OG in the spotlight | Siakam getting love | McKechnie manages his way to a new load of job responsibility (sorry)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0V8harKrxT4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nD4PxE1Pwqo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d3nmk0yMzsk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AP5OUH-ld5Q
OG Anunoby in the last two games: 6 blocks, 6 steals pic.twitter.com/GcP33cPrtr
— William Lou (@william_lou) October 29, 2019
1 of 1 exclusive from The Boy @Drake. #WeTheNorth pic.twitter.com/GFTTvkag5f
— Toronto Raptors (@Raptors) October 29, 2019
The Raptors have promoted Alex McKechnie — who developed the Load Management concept Kawhi Leonard popularized last season in Toronto –to vice president of player health and awarded him a contract extension
— Marc Stein (@TheSteinLine) October 29, 2019
Inside Raptors’ Pascal Siakam’s Evolution – Sports Illustrated
Siakam doesn’t have any deep explanation for his improvement. He just works. “I had to shoot [three’s] in the NBA and I didn’t have to shoot them in college,” Siakam said. “I think that’s a big difference. Then just the hours, spending more hours doing it and I think as I continue to spend hours doing it, I continue to get better.”
Indeed. Weir isn’t shocked. He saw the potential in Siakam in college. The fast reflexes. The quick feet. The tireless work ethic. Once, Siakam went into Weir’s office looking for a basketball book. Weir gave him one, a 400-page missive with chapters on ex-Bulls boss Jerry Krause and former UNC coach Dean Smith. Days later, Siakam was back, asking for another one. Said Wier, “He was dying to soak up knowledge and develop and grow.”
For Nick Nurse, “there wasn’t an a-ha moment” with Siakam. The Raptors coach remembers in Siakam’s second year, the wiry forward started showing flashes. “There were several things he started doing that were interesting,” Nurse said. “Probably the most interesting thing was he started snapping rebounds down and taking it coast to coast and making plays. Not just scoring it but making plays and the right plays and that was putting a lot of pressure on defenses.” Last season, Nurse’s first as head coach, he emphasized Siakam as a point forward.
Said Siakam: “Having more freedom to bring the ball up and have the ball in my hands, just trusting me with the ball, that was one of the big things. My rookie year, I didn’t have that. Just having that trust in me, just working and them seeing that I’m getting better at it, that I’m capable, that was kind of like a changing point for me.”
Siakam is expected to compete for an All-Star spot this season. If the Raptors—17-5 without Leonard last season—play well, he could be a darkhorse candidate for MVP. That’s everything Toronto could have hoped when they rewarded Siakam with a four-year, $130 million contract extension earlier this month. The Raptors are not a title contender, but that they are as good as they are is largely due to Siakam, an understudy to an All-NBA talent last season with a chance to become one in this one.
Raptors Podcast: Siakam and Anunoby off to flying starts – Yahoo!
Host William Lou is joined by Alex Wong to break down the Raptors’ promising start to the 2019-2020 season.
- Pascal Siakam as a No. 1 option
- OG Anunoby showing signs of a breakout season
- Kyle Lowry is still in his prime
- What to make of Fred VanVleet
- Who is the weak link?
- Twitter questions
Raptors’ OG Anunoby showing signs of a promising shutdown defender – Sportsnet.ca
“We’re just trying to pressure the ball, and he’s getting really good at that, at getting his body on people,” said Raptors coach Nick Nurse. “He’s locked in, he’s pressuring. They’re trying to take it multiple dribbles right in front of him and he poked his hand in there a few times last night and knocked it away from them.”
But it isn’t just Anunoby’s defence that’s impressed thus far, offensively, he looks to be taking another leap as well averaging 12.3 points and shooting a scorching 43.8 per cent from deep and 53.8 per cent from the field overall.
His strong shooting percentages have been a testament of the kind of shots he takes. As this shot chart below demonstrates, Anunoby is about as analytically sound offensively as they come as he only attempts either three-pointers or looks in the paint.
All of Artest – better known as Metta World Peace, of course – Pippen, Leonard and Green also threatened on the offensive end nearly as much as they caused havoc defensively. Anunoby looks to be reaching that level right now.
Raptors’ Anunoby flashing elite defensive potential early this season – TSN.ca
In just over 34 minutes per contest – a 14-minute increase from last season – he’s averaging 12.3 points (up from 7.0) and 7.3 rebounds (up from 2.9) while shooting 54 per cent from the field (up from 45) and 44 per cent from three-point range (up from 33).
“Certainly he’s done great work physically on his body,” said head coach Nick Nurse. “He’s moving great, jumping great, etc. I think he’s got a really refreshed mindset as well. He looks to be really happy out on the floor. I mean he’s not out there giggling and laughing and stuff but he’s playing with a sense of ‘man, I really want to play and I’m really gonna make good plays and I’m really gonna play hard and I’m gonna play the right way.’ ”
Anunoby spent the first few weeks of the summer getting his strength and conditioning back following the emergency appendectomy that cost him his entire postseason and 15 pounds in the recovery process. Once he felt like himself again he really focused on growing his game.
The early results have been encouraging. His jump shot looks more consistent and compact than it did last year and he’s shown an improved ability to react when the defence closes out on him, either by swinging the ball or putting it on the floor and getting to the rim.
Still, his best work has come on the defensive end, where he’s always possessed elite potential.
Whose Raptors Team Is It Anyway: Pascal Siakam and Kyle Lowry share the torch – Raptors HQ
This comes down, as it will in most weeks, to Kyle Lowry and Pascal Siakam. OG Anunoby has been the Raptors’ best defender and has been efficient offensively, but he’s only playing a bit part on the offensive end. Fred VanVleet has been good, but inconsistent, in his larger role; shooting well from deep and orchestrating the offense better than he has in past years, while still being limited by his size as an interior scorer. Meanwhile, Siakam and Lowry have stepped into their new roles as the Raptors’ first and second options respectively, and both have been consistently excellent.
