Chris Boucher deserves his own category: offensive rebounding fouls drawn. Scottie Barnes just needs a yells per game column.
Likewise, Davion Mitchell is due for an illegal screen drawn tally. He’s had five in the last five games he’s started. An astounding count.
Most often, I’d estimate, illegal screens are called when a ballhandler initiates an action prematurely: the screener is not solidly set and penalized for initiating contact while the defender is already in motion.
The magic of Mitchell, however, is his ability to draw illegal screens when they’re already set. He jockeys ballhandlers so tightly, screeners have no choice but to extend their frames – hips, knees, shoulders, elbows, whatever – to ensure they make contact with Mitchell.
It’s all about the ballhandler’s hip. Mitchell orbits it tightly allowing him to take the same path as the ballhandler. Screeners, like Jonas Valunciunas in the above, are then forced to enter space they weren’t previously occupying.
Mitchell’s not only quick enough to keep tight, he has a fantastic ability to “get small”, straightening his body like a vertical inchworm, and squeeze between the screen. He does exactly that below forcing Zion Williamson to leave his position and hunt Mitchell down.
The Raptors defence has tortured teams of late. And, Davion Mitchell a big reason why. It’s no coincidence that in the eight games Davion Mitchell replaced Immanuel Quickley in the starting lineup, the Raptors defensive rating vaulted to number two in the league.
4. A Relaxing NBA Trade Deadline
Might this be the first trade deadline in over a decade where…nothing really matters for the Toronto Raptors?
For years, it was the missing piece. The elusive power forward. The “other” scorer. Another wing.
Then, in the post-championship era it was to sell or buy? When the Jakob Pöltl and Thaddeus Young trades arose families were nearly torn apart.
Last year was the culmination of the senatorial deadlock. Finally, a decision was made. Finally. Such relief.
Now, we’re free. Kind of. The Tankers and Naturalists still quibble (read above). But, everyone can agree, the core is not going anywhere. Nor will it, likely, see a major addition to its structure.
We know anything can happen. Especially, if Luka Dončić can be traded. NO ONE IS SAFE.
Still, we humans can’t live life thinking every next minute an asteroid could smush our house.
Deduction and history and mere odds assure us our momentary solace should remain in tact…
…Right?
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