The Toronto Raptors get the unofficial second half of their season underway on Friday night, visiting the Chicago Bulls for an 8 p.m. tip on TSN.
Despite dropping seven consecutive decisions to the Bulls and the game taking place in Chicago, the Raptors enter as mighty favorites. The line opened at Raptors -5.5 and quickly moved to Raptors -7.5, with the over-under (correctly) coming down to 200 from 201.5. The line movement isn’t necessarily due to any change in news but due to the original line being a little soft.
If the line seems odd, check out the game preview – the Bulls are really banged up.
Bulls Updates
Not only are the Bulls without Jimmy Butler, Nikola Mirotic, and Joakim Noah, but deadline acquisition Justin Holiday will be unavailable, per the homie Sean Highkin. That renders their already-thin rotation to look something like this:
PG: Derrick Rose, Aaron Brooks
SG: E’Twaun Moore, Tony Snell
SF: Mike Dunleavy, Doug McDermott
PF: Taj Gibson, Bobby Portis, Cristiano Felicio
C: Pau Gasol, Cameron Bairstow
Factor in that the Bulls are also on the second night of a back-to-back, and the line makes more sense.
Raptors Updates
James Johnson will return for the Raptors, giving them a full squad outside of DeMarre Carroll. It’s unclear if Johnson will regain his starting spot, but if he does, that bumps Norman Powell back to being the fourth wing in the rotation.
UPDATE: Silky’s starting.
PG: Kyle Lowry, Cory Joseph, Delon Wright
SG: DeMar DeRozan, Terrence Ross, Powell
SF: Johnson, Bruno Caboclo
PF: Luis Scola, Patrick Patterson, Anthony Bennett
C: Jonas Valanciunas, Bismack Biyombo, Lucas Nogueira
Or, for that one dude who got really bothered by me listing players by the five positions for the 53rd time this season…
PG: Lowry, Joseph, Wright (garbage time only)
SG: DeRozan (starting 1st and 3rd), Ross, Joseph (two-PG lineups), Powell
SF: Johnson, DeRozan (later in halves with 2PG or Ross), Ross (odd time he shares floor with Powell), Caboclo (basically never)
PF: Scola, Patterson, Johnson (smaller lineups), DeRozan (really small lineups), Bennett (lol, ok)
C: Valanciunas, Biyombo, Scola (really small lineups), Nogueira (foul trouble)
I’d love to see Patterson and Scola flipped in the starting lineup, something I now win a prize for mentioning for the 1,000,000th time, but it’s not happening.
Casey was asked today by @Eric__Smith about switching starters. Said Patterson plays ton against starters already and thinks it’s fine.
— Ryan Wolstat (@WolstatSun) February 18, 2016
Casey’s assertion is mostly incorrect, by the way. Of the team’s 10 qualified players, Patterson averages the fewest number of opposing starters on the floor and the lowest percentage of minutes played against starter-heavy units, per data from Nylon Calculus.
Even if it were the case – and again, it is decidedly not the case – the fact that none of the Raptors’ Scola-Valanciunas combinations are working remains an issue. Sure, all 48 minutes count the same, but knowing in advance you’ll struggle early in each half seems silly when there’s a pretty obvious tweak to make.
(Pardon the none-standardized decimal places, I’m not going back to fix it. That’s the team’s overall rating, by the way, not the sum of Scola-Valanciunas lineups.)
Oh well!
Buyouts
We talked a ton about buyouts today. J.J. Hickson, David Lee, and Steve Novak have already been waived and there are plenty more to come.
Don’t get your hopes up, though.
Raptors will keep an eye on waiver wire, I’m told, but aren’t likely to make a move. Roster is full & not much out there that addresses need
— Josh Lewenberg (@JLew1050) February 19, 2016
They’re right that nobody really feels a clear need, but I’d still arguing turning Bennett into something useful would be worthwhile.
Read This
The jeans-wearing dunker at All-Star Weekend that I tried to warn Will about on our preview podcast? Jordan Kilganon of Sudbury. You should read Chris O’Leary’s piece on him.
Well…
Pretty slow news day other than this stuff. Hope everyone has a safe and fun and happy weekend!
