The North is abuzz with the recent play of one Jonas Valanciunas: Lithuanian lightning, potential Viking, and positive team defender. He has always been an excellent offensive player, finishing in the 90th percentile or higher league-wide in plays finished as the roller in the pick and roll in 2015-16 and 2015-16. He is above the 90th percentile this year in post-ups. The man is a talented offensive player. It is known. What has not been praised, until recently, has been Valanciunas’ defensive prowess. But when it rains, it pours, and the floodgates have opened on the praise for his two-way game.
*whispers*
**but secretly shouts because I want followers**
JV has quietly, maybe, put up the best month of his career as a two-way player— Louis Zatzman (@LouisZatzman) January 18, 2018
Warrants repeating because of the discourse around him sometimes: Jonas Valanciunas is quietly in the midst of maybe the best 2-way stretch of his career right now, playoffs excluded.
— Blake Murphy (@BlakeMurphyODC) January 20, 2018
If this isn't the best defensive game Valanciunas has played, it's right up there. Only (brief) stretch where LMA has looked anything like LMA came with JV on the bench late in the 3rd. Can't give him all the credit for that, but he deserves a lot of it.
— Josh Lewenberg (@JLew1050) January 20, 2018
Since the beginning of the season, Valanciunas’ defensive rating has been 106.6. That’s bad. Since December 1st, it’s been 103.2. That’s good. In the month of January, he has had the fifth-best defensive rating on the Raptors. In fact, since the 1st of December, the Raptors have played 13 games in which Valanciunas’ minutes improved the team’s defence and 11 in which they did not. Of the December-January games in which Valanciunas has not statistically aided the team on defence, 3 have come against Philadelphia, and 1 against each of Cleveland, Golden State, and Brooklyn. All of those teams play significant minutes with a center who stretches the offence to the 3-point line.
It’s been clear for some time that Valanciunas has been a net-positive defender in the post against big, bruising players. He is the only player on the Raptors who has the strength and size to consistently grapple with the last few behemoths in the NBA, such as DeMarcus Cousins, Enes Kanter, Hassan Whiteside, Rudy Gobert, Dwight Howard, DeAndre Jordan, or Andre Drummond. (OK, that’s not so few – there’s more remaining behemoths than originally stated). But Valanciunas has had great success in his 10 games against those players, recording an average, pro-rated-by-minute, defensive rating of 102.1.
He is able to contain said titans while also securing the defensive rebound. This is difficult. Defenders like Jakob Poeltl or Lucas Nogueira may be better than Valanciunas at forcing misses near the rim; the latter two hold would-be scorers to field goal percentages 6.6% and 9.2% worse than expected from attempts less than 6 feet from the rim, and Valanciunas only holds them to 5.2% worse than expected. However, that doesn’t tell the whole story. After a missed shot, Poeltl (16.7%) and Nogueira (18.3%) fail to even rebound 1/5th of missed shots. Valanciunas posts an elite defensive rebounding rate of 30.0% on the season.
However, his defensive skills are expanding. Valanciunas is becoming a much more effective defender in a well-executed scheme, and he is increasingly more able to contest shooting bigs. Valanciunas’ season-long defensive improvement coalesced into one watershed moment of domination against San Antonio on January 19th. Although LaMarcus Aldridge proved too strong and skilled for any non-Lithuanian defender, Valanciunas held Aldridge to 2/17 shooting while they were matched up on the floor.
Valanciunas showed every trick in the book against Aldridge. When Aldridge was involved in the pick and roll – a great weakness for Valanciunas in past seasons when involving speedy point guards or shooting bigs – JV followed the gameplan impeccably.
Valanciunas stayed perpendicular with the point guard, whether Tony Parker or Dejounte Murray, willing to help on penetration and deny any blow-by. When the point guard’s defender had recovered sufficiently to negate any offensive advantage, JV trusted his footspeed to return to Aldridge, contest the shot, or stay with him on a drive. JV consistently forced tough step-backs and fadeaways from Aldridge when he received the ball out of the pick and pop.
