Raps facing questions heading into season
When Raptors training camp began in early October, there was a lot to wonder about the 2017-18 edition.
Five pre-season games and a bunch of practices aren’t a huge sample size and it will take months before we truly learn the answers, but at least a bit of intel has emerged.
Can the offence be changed as much as the franchise has said it wants it to?
By now everybody knows the Raptors posted elite offensive numbers over each of the past few regular seasons, before reverting to a historically inept (for a team that actually won some rounds) playoff group. The plan was to move the ball, all but abolish mid-range looks in favour of more outside attempts, while still ranking near the top in free throw attempts. Easier said than done, but DeMar DeRozan has bought in, eschewing forced shots in favour of making extra passes and that decisionmaking has been contagious.
Team assist numbers have spiked considerably, even though Raptors players have connected on only 29.8% of three-point attempts in the pre-season vs. 36.4% accuracy last season. The offence has looked crisp and many of the advanced numbers still ranked near the top of the NBA.
Last year’s Raptors attempted 24.3 three-pointers and made 8.8 of them, this pre-season gang attempted 41.6 threes a night! Only 12.4 of them went in, but it’s a process and Serge Ibaka and C.J. Miles looked rusty early on.
“We want to use the skill of our players a little bit more next year, whether it’s passing, whether it’s cutting, whether it’s DeMar bringing the ball down, all those things Kyle playing the two, there are so many things we want to try to figure out,” Masai Ujiri had said.
“I thought overall our training camp kind of established what we wanted to accomplish as far as tweaking our offence a little bit and understanding our shot spectrum and making sure we were concentrated on getting the shot we wanted to get,” Dwane Casey said after the final tuneup game in Chicago. So far so good.
What do we wonder? Will they keep playing this way if times get tough, or will they revert to what they know and had past success with?
Can Jonas Valanciunas and Serge Ibaka coexist up front?
All signs pointed to no. Ibaka prefers to play centre and is at his best defensively when in that spot, but the big Lithuanian has been entrenched there (with six exceptions in 363 appearances) since breaking into the NBA in 2012. Both are below average passers and there are only so many touches to go around with Lowry and DeRozan historically dominating the ball.
The jury is still out on the combination, but early results were at least encouraging. Valanciunas has looked better than ever offensively (hitting two-thirds of his shots, moving the ball well and generally looking more comfortable) and Ibaka started slowly but came on recently. Again, the offence was mostly tremendous. At the other end, the Raptors controlled the defensive boards in the pre-season (only Chicago and Memphis grabbed more available defensive rebounds and allowed fewer defensive rebounds, per NBA.com), but they allowed far too many opposing trips to the free throw line and opponents got more open looks from deep than Casey and his staff would like.
Long-term, it’s hard to see this being the front-court duo because Toronto is going to run into huge cap issues without a move, but, for now, it might not be as much of a negative as many expected.
How quickly can Anunoby be worked into the mix?
Quite, as it turns out. Initially, the club didn’t expect the 23rd pick of the 2017 draft to play NBA minutes until around December. However, Anunoby got a couple of exhibitions under his belt and didn’t look out of the place, aside from the usual rookie mistakes. He might have already leaped over Pascal Siakam on the pecking order and it’s easy to envision Anunoby getting a good chunk of regular time at either of the forward spots. He has superb defensive instincts, an NBA body and athleticism and his offensive skill package surprised.
Will the all-stars get some rest this year?
The Raptors can’t afford to have an exhausted, broken down Lowry trying to lead them again in the spring. And while DeRozan seems superhuman at times with his relentless ability to get to the line, a bit more rest might keep him fresher and allow him to commit more to the defensive side of the floor.
Few can score like DeRozan and Lowry ranks third in the East in value over replacement player over the past four seasons, so they need to be on the floor, but if the kids can get them 3-4 more minutes of bench time a night while still keeping the team afloat, Toronto will reap the benefits down the line.