MONROE IS GOOD TO GO

An often overlooked cost in the Kawhi Leonard/Danny Green acquisition, beyond the obvious of DeMar DeRozan and that 2019 first-round pick, is the loss of bench mob centre Jakob Poeltl.

The former first rounder’s ability to get up and down the court with the Raptors’ speedy bench mob or second unit was at least a part of their success to say nothing of his popularity within the room.

That the Raptors have elected to replace his speed with veteran Greg Monroe seems surprising at first, until you hear Fred VanVleet explain it.

Monroe will never approach Poeltl’s ability to go end-to-end, or even that of Lucas Nogueira, who has taken his game to Spain, but as VanVleet points out Monroe really doesn’t have to.

“Honestly, he does the same thing those guys did, obviously in a different way,” VanVleet said.

“Jakob was more running and agile and playing defence at the rim, and Greg can take charges, he can block shots, he can roll, he can pass, so the good thing about our group is you can plug just about anybody in there, and we’ll mold it and play to their strengths and pull them along to what we do as well.

“If you look around the league, I think Jakob to me was one of the best backups in the league last year at the centre position and as you start to make that list Greg is right there with him,” VanVleet said.

“So you talk about second-unit fives, and guys that are coming off the bench, Jakob’s my guy obviously, but Greg is right there as well.”