Who is worried about Gasol now?
The jokes going around on social media after Marc Gasol’s latest demoralizing shutdown of Orlando Magic all-star centre Nikola Vucevic was that Gasol should file adoption papers because he’d “sonned” the big man once again. Gasol is one of the best centre defenders of the past couple of decades and he proves it again and again against the likes of Vucevic, who is an extremely skilled player, and Joel Embiid, who is merely and MVP candidate (Embiid dropped 36 and 13 on Atlanta on Monday).
Vucevic just has no answers against Gasol and had to be subbed off the floor with the game on the line. Remarkable. Credit to Orlando coach Steve Clifford for making that bold call, but Gasol really gave him no choice.
Anybody still worried about Gasol after his second straight strong two-way game? Nick
Nurse wasn’t worried at all about his rough start and now you know why. Could Gasol stand to be more aggressive with his shot and be a bit more like the guy who was a primary option in Memphis? Definitely. Is there anything else to quibble about with him at this point. Nope.
Kyle Lowry told us in Boston that he wasn’t happy at all about his conditioning or his play. He will be much better he said, despite putting up big-time numbers. That’s a scary warning for the rest of the NBA, since Lowry is putting up all-star stats (22 points per game, which would be his second-most as a Raptor, 6.8 assists, a career-best 3.8 three-point makes a game). Lowry’s been awesome at both ends of the floor.
Whenever the Raptors looked to be in a bit of trouble against Orlando, Lowry seemed to have an answer. He just willed them to that win. He closed the first half with some aggressive takes when the rest of the team appeared to be completely out of gas.
The minutes load will be interesting to watch. Playing Lowry 39.3 minutes a night and Fred Vanvleet 38.8 is simply not sustainable. Lowry’s too old for that kind of a workload, while Vanvleet hits the deck and gets hit too much for that to hold up. The Raptors will need to get that under control or it will surely bite them down the line.