Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: The Raptors are struggling to find solutions to keep their head above water when Kyle Lowry goes to the bench. It’s an old story, and one that wasn’t really the case this season. This also isn’t going to be another Fred VanVleet piece, even though he’s a huge part of this story, because I already wrote that one earlier in the week. Fred is truly really important, and it’s a problem that he’s not available right now, but that’s not in and of itself a solution until he’s healthy, and solutions are what the Raptors need right now, especially heading into a game 6 on the road, where they’ve struggled so far in the series.
The Raptors were supposed to be the depth team in this series, and they haven’t been thus far. They’ve been winning the minutes given to their starting lineup, which has a +12.0 net rating, almost entirely against the Wizards stars, but is only currently playing just over 18 minutes per game in the series. There’s an argument to be made that one of the easiest paths to improvement for the Raptors is an increase in minutes here, finding ways to get OG Anunoby and Jonas Valanciunas, who have played the least from that unit, more with DeMar DeRozan, Lowry and Serge Ibaka, and trying to take advantage of a lineup that’s scoring effectively. However, in the two games in Washington, the starters maintained their offense but fell off defensively, and lost their minutes, with just a -0.5 net rating. As well, they can’t simply play all of the minutes, so there has to be solutions outside of this.
Unsurprisingly, Lowry and the Bench has also been solid for the Raptors, with a +2 net rating in 16 minutes thus far in the series. Not fantastic numbers, and they need to be better on the offensive end, where they have just a 39.7% eFG%, but the defense has been good enough to keep their heads above water and that’s what you really need from other lineups as long as the starters are this good, which they should be able to maintain in this series, at the least. Eleven of those sixteen minutes came in the two losses in Washington, and this lineup was even more impressive defensively in that small sample size, with a +18.7 net rating.(the only Raptors lineup to play more than 5 minutes in Washington and have a positive net rating)
The problem comes when, eventually, Kyle Lowry has to go to the bench, because he’s not going to play all 48 minutes, and the Raptors need to not fall apart completely during his rest.
Aside from his on/off differential, which currently sits at +36.4 for the series, the next best Raptor has been Jonas Valanciunas, at +32.1. For Jonas, the vast majority of those minutes have come with the starting lineup, with him having played 79% of his minutes thus far in the series with that group, and Jonas has been somewhat limited by both some early foul trouble in a couple of games, as well as by the team’s seaming unwillingness to play him large minutes, whether due to conditioning or matchups that they prefer isn’t clear, but that doesn’t seem poised to change anytime soon. So, for the moment, Jonas will be effective, but probably won’t provide much of a solution to the minutes Lowry is on the bench and doesn’t really help with this particular problem, in this series.
The full bench lineup, with Norman Powell in the place of Fred Van Vleet’s normal minutes, has played just 14 minutes in the series, and looked extremely rough in their first stints. The numbers on the other hand don’t mind this group, with a +9.5 net rating in the 14 minutes so far. Small sample size caveats obviously apply here, as with most of these lineups, because a playoff series is inherently a small sample size and we just aren’t going to have proper data sets to always be sure, outside of looking at the season as a whole. It’s still not unreasonable to have concerns about the sustainability of these numbers, as Norm isn’t a natural fit as a replacement for Fred, but this is probably worth using a little bit more at least while they remain a positive, as they’ve found success on the offensive end, something which is rare without Lowry on the floor against Washington.
The big issue for the Raptors, however, currently sits when Lowry heads to the bench and DeRozan remains on the floor. Although DeMar has been unquestionably very good in the series, he’s struggled without his All-Star counterpart, and they haven’t been able to find fits around him. While the totality of the minutes that Lowry has sat sits at a -26.4 net rating, the sample size when Delon Wright is on the court and neither All-Star is, which allows the removal of garbage minutes, at least to some extent, sits at -9.3 net rating, still not good, but a slower bleed, which might be acceptable as long as the Raptors win the minutes Lowry is on the court by a large enough margin. To contrast, when Lowry is resting and DeMar remains on the floor, the team has a -38.4 net rating, and DeMar’s own offense suffers mightily. His assist ratio drops to 8% from 16.4% alongside Kyle, and his effective field goal rate also drops from 52.9% to 38.9%, while his usage climbs from 31.9% to 46.3%.
There are legitimate reasons that parts of this might not be DeMar’s fault. Him and Delon Wright aren’t natural fits beside each other, as they both prefer to attack off the dribble rather than taking shots created by others for them, and Pascal Siakam and Jakob Poeltl are limited, if capable, offensive players who rely on the offensive created around them affording them easier looks where they can capitalize on a defense not fully focused on them. In theory, those opportunities should be there for this lineup, with the attention given to drives from DeRozan and Wright, the dump-off passes to their big men should assist the offense in creating seams and, possibly, even open things up for DeMar and Delon. At the same time, if Delon maintains his willingness to shoot from game 5, that will also help here. To some extent though, in order for the Raptors to survive these minutes, it has to come down to DeMar making those same decisions he’s learned to make with the starting lineup, trusting his teammates and not trying to force his own offense, as this is where the DeMar of years past has shown up the most in this series, and when the Raptors allow their role players to be ignored on offense, it closes the space off for their stars.
If all else fails though, at least until the return of Fred VanVleet, the answer for the Raptors might simply have to be more. More minutes for the starters, to capitalize on the effectiveness of Jonas Valanciunas, more minutes for OG Anunoby, who has been one of the best players off-ball for the Raptors in this series, and more minutes for Kyle Lowry, if he can handle them without wearing down and reducing his own effectiveness, because the Raptors just aren’t the same team without him, at least in this series.
