The Toronto Raptors have twelve games left in the regular season, and still no sign of DeMarre Carroll. This is disconcerting. Not because we should fear for the long term health of Carroll (although that small forward curse looms large), but because if Carroll is to return this season, there isn’t a lot of time to integrate him back into the lineup.
Yes, I said integrate, not re-integrate, because at this point in the season what was true in November is no longer true today. Training camp was five months ago, a time when core principles are being instilled and the playbook is being written, but little is actually settled on by the end of October. It’s during the months that follow that really put the work done in training camp to the test, and many strategies are refined and rewritten as the season wears on. Most of that refinement time? Carroll has missed it, and by the time he gets back there won’t be much of what was true when he last played that will remain true – which means he’ll be on a steep learning curve headed into the Playoffs, but he’ll nonetheless be expected to perform like the key free agent addition he was brought in to be. That is not an enviable position to be in.
Remember, Carroll wasn’t exactly a hand-in-glove fit when he was playing. Defensively he was strong, at least individually, but on offence he looked totally out of place. He was used to a steady diet of catch-and-shoot opportunities in Atlanta and was suddenly creating with the ball in his hands way too often in Toronto. The team around him also looked unsure of how to use him. They were winning, but they didn’t start to reach near-elite status until well after he was shut down. When James Johnson was starting in his place, the team lost Carroll’s intelligence, spacing and passing, but they also didn’t have to concern themselves with getting their three-man touches, leaving more shots for Kyle Lowry and DeMar DeRozan, which is never a bad strategy. There has to be concern about what happens when Carroll is fit to return, and how much his presence might serve to rock a very steady boat.
Let’s assume Carroll is ready to return in the first week of April (which is certainly no guarantee, at this point), that leaves eight games to tune him up for the Playoffs and to tune the rest of the team to his presence. That’s a major adjustment. Yes, some of what they worked on in training camp can now be put back into the playbook (on both ends), but the team hasn’t been focusing on those looks for months, and will have to jam them back into their heads quickly so that they can become reflexive in time for the Playoffs.
That’s a scary proposition. Had Carroll been a perfect fit to start the season, at least you could convince yourself that he’ll be easy to re-insert in the team’s action, but he was only a so-so fit (I attribute this mostly to a lack of time to get familiar and a series of nagging injuries) and so even when he comes back there will be tweaks that need to be made. The goal going into the Playoffs, especially for a team like the Raptors that will (almost assuredly) be a 50-plus win team, is to ride on as much momentum as possible into the first round. You want to take all of the rhythm and familiarity that you’ve built all season long and unleash it on your first opponent. Carroll is a major piece, though. You can’t quietly sneak him back in, he needs to be accounted for, and in accounting for him you have to upset your rhythm. If you can get him playing up to his potential, then those adjustments will be worth it. If they team is bungling plays or blowing assignments because they aren’t used to playing together, well that’s a problem.
There’s also not much the team can do about it, either. If Carroll is healthy, you play him, he’s too good to not (and, you know, he’s being paid more than anyone on the team), and if you’re playing him then you’re most likely starting him, since you brought him in to guard starting wings (like possible first round opponents Paul George or Jimmy Butler). For the Raptors to really get to where they have the chance to get, which is the conference finals, they will need a well-integrated Carroll. They can do it without him, but the road will be much harder to traverse.
All of which is a way of saying: nothing ever comes easy for this club. Even in a (again, probable) 50-win season, easily the best in team history, they can’t head into the postseason without questions looming over their heads. This season, however, has been about overcoming these sorts of issues as much as it’s been about anything. Losing Carroll, losing Valanciunas for long stretches, losing Johnson for a spell, the erratic play of Patrick Patterson and Terrence Ross, the need to find rest for Kyle Lowry and DeMar DeRozan – this club and their coach have done a great job of negating nearly all of these issues. So maybe integrating Carroll will just be their crowning achievement. Maybe they’ve actually been preparing for this eventuality all season long. Maybe having to constantly be shuffling the deck is going to work out in their favour when they have to stick a major piece back into their starting five only days before they kick off round one.
Of course, this is all assuming that Carroll is actually on his way back, but that would be an issue for another day.
