• Moderators, please send me a PM if you are unable to access mod permissions. Thanks, Habsy.

OT: The Official Toronto Raptors Thread

The Immanuel Quickley contract apology tour continues...

Spurs extend Fox for 4/229

Advanced stats say that Quickley is the better player fwiw. If IQ has been given 19-21 shots a night he'd have some pretty sexy counting stats too.
GS crying about Kum Bucket's contract as well. Poor guy can't find a deal anywhere because of the new CBA.
 
Just need him to stay healthy.

Fwiw, I've seen a ton of clowning on the Raptors this off season and everyone talks about a lack of shooting....and yeah, they could use more shooting but IQ-BI-RJ all shoot average or above average percentages from outside. Scottie adjusting his shot diet is capable of providing enough corner 3 shooting (35-36% from the corner over the last 2 seasons) to be considered a "stretch" 4. Jakob can't shoot, ever, for any reason but it's not like every team in the league has a 5 that can shoot. Miami (when they go small with Bam at the 5), Philly (when Embiid isn't dead), Milwaukee, Knicks, Atlanta (when Tingus isn't dead), and the Bulls (until they buy him out and he signs in GSW) are it. It's a nice to have, not a need to have.
 
GS crying about Kum Bucket's contract as well. Poor guy can't find a deal anywhere because of the new CBA.

Yeah they keep trying to S&T him but no one wants to pay Kuminga. I've heard that there is a Sacto offer out there but it seems to be a limited market. I get it, his 3 point shot hasn't come around and he wants money and a starting role while at the same time GSW wants things in return for him.
 
Fwiw...while I'm looking at shooting: I have concerns, but I don't think it's as bad as it's been made out this summer. If I was looking at the teams I expect to be in the playoff picture: Cleveland, NYY, Bucks, Magic, Raptors, Hawks, Pistons, Heat....and I ranked their starting lineups in order of shooting, here's what it would look like.

Fwiw, my rankings are going to consider not shooting being better than inefficient shooting. So for example, I'd rather have Jake not ever stretching the floor than Wendell Carter Jr shooting 23% on 2 attempts a night. "/" denotes more or less a tie

Centre: KAT, Tingus, Turner, Bam, Allen/Duren/Jake, Carter Jr
- 2 guys who can legit change a game with their shooting and one kinda can sometimes. Bam good enough to force you to defend him. Everyone else doesn't or shouldn't.

PF: OG, Mobley, Wiggins, Tobias, Johnson, Paolo, Giannis/Scottie
- OG & Mobley ahead of the rest. Wiggins and Tobias not really good PF's but they play there. If Scottie never shot above the break he would have been in the Tobias range...above the break drags him down to unusable as a shooter though. Shot diet, shot diet, shot diet.

SF: Norm Powell/Hunter, Robinson, Brandon Ingram, Mikal Bridges, Risacher, Kuzma, Franz Wagner
- BI isn't the best SF shooter of the bunch...but he's a better SF than anyone else ahead of him by a fair bit. Norm is tiny for the position, Robinson brutal defensively, Hunter not much better.

SG: GTJ/Bane, Herro/Spider, RJ, Dyson Daniels, Hart, Ausar
- RJ mid pack among starters here. SG has become a bit of a specialists position with guys like Duson, Hart, and Ausar being legit impact SG's who can't shoot. Would I trade RJ for GTJ for the shooting? Fuck to the no.

PG: Brunson/Garland, Quickley, Cade, Davion, Trae, Cole Anthony, Suggs,
- Not the best shooter of the group, but shoots better than a few bigger name guys who are inefficient in the volumes they chuck at.


So yeah...get Scottie to eliminate above the break 3's and all of sudden our starting lineup doesn't shoot so poorly compared to other playoff teams.
 
Just need him to stay healthy.

Fwiw, I've seen a ton of clowning on the Raptors this off season and everyone talks about a lack of shooting....and yeah, they could use more shooting but IQ-BI-RJ all shoot average or above average percentages from outside. Scottie adjusting his shot diet is capable of providing enough corner 3 shooting (35-36% from the corner over the last 2 seasons) to be considered a "stretch" 4. Jakob can't shoot, ever, for any reason but it's not like every team in the league has a 5 that can shoot. Miami (when they go small with Bam at the 5), Philly (when Embiid isn't dead), Milwaukee, Knicks, Atlanta (when Tingus isn't dead), and the Bulls (until they buy him out and he signs in GSW) are it. It's a nice to have, not a need to have.

shooting is better than it' s been for a long time i think.

Scottie and Poeltl can't shoot in the starting lineup (tho scottie will likely be better with lower volume), but the other 3 can all shoot and so can Dick and Walter and Agbaji off the bench,
 
The Raptors ARE making the playoffs this year.

Injuries/load management are my big concern. The starting lineup is legitimately good imo and will shut some people the fuck up this year if it stays healthy. My concern is the bench, and I'm legit worried that not bringing in 1-2 functioning, leage average veterans is going to fuck us. Too much is dependent on the kids all taking steps forward, especially the kid than can shoot the ball.
 
playoffs aren't in question imo. they would have easily made the playoffs last year, even without BI, if they had actually tried.

question is whether they can get top 4.
 
shooting is better than it' s been for a long time i think.

Scottie and Poeltl can't shoot in the starting lineup (tho scottie will likely be better with lower volume), but the other 3 can all shoot and so can Dick and Walter and Agbaji off the bench,

That's part of my concern though....both Jakobe and Dick were actually a touch below league average (36%) last year. Okai shooting in the 38-40% range again would be nice, so would Battle being able to defend well enough to get on the floor. All of our answers to the shooting questions have legit issues that can keep them off of the floor, or at the minimum, limit the matchups they should be getting

- Okai can shoot, but he doesn't do a lot else offensively, and he's fine defensively but too small to be a stopper against good scoring wings.
- Gradey might not be able to defend well enough at the NBA level to stay on the floor, and the shooting has been streaky as fuck.
- Walter's shooting needs to take a step forward
- Battle probably isn't athletic enough to defend the wings that he's going to need to for him to stick in the rotation.

Fwiw, we need to consider condensing the shit out of this roster by next summer. Right now if you were to ask me if I wanted the 4 of them or 1 NAW in free agency for the cap hit, I take NAW. I'm hoping that they change my mind on that this year though.
 
The Immanuel Quickley contract apology tour continues...

Spurs extend Fox for 4/229

Advanced stats say that Quickley is the better player fwiw. If IQ has been given 19-21 shots a night he'd have some pretty sexy counting stats too.
That's what teams need , very good players making 30-35 mil not 50+
 
I don't think Darko has ever really had time for him tbh. Boucher is a good bench body and an analytics darling that impacts winning, but he's a weird player to work into your system. He's a bit of a ball movement black hole (if the ball touches his hand, it's either a shot attempt or an easy pass back to a ball handler), who is an okay but only okay rebounder and defender. Most of his positive impact comes on the offensive end and we've kind of decided that as an organization we're defence first. Also, what he does offensively in the half court (space and chuck) doesn't work super well with this high, high off ball movement system that Darko utilizes. So he impacts the game when he's out there, but he's doing it outside of the system largely, cleaning up broken plays, hitting late clock 3's on busted possessions, etc.
 
Back
Top