Aldridge is an excellent post scorer, scoring 0.94 points per possession, good for 70.0th percentile league-wide. When Aldridge tried to beat Valanciunas in the post, he encountered difficulty. Here Aldridge tried to back down Valanciunas and failed miserably. The man is unmoveable. Aldridge settled for a difficult, contested turnaround.
This play was particularly impressive. Valanciunas stayed with the ostensibly-quicker player on an up-and-under, which is a move that has burned JV in the past. This time, JV stayed vertical while keeping a low center of gravity, enabling him to move with Aldridge and deny a clear shot at the rim. Notice his awesome synchronized point towards the Raps’ end of the court with the ref: damn right it’s our ball!
Clearly, Aldridge wasn’t having any luck beating Valanciunas with his jumper or in the post. Perhaps, Aldridge thought, he might be able to drive by the monster? Perhaps not, said Valanciunas, as he blocked Aldridge’s layup attempt:
Valanciunas did his post work early, often denying Aldridge good position well before the ball even hit the Spur’s hands. His activity allowed him to deny an entry pass:
This was indicative of Valanciunas’ incredible level of activity all game. He hustled out to contest jumpers that he – in years past – would just allow:
He hustled back in transition to fight multiple Spurs for a rebound:
Clearly he walked away with the ball. This game was a statement for Valanciunas. LaMarcus Aldridge is a talented volume scorer from virtually every area on the floor. He is a killer shooter from the midrange and capable from behind the arc. He has a polished post-game and is quick enough to drive by most defenders with the size to contest his shot. None of that mattered.
Valanciunas is faster on defence than I’ve seen him, but his strength is also a weapon. He is able to legally use his massive frame to slow his opponents without using his hands, and he has improved immeasurably at contesting shots vertically, without fouling or selling out the farm for the block. He doesn’t gamble himself out of position on contests at the rim, and he simply eats glass when shots go up. He carves out position early, doesn’t jump unless he needs to, boxes out, and uses his giant ham hands to tip balls multiple times until he has possession.
All this is to say: Valanciunas is a useful weapon, one of many for the Raptors. He isn’t an elite defender, as he often fails to provide multiple-effort contests, simply willing to fight for rebounding position that often never matters, as opponents’ shots fall without enough resistance. He found the right balance against San Antonio. Perhaps in another game, Aldridge would have hit more of his jumpshots, which would have rendered Valanciunas’ efforts moot. That’s the nature of basketball, in that even perfect defence will be beaten a high percentage of the time.
But Valanciunas over the past 1-2 months has been competitive on defence. This makes him playable in more game situations, especially as his offence in the post and on the roll is critically important to the Raptors’ offensive gameplan. His defence never needed to be a strength, but it simply had to be playable. In some situations, such as against players like DeMarcus Cousins or Aldridge, Valanciunas is more than playable; he is the only defender on the team capable of providing resistance.
Jonas began the season as many fans and media members` preferred trading chip. The Raptors themselves have for years – according only to media sources, as Masai Ujiri runs his ship like the British Empire during WWII – shopped Valanciunas so as to duck the luxury tax. They failed to trade him, if reports are to be believed, because there is no trade market for centers, and because the Raps were unwilling to attach an asset to the young big to help grease the trade wheels.
Nearing the 2018 trade deadline, the Raptors seem unlikely to trade Valanciunas. Nobody on the roster can provide the same number of skills as can the Lithuanian big, which makes him a valuable rotation player. For the first time in years, Valanciunas is no longer a lightning rod. Critics can no longer attack his defensive shortcomings, and devotees can no longer complain about Casey’s misuse of the talented center. Valanciunas is no longer a mirror for fan debates. Perhaps instead, we can all simply see him as himself: a giant man who makes awesome jokes off the court and helps win games on it.
