The Greek Freak will be handful for Raptors

NBA PLAYOFFS

tremendous strides just this year from last.

“He’s a freak of nature for an athlete,” Raptors head coach Dwane Casey said. “He reminds me so much of a young Magic Johnson as far as his length, his size, the way he can pass the ball and Lord forbid he gets consistent on his jump shots. But his length and his ability to see the floor, his willingness to pass — he enjoys passing — and then his one-step from the top of the key to the rim laying it up or dunking it. That’s why he’s a freak. He’s totally different than anything else in our league.”

Antetokounmpo is a 6-foot-11, 222-pound poster child for the perfect basketball body. He has a wingspan of 7-foot-3 which shrinks angles for opposing attackers down to such tiny openings that few ever try to go around him.

If there is a flaw in the 15th overall selection of the 2013 draft, it is that he remains a guy without a trustworthy NBA jump shot.

Without question he will get plenty of attention from the Raptors, but he won’t be the only one.

The X-factor as Casey calls him, will be Milwaukee’s Khris Middleton, the Bucks shooting guard who can stretch defences out to the three-point line and make life in the paint much less congested for the uber-athletic Antetokounmpo who can do plenty of damage once there.

Middleton is also the kind of physical defender that makes life difficult on DeMar DeRozan.