Siakam is going through an adjustment period. He’s skilled enough, though, that even in his adjustment period he’s thriving. Through the opening four games of the Raptors’ season Siakam has run a 32 percent usage rate (for those unaware, that means he’s finishing 32 percent of the Raptors’ possessions when he’s on the floor), a ludicrous increase on the 20.8 percent usage he ran last year. Despite this jump in usage he’s still been incredibly efficient, keeping his True Shooting Percentage above 60 percent, largely as a result of the improved jumper he’s showcased. Siakam has rocketed past expectations, he’s been phenomenal.
But he’s still going through an adjustment period. Siakam has had some issues with his new offensive responsibilities that have manifested in predictable ways. He’s become much more turnover prone, running a negative assist-to-turnover ratio, clearly unused to some of his new playmaking responsibilities. Those additional playmaking responsibilities have also made Siakam much more prone to offensive fouls than he’s been in the past. That doesn’t just mean turnovers, it means foul-trouble, and in the case of opening night it meant he fouled of the game.
We arrive at two words: load management. While the final final outcome of the Kawhi Leonard saga in Toronto was perhaps not what we here in the city wanted, it was McKechnie’s work behind the scenes — work Kawhi credited more than once — that kept the team’s superstar happy throughout the season as they climbed all the way to the 2019 NBA championship. If nothing else, we’ll have McKechnie to thank in part for keeping Kawhi healthy enough to crush one playoff foe after another.
So that does it. McKechnie’s place in Toronto is now secure for the immediate future. And if anyone else on the team needs some special, out-of-the-box medical treatment, it feels certain that he’ll be the man to come up with and administer it.
In a star-driven league, you do not want to become known as a team that just uses up its players and tosses them aside when they are no longer of value. Under Tom Thibodeau, the Bulls gained a reputation for pushing primary players like Luol Deng, Joakim Noah and Jimmy Butler too hard. The Bulls have not been a major player in free agency since. Meanwhile, the Suns became a more attractive organization last decade when word got out about how their training staff dealt with Steve Nash’s persistent back problems. For a while, the Suns became the place where veteran players went to resurrect their careers, often at a discounted price. From ages 35-38, Grant Hill played at least 70 games in four consecutive seasons, after not reaching that mark in any of the previous seven seasons.
Ultimately, money and winning generally carry the day when chasing free agents. It is not necessarily fair to say that the Bulls struggled to land free agents because of their negative reputation in terms of prioritizing health. But in this climate, being adept at keeping players on the floor — and knowing when to rest them — is a major boon.
“It’s an honour to work with him. He’s a legend,” said OG Anunoby, who worked with McKechnie closely as he came back from an emergency appendectomy on the eve of last year’s playoffs. “He’s probably the best, he’s for sure the best at what he does. He’s real detail-oriented, he focuses on the little things, stuff I wouldn’t even think about he’s telling me to focus on, and it makes a difference.”
When asked what McKechnie did differently during Anunoby’s recovery last year, the Raptors forward mentioned how he accentuated the importance of core strength, back strength and hip mobility, giving Anunoby a firm plan on how to get back on the floor. Anunoby’s appendix had burst, causing a longer recovery than usual, but he was cleared to play in the NBA Finals. By then, the Raptors had established a rhythm and rotation, and re-introducing a second-year role player into a series featuring the most competitive basketball in the world never seemed like it was in the cards.
“I instantly trusted him because of his reputation, but then over the years, working with him every summer, he’s earned it,” Anunoby said.
Raptors’ load management guru earns promotion and extension | Toronto Sun
Load management became synonymous with Leonard as McKechnie mapped out a year of activity for Leonard that saw him play 60 of the 82 regular-season games but then all 24 games in the victorious playoff run.
McKechnie loves to talk as Norm Powell kindly put it yesterday but publicly or on the record with media he prefers to remain silent so it wasn’t exactly a shock when the Raptors’ public relations team confirmed he would not be speaking on this personally rewarding day for him.
Instead the talking was left to the men whose care he oversees and head coach Nick Nurse who admittedly gladly leaves the decision of can player X play or not tonight in the capable hands of McKechnie.
“We’re fortunate we have him (here)” Nurse said Wednesday. “There’s no gut reactions or gut feelings, it’s the science of can the guy play or can they not? And when he tells me they can I feel 100% I can play them and when he tells me they can’t there’s no debate. So it’s really cool. And his job is to keep the players out there on the floor as much as possible and if he doesn’t I can’t do my job.”
Nurse says he and McKechnie have a real good working relationship.
“You never know when injuries are coming, but you can try to maximize energy, and sometimes that means resting guys,” Nurse said. “That’s a combination of nutrition and sleep and getting off the court a little bit etc. My main concern is that these guys are ready to go at 7:30 when the ball goes up.”
McKechnie is instrumental in maximizing the Raptors efficiency at that.
Raptors reward load management guru Alex McKechnie with extension, promotion | The Star
McKechnie most recently worked his magic on Kawhi Leonard during the Raptors’ championship run last season. Leonard arrived in Toronto as a player with just nine games under his belt the previous season. He left with the Larry O’Brien Trophy, remaining healthy through the rigours of a long season thanks in large part because of a 60-game regular season imposed by McKechnie.
“He’s for sure the best at what he does,” Raptors forward OG Anunoby said. “He’s real detail-oriented, he focuses on the little things, stuff I wