DeRozan two-stepping to record
Toronto guard should break Bosh’s franchise scoring mark next week
It will come, hopefully, on some anti-analytic, mid-range jump shot in traffic, the kind of field-goal attempt that makes some cringe and that has made DeMar DeRozan one of the most lethal offensive forces in the NBA.
It will be like him, if the worlds align correctly, not at all flashy, against the common perception of what’s best in the game these days.
It will come Monday in Portland, perhaps. Maybe Wednesday in Oakland. And it will go largely unnoticed because it will come in the middle of the night in a game largely ignored by anyone other than the most devout Toronto Raptors fan.
It will be the basket that propels DeRozan past Chris Bosh into first place on the list of all-time Raptors scorers, another chapter in what has become a DeRozan rewrite of the franchise record book.
Going into Friday’s game in Utah, DeRozan was just 58 points shy of Bosh’s team standard of 10,275 points in a Toronto uniform.
There will be little hullabaloo when he passes Bosh, in part because the 27-year-old doesn’t really do hullabaloo all that much.
Coach Dwane Casey was speaking the other day about this specific DeRozan season, but he was also summing up the essence of the Raptors all-star: “DeMar is so unassuming and humble as a man and as a player, so you don’t notice it. He doesn’t do it with a lot of flair, he just gets it done, which is what I like.”
DeRozan accepts the accolades quietly and without any boasting. He’s proud, of course, of what he has done for the franchise and for himself but now is not the time to dwell on accomplishments, no matter how many there are.
“Just to be in the record book for something like that is incredible,” he said. “When I see it sometimes, it’s unbelievable that somebody’s going to try to beat that some day in the record books.”
DeRozan already owns a host of Raptors records and he will dominate the “most ever” section of the book before his time in Toronto is done.
Before Friday’s game in Utah he was first in games played (549), field goals (3,630), overall field-goal attempts (8,155) and two-point fieldgoal attempts (7,391). He was second in two-point field goals made (3,414, behind Bosh’s 3,564), minutes (18,640 to Bosh’s 18,815), free throws made (2,741 to Bosh’s 2,997) and free throws attempted (3,316, behind Bosh at 3,767).
Barring any unforeseen circumstances, DeRozan should catch Bosh in each of those categories.
DeRozan is also in the midst of one of the great individual seasons in the last 25 NBA years, averaging career bests in points (27.9), rebounds (5.1), assists (4.1) while shooting 48.2 per cent from the field.
“He’s the best to ever do it, I think personally, only scoring two-pointers,” teammate DeMarre Carroll said. “It’s amazing how he does it, amazing how he gets all those points not even shooting threes. Most guys like Steph (Curry) and Klay Thompson when he had 60 (points in a recent game), they shoot threes and it makes it a little bit more easier.
“But he’s getting it scoring twos, that makes it even crazier how he’s doing it.”
And that, too, is the essential DeRozan. He’s done all he’s done while basically thumbing his nose at conventional basketball wisdom. Oh, he’ll take a three-pointer if it’s there but he’s the king of the mid-range game — those 15- and step-back 18footers.
Surpassing Bosh for the all-time scoring lead may be seen in some quarters as simply a function of time, and that’s true to a large degree. But the time only matters if you use it right and be consistently productive, as DeRozan has been.
“I’m happy for him and, probably, if you look at the history, any time a guy signs a big contract (DeRozan signed a five-year, $130-million deal in July) and is rewarded for what he has done . . . there is a little letdown. But there has been no letdown from him from practice, to his leadership, to his play whatsoever.”