Lots of questions facing Raps
TORONTO — After what had to have been the wackiest off-season in NBA history, the Toronto Raptors are back.
Training camp kicked off with physicals and media day on Monday, followed by trips to Victoria, Hawaii and Portland, before the lone home pre-season contest goes on Oct. 10 vs. Detroit.
Here are some big questions heading into camp:
Can the Raptors take advantage of massive movement in the Eastern Conference to get off to a big start (even though the schedule is rough early)?
The consensus conference powers, Cleveland and Boston, swung a blockbuster deal, shifting the landscape significantly. The Celtics will surely take some time to adjust to life with the ball-dominant duo of Kyrie Irving and Gordon Hayward, as well as the departures of much of last season’s rotation. Meanwhile, the Cavs won’t get Isaiah Thomas for months and also need to find chemistry, Washington will be without starter Markieff Morris for the early going and four all-stars have defected to the West (with only one making the opposite voyage).
The Raptors return the same core, with C.J. Miles and rookie OG Anunoby being the only prominent additions.
Continuity and the bitter taste left by last May’s one-sided defeat at the hands of Cleveland — a series which saw LeBron James and the Cavs toy with the supposed contended — should propel this group to a fine start, even if October and November will be littered with tough trips.
Who starts at small forward?
It will be veteran sharpshooter Miles, one of the best three-point gunners in the entire NBA (only two players hit more corner three-pointers last season) vs. fan favourite and now third-year swingman Norman Powell.
Powell can do more offensively and is a better defender against smaller players (while Miles has capably guarded up to the power forward spot in the past), but with the Raptors preaching a new focus on longrange shooting, Miles would appear to be the better fit. Miles will space the floor for top dogs Kyle Lowry and DeMarDeRozan,whilecomplementing Serge Ibaka, who led all big men in three-point makes after being acquired from Orlando last February. Powell has played better historically (granted, the sample size isn’t a huge one) alongside DeRozan, but right now it makes more sense to make him the key attacker off of the bench.
If Ibaka eventually shifts to centre, where he is best suited (and Jonas Valanciunas is dealt or moved to the bench), then the starter could depend on whether the power forward is a three-point shooter or not.
Alfonzo McKinnie, a 25-year-old athletic marvel on a partially guaranteed deal could take advantage of a lengthier than expected Anunoby recovery process to get into the mix. He has impressed.
Which young player steps up?
The franchise hopes the answer here will be several of them. Powell willattheleastbethesixthman,which is a big responsibility. He will guard the best perimeter player most nights and be asked to be a scoring threat as well. The rookie Anunoby won’t be able to fully show what he can do until after the calendar changes (due to off-season knee surgery) and there are huge expectations there, but not immediate ones. He will probably be the youngster the Raptors anticipate getting the most from in 2018-19. For now, Delon Wright and Fred VanVleet will replace Cory Joseph as Lowry’s backup. Both should jockey for time, creating solid internal competition. Whoever wins the job needs to produce, especially alongside Lowry as part of the team’s traditionally lethal second unit.
Sophomores Pascal Siakam and Jakob Poeltl, plus Bruno Caboclo probably are still a year away from being real contributors (and Caboclo might never get there).
“We’ve got to give them a shot to play. That’s just the way our team is built,” Masai Ujiri said at the end of last season.
“I don’t think about the Toronto Raptors just for today. I think about the Toronto Raptors five years from now, too. I have to keep that in perspective.”
How much will Patrick Patterson, P.J. Tucker, Cory Joseph (and others) be missed?
In Tucker and Patterson, the Raptors lost two of its plus/minus darlings, a pair of competitors that always seemed to be in the right place at the right time defensively.
Patterson has been a major part of the surge the past few seasons, even with his pedestrian stats, while Tucker was a lockdown, energetic, intense leader. They will be tough to replace.
“It’s tough to lose those guys. Patrick was a signature in our ball club and we’re going to miss him like crazy,” Ujiri said.
“And then P.J. gave us toughness. So we have to figure that out … But guys have to step up on our team.”
Meanwhile, DeMarre Carroll and Terrence Ross (dealt for Ibaka), like Patterson and Tucker, were relied on to hit a number of three-pointers every night. The offence can be re- ell. It’s the defence they brought that placed by the likes of Miles and Pow- we wonder about. Anunoby will bring that, eventually.
Wright and VanVleet should be able to play better than Joseph defensively (he had a down year in 2016-17) though it remains to be seen if they will co-exist with Lowry as well as Joseph did.
The bottom line is the next man up theory will be put to the test.
What will the rotation be?
We’ll keep this short. Lowry and DeRozan are the all-star guards. Miles and Powell split small forward duties. Ibaka and Valanciunas start up front, even though that’s far from an ideal situation (because Ibaka is both better and prefers to play centre and since neither are even average passers). Wright is the backup point guard, with VanVleet chasing him. Poeltl is likely the first big man off of the bench, while Siakam, McKinnie, Caboclo and possibly K.J. McDaniels could fight for another rotation spot until Anunoby can go.