10 Early Raptors Takeaways: How has team adjusted to new system?

So what do we know about the Toronto Raptors so far? Probably not enough, is the honest answer, but they have played 10 games, which is a nice round number that we can somewhat arbitrarily use to draw some inferences, if not conclusions.

Helping the cause is the Raptors have played five games at home and five on the road and nearly as many games against the Western Conference (four) as they have against the East (doing the math on his fingers … yes, six).

Helping also for evaluation purposes is that they’ve been mostly healthy as head coach Darko Rajakovic has been able to play his preferred starting lineup of Dennis Schroder, Jakob Poeltl, Pascal Siakam, O.G. Anunoby, and Scottie Barnes for 105 minutes already, the eighth most of any five-man unit in the NBA.

Overall their schedule has been difficult, with the NBA’s second toughest strength of schedule, but they’ve had some games which – on paper – were gettable.

All of which to say, here are 10 Raptors takeaways after 10 games played.

1. No Fred VanVleet, no problem

One of the bigger question marks heading into the season was how Toronto would manage without its starting point guard and all-round cultural touchstone, who left for Houston in free agency for $84 million guaranteed over two seasons.  Not too badly, it turns out.

While VanVleet certainly had an impact with the previously woebegone Rockets who have won six straight, Dennis Schroder, his Raptors replacement, has proven good value for the two-year, $25.4 million he signed for shortly after VanVleet opted for the Rockets.

Schroder’s ability to get into the paint is apparent and his 4:1 assist-to-turnover ratio indicates he’s comfortable making decisions when he gets there.  He’s a competitive, pesky point-of-attack defender and while he doesn’t have VanVleet’s gravity as a high-volume three-point threat, he’s at least been able to hold his own from distance, connecting on 36.2 per cent of his nearly five three-point attempts per game.

2. Um, about that offense

Former Raptors head coach Nick Nurse emphasized offensive rebounding and turnover creation to give his team enough extra shots to be competitive with a roster he (correctly) deemed light on shooting and lacking threats at the rim but long on ball-hawking defenders. 

It yielded results: the Raptors managed a 13th-ranked offence rating despite finishing 28th in effective field goal percentage. The downside? If teams didn’t turn it over against Toronto it was either a lay-up or an open corner three. Not ideal.

Under Darko Rajakovic, the Raptors are trying to offset similar shortcomings with a greater emphasis on ball movement and cutting. So far, so-so: The Raptors are passing more and cutting more, but the spacing issues remain and as a result, Toronto lingers at the bottom of the table in halfcourt offence efficiency per cleaningtheglass.com, which is almost exactly where they were last season.

3. Scottie Barnes, sophomore slump no more

The third-year forward has taken an impressive jump after a slight regression -- from a better-than-expected standout rookie season -- in his second season year. With so much of the Raptors' future hinging on Barnes becoming an elite two-way presence, another stagnant season would have sent the red flags flying.

Instead, Barnes is off to an impressive start, averaging career highs in points (20.1), rebounds, (9.7), assists (5.6), blocks (1.8) and steals (1.8). After a torrid start from behind the three-point line where he shot 42.1 per cent for the first seven games of the season, he’s cooled off (2-of-15 in his last three) but has still managed to impact winning, racking up nine steals, ten offensive rebounds and three blocks in the Raptors last three games, playing critical roles in a pair of wins even if his shot was wonky. A full season of this would suit the Raptors this season and in years to come.

4. Darko Rajakovic. So far? Good

Regardless of how highly Rajakovic was regarded as an assistant coach along his path to winning the competition for the Raptors job, a first-year head coach typically doesn’t get a lot of leeway to ease their way into the role. Early stumbles are magnified and can spiral.

The Raptors pre-season couldn’t have gone better for Rajakovic, but when Toronto was 1-3 and hosting the highly regarded Milwaukee Bucks before leaving on a tough four-game road trip it was easy to project things going south quickly. Instead, the Raptors won impressively against the Bucks, stormed back against the San Antonio Spurs, and manhandled a red-hot Mavericks team to sweep Texas. If they haven’t fully expressed his vision, the Raptors are at least embracing it: they rank second in the NBA in passes made and perhaps more encouragingly second in potential assists.

That they are 10th in points from assists suggests some of the other underlying issues the Raptors have, offensively. Defensively? They are forcing fewer turnovers than a season ago, but a slightly more conservative style seems to be paying dividends as the Raptors are ninth in opponents’ field goal percentage, up from 29th last season.

5. O.G. Anunoby? More like Awesome Anunoby

The seventh-year wing is making a case that he’s the Raptors' most valuable player. To this point in the season, he’s a constant in all iterations of the Raptors' best-performing lineups. His timing is excellent given that he’s going to be a free agent this summer. Is he the Raptors' best offensive player? No, but he’s building on the status he earned as a second-team all-Defense selection last season to make a case that he’s the best defensive player in the league.

Opponents are shooting about 7.5 per cent worse from the floor against Anunoby than would otherwise be expected; remarkable given he’s always guarding the best player on the other team almost regardless of position. Add in that he’s averaging 16.4 points per game and shooting 40 per cent from three and it’s easy to see how Anunoby will be among the most coveted free agents on the market next summer.

6. How deep is your depth?

One of the areas Nick Nurse and the Raptors didn’t see eye-to-eye was that he didn’t believe he had more than seven or eight players he could rely on, and the Raptors believed his unwillingness to extend his rotation meant more players didn’t get the minutes they needed to be developed.

Rajakovic has stood by his pre-season promise to play 10 players each night and so far 11 different Raptors are averaging at least 15 minutes a night while appearing in half of the games. Has it worked? It’s too early to judge.

The Raptors are 11th in the NBA in minutes played by non-starters after being 30th last season, but they rank 27th in net rating, so you can see the argument for trimming those minutes back. Free agent signing Jalen McDaniels has been a disappointment but the return to health of Otto Porter Jr. has been a bonus.

Also, consider Malachi Flynn who is beginning to play some very solid basketball with a steady rotation role. His first three games were abysmal, but he was allowed to play through it and has been a contributor since, hitting 40 per cent of his threes, taking care of the ball (2:1 assist-to-turnover ratio), and averaging two steals per 36 minutes.

7. Gradey Dick will definitely be an NBA contributor – maybe even this season

You wouldn’t have thought so in the early part of Summer League or even in the early stages of the exhibition season. But in each case, the No.12 pick out of Kansas has shown the ability to turn lessons into practice faster than you might think.

He put up 22 and 21 points in his final two Summer league games after looking overmatched in his first two starts and scoring 21 total. He looked rushed and flustered in his first three pre-season games and finished off by going 4-of-7 from deep in his last one.

Through 10 regular season games, he hasn’t shot the ball well – just 27 per cent from three – but there have been plenty of flashes. He came off the bench against Philadelphia to score 16 points while going 4-of-6 from three and hit a pair of threes against Washington on Tuesday. Perhaps most encouraging is that even without knocking down shots he’s looked increasingly at home in an NBA game.  Everyone I’ve talked to about Dick is convinced he’ll be a good NBA player, with most allowing for the possibility of him being an impact starter as he matures.

8. Pascal Siakam is going to be just fine

It was a tough off-season for the Raptors only returning all-star and two-time all-NBA selection. Not only did the Raptors front office not engage in extension talks with the eight-year veteran, but they also spent most of the summer fielding trade offers.

Then, when the training camp started Raptors president Masai Ujiri not-so-subtly linked Siakam with the notion that selfish play had derailed last season. Then there was the idea that Rajakovic was going to have Barnes as the offensive fulcrum, and sure enough through the first seven games Siakam’s usage rate was 21 per cent after averaging 27 per cent the previous four seasons.

But in the last three games, the ball’s been back in Siakam’s hands more and he’s delivered with 31-12-5 and 39-11-7 games sandwiched around a team no-show against Boston at the end of the Raptors road trip. As long as Siakam is a Raptor there is no chance they are a better team with him playing passively. His ramped-up offensive aggression is a positive marker, as is what seems to be growing trust between and Rajakovic.

9. More passing, but more turnovers too

This is going to be a challenge for the Raptors all year. Last season the Raptors were content to hunt mismatches in the half-court and allow players to attack them 1-on-1. There was less passing – by design – and so fewer passing mistakes. Toronto ranked first in the NBA in turnovers, as in, not making them.

So far this season they are 20th in the league with nearly four more than they did a year ago. That impacts their transition defense and costs them chances to score in their own right. It’s likely a feature, not a bug.

As long as teams feel they can crowd the paint on the Raptors because of their lack of deep shooting threats, fitting passes into the spaces Rajakovic wants will be problematic. He’s convinced that better execution – screening, passing angles, player movement – will help trim down some of those mistakes. His goal is to be a top-10 turnover team. It will be an interesting measure to keep an eye on.

10. Outlook? What you see is what you get

The Raptors didn’t make any significant upgrades to their talent in the off-season and instead subbed out a very good and proven NBA head coach for a highly respected and unproven one. Rajakovic is at least showing that this group is capable of playing .500 basketball while adopting a different style and expanding the rotation.

He looks increasingly comfortable as a head coach. But is there reason to believe his approach can squeeze significantly more wins out of what is largely the same group of players? If you squint you can see it: a huge year from Barnes; Siakam settling in and playing at an All-Star level; Dick fast-tracking to become the kind of spacing and cutting threat the Raptors need.

Combine all of that with good health – can their starters all play 70 or more games? Can Otto Porter Jr. give them 60? – and continued growth under Rajakovic’s system and you can talk yourself into 44 or 45 wins. It’s a long way from the Raptors' 50-plus win glory days, but it could be enough to challenge for homecourt in the East. But that’s probably too optimistic. Players get hurt. Improvement isn’t linear.

The most likely scenario is the Raptors are more or less what they’ve shown through 10 games: a competitive, well-coached team with just enough flaws to make playing anything above breakeven basketball too much to expect.