Boucher, Raptors' bench steadily improving despite Porter Jr.'s absence

The nice thing is that the cavalry is coming – eventually – but for the meantime the Toronto Raptors are doing just fine.

The hope was that Otto Porter Jr., the Toronto Raptors prize off-season acquisition, would make his season debut Friday against the Philadelphia 76ers. The 10-year NBA veteran and recent member of the Golden State Warriors championship team has been out since early on in training camp with a hamstring strain.

But Raptors head coach Nick Nurse said Thursday that Porter Jr.’s return would be put on hold “for a bit” as he had to leave to team for personal reasons, with no specific date set for his return.

What’s telling, however, is another delay in having Porter Jr. back in the lineup was greeted mainly by a shrug — at least in the basketball sense. Even a few days ago, having Porter healthy and back in the lineup would have been cause to celebrate for the Raptors, whose shooting often seems precarious and whose bench production was sputtering.

The Raptors had the lowest amount of scoring from their bench league-wide last season and were 20th in three-point percentage. So it wasn’t all that encouraging when the Raptors were the second-worst three-point shooting team in exhibition play.

Porter — who has shot 39.8 per cent from deep in his career and was a useful bench piece for the Warriors last year — was signed to two-year contract worth $12.3 million to help alleviate both issues

Except — so far — the Raptors are more than getting by.

After they went 16-of-37 from three in their win over Philadelphia on Wednesday, the Raptors are second in the NBA in their accuracy from beyond the arc at 41 per cent. Overall their True Shooting percentage, which factors in three-point shooting, two-point field goals and free throws is 56.6, which is 19th in the league but a significant step up from 54.3 and 27th a season ago.

The sample size — all five games of it — is not big, but it’s at least encouraging.

“Well, we’re getting pretty good shots, I would say that much,” said Raptors head coach Nick Nurse on Thursday. “I think there is a fair share of catch-and-shoot shots with a fair amount of being open or lightly contested, etcetera, so that’s always the key to get rhythm, not contested ones is where it starts. Taking good ones.”

As for their bench?

The return of Chris Boucher, who also missed pre-season and the start of the campaign with a hamstring strain before joining the lineup for Monday’s win against Miami, has put a charge into a unit that needed some. They were scoring just 19.7 points a night through the first three games of the season, compared to 29.7 for their opponents.

With Boucher in the line-up the Raptors bench-scoring is up to 25.5 points a game over their past two starts, outscoring their opponents’ second unit in each case.

The addition of Porter Jr., when he returns, should only help.

“I think it could be exciting, we play a lot of different positions,” said Boucher, who began to fully embrace his role as an energizer off the bench in the second half of last season and has made himself an essential piece of Nurse’s rotation since. “I think we’re all starting to realize our role and how we can help the team, I think it’s a good combination of all guys who can do a lot of different things and really disturb the other team. Hopefully, we can figure it out really quick and keep up with the starters and win games.”

Adding Porter to a bench mix that is long on length and defensive energy but a little shy on dead-eye shooting should give Nurse more lineup options. The presence of Porter’s shooting should ease up the urge Nurse feels to keep Fred VanVleet or Gary Trent Jr. on the floor as long as he has been with the second unit.

That itself would contribute to a larger goal of trimming back on the starters’ minutes to keep them fresh for the long haul.

“We want him back,” said Nurse of Porter. “He’s a high-level player, high level shooter [that] we certainly need. I would assume he’s going to get right into the rotation, and we’ll figure out how that affects the rest.

“There’s a lot of times I’m looking to keep shooting on the floor,” Nurse continued. “And that’s why – a lot of times – I’m sending Gary back in fairly quickly and Freddy back in fairly quickly. With the big lineup we have out there – those guys can all pop and make their share – but they’re not necessarily ‘shooters’ right?”

Porter is certainly that, and when he’s ready to play, the Raptors will welcome him.

But for now? When it comes to shooting from deep and getting some bench production — two areas he was hired to improve —  the Raptors are getting by. The new guy’s job will be to augment what’s already going on, rather than save the day.

It’s better for everyone that way.