Watching DeMarre Carroll hang his head on the way to another late benching in Sunday’s brutal performance against the Kings, and the panic stared to set in. It had been waiting in the corners, warded off by buzz words like “slow starter”, “it’s early”, and “not 100 percent”, but now it’s here. It revealed itself in a 1-8 shooting performance, highlighted by going 0-5 from 3, then moved in permanently as whispers filled the silence of the ACC about his health. Carroll was given a free pass last season. The definition of a grinder, he was brought in to shore up the Raptors’ defense and shut down LeBron James, and he almost did. When his knee injury robbed him of his potential, fans made excuses for their shiny new toy, and rightly so. Injuries suck, and anyone who is neither a doctor nor DeMarre Caroll himself has the right to judge a player’s work ethic, but we do have the right to judge how he’s being used.
DeMarre Carroll starts because his defense his lightyears ahead of his offense, and as long as Kyle Lowry, DeMar DeRozan, and Jonas Valanciunas carry the scoring, Carroll does enough on the other end to make the sacrifice worthwhile. This is where two problems present themselves. The first (and more fixable of the two) is that Lowry, DeRozan, and Valanciunas aren’t carrying the scoring – at least not as the three-headed Raptor we imagined. Instead, that distinction belongs to DeRozan and DeRozan alone. The league’s scoring leader is averaging 33 points a game while Lowry and JV are combining for 30. While almost everyone expects both those numbers to trend toward the mean, secondary scorers still need to present themselves, and Carroll has not held up his end of the deal. This is where the second (and more troubling) problem rears it’s ugly head.
Carroll is in his 8th season without ever averaging more than 12 points a game. He has averaged double-digit scoring just three times, and while they have come in his last three seasons, the expectations of that number growing are becoming unrealistic. Here’s where the shouts of “but he’s not a scorer” drown out the sensible please of “he needs to become a capable one”. He’s averaging just over six points a game this season while shooting 27% on two-pointers and three-pointers. The most troubling part of those statistics is how open those shots have been. That same 27% is the exact percentage of shots he’s made from a catch and shoot position, meaning either his shot is broken, or he is.
With the exception of Cleveland and a surprisingly hot start from the Hornets, the East is still trying to figure itself out. Indiana doesn’t appear to be the darkhorse everyone envisioned, and the Celtics aren’t as good as they thought they were (just ask Isaiah Thomas). So why not give Carroll the time he clearly needs? The Raptors can easily make the playoffs without him, and unleashing the one and only Terry Ross for a few weeks would at the very least be entertaining.
Our expectations of the Raptors have grown stale because we choose to view the Cavaliers as an insurmountable foe. Yet, there’s a player Toronto brought in (for a pretty penny) to help the Raptors get over that very mountain. Toronto has yet to experience a healthy DeMarre Carroll with any consistency, and thats not right for a player making $14.2 million this season. The Raptors are a good team. With a healthy and productive DeMarre Carroll, they’re a great one. It’s time to rest JYD 2.0
