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OT: The Official Toronto Raptors Thread

What a motherfucking ridiculous.

-13 bench points on a fully healthy (minus Otto, of course) Raptors team. Milwaukee with 27 bench points, literally playing their 11th and 12th man for stretches

-Hard fail on defending the 3 point line...again. Bucks shoot 49% from outside. 40 fucking 9.

-Lose by 8...miss 10 free throws, shooting 63% from the line.
 
There's a cultural bit to it yeah, but I think there's compounding mistakes that have flowed downhill here. Masai flat out ignored the obvious roster issues he had and left a few gaping holes that has flat out hurt the team's chances at winning on most nights. They simply don't have enough size and shooting. Too many of the same guys that play the same roles more or less the same way. No team in the league needs Thad, Otto, Precious, & Boucher on a roster with Pascal, OG, & Scottie. That's 7 dudes who naturally play 2 positions.

and Nick...I keep trying to be chill about Masai and Nicks' obvious fuck ups this year (that ring is still pretty fucking recent) but Nick's rotation feels like he's trying to spite Masai. Oh, you won't give me players I can use, fine, I'll play 6 guys.
 
eh, they're not perfect, but this team should be significantly better than it is. there's clear disgruntlement and lack of effort. it's too bad.

and I dunno, nobody is forcing Nick to have Juancho in his rotation.
 
MindzEye said:
There's a cultural bit to it yeah, but I think there's compounding mistakes that have flowed downhill here. Masai flat out ignored the obvious roster issues he had and left a few gaping holes that has flat out hurt the team's chances at winning on most nights. They simply don't have enough size and shooting. Too many of the same guys that play the same roles more or less the same way. No team in the league needs Thad, Otto, Precious, & Boucher on a roster with Pascal, OG, & Scottie. That's 7 dudes who naturally play 2 positions.

and Nick...I keep trying to be chill about Masai and Nicks' obvious fuck ups this year (that ring is still pretty fucking recent) but Nick's rotation feels like he's trying to spite Masai. Oh, you won't give me players I can use, fine, I'll play 6 guys.
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i love Nick, and absolutely give him the benefit of the doubt. But I agree with Mindz, I don't understand why he won't play a little deeper into the bench. They're not all useless players, and what he's doing ain't working. And if I recall was a massive problem last year too.
 
Zach Edey might finish the year with the greatest season for a Canadian!

AZN pride worldwide
 
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I'm on board with this as long as Masai goes and gets some shooting.

Fwiw, I'm going to assume that the 3rd team is the Lakers. The Lakers have been attached to the Spurs with Westbrick rumours recently and this works under the cap:

To SAS: Westbrick and all the Lakers future 1sts
To LAL: Gary Trent Jr, Doug McDermott, Gallinari
To TOR: Jakob Poeltl, Josh Richardson

Why SAS does it? Clears out some of next year's salary (if they get Vic, they can immediately sign a max player to compliment him and the kids) and loads them up on future Lakers 1sts that will be post Lebron era and probably top 5-10 picks.

Why do the Lakers do it? Gets them some legit shooting and scoring depth as well as a young piece like Gary that they're willing to go deep into the tax to use their bird rights on.

and the Raptors? So...we kind of need a centre, and Poeltl is a really good modern rim runner. Does everything well that we're missing. Rebounds, defends the rim, generates offence without needing touches. He's expiring, but Pascal is legit his BFF and he knows the city and program well. A pretty easy re sign and the centre market is always soft, so he's probably looking at half the cap hit Gary is for 2-3x the impact. Also...Josh Richardson is the role player version of Gary. We lose no shooting in this scenario, but shift our "Gary" to the bench (where he's belonged imo). Expiring as well, so if he's a bad fit down the stretch just don't exercise your cap hold on him and let him hit free agency. Not a bad guy to have bird rights on though, won't be expensive to keep and is a solid 3pt shooter as a bench guard.
 
starter/bench is kinda besides the point tho.

He's good but Poeltl is maybe a 25mpg guy on a contender. maybe. Not sure it matters if he's techinically a "starter".
 
zeke said:
starter/bench is kinda besides the point tho.

He's good but Poeltl is maybe a 25mpg guy on a contender. maybe. Not sure it matters if he's techinically a "starter".
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Eh. Gary is a 25mpg game on a contender though too. He's just going to want to be paid like a ~33mpg/16-17 shot per night guy. We're at the point with Gary where it's either pay him his max deal or cut bait and move on. Sign me up for Jakob at 4/55 over Gary at 4/120 all day every day.
 
Poeltl is fine. But obviously will never shoot enough to be a full time guy. The nerdies average out to about 1.3 for him in 25mpg, which is solid, but also at age 27 that's likely peak value.

Gary's only at about 0.5, but he's doing it in a bigger 30mpg+ role and he's still only 23, and doesn't have the kind of fundamental flaws that would theoretically stop him from being a full time starter if his decision making matures.

I'm not married to Gary by any stretch but I kinda feel like players like Poeltl end up limiting your team's upside considerably.
 
Paying a thoroughly mediocre starter 30+ million dollars limits your team's upside more than anything else.

I'm obviously not against aiming higher for a trade target, but if we have already and it's just not out there, I've got no qualms with saving the cap space and filling our biggest position void at the same time.

Fwiw, there's no reason Poeltel couldn't play 28-31 minutes. He doesn't shoot, but he passes well for a big, he's not hurting you offensively at all when he's out there despite his limitations. That his Ortg is first among Spurs regulars by a lot kind of speaks volumes here. He's the only Spur not heavily under water in net rating this year. Good shit just happens when he's on the court. The exact type of quiet efficiency we badly need at both ends right now.
 
Paying Gary is the worst idea
Letting Gary go for nothing is the second worst.

Poetl does everything we lack except shooting, which i assume is addressed with our 1st rounder this year
 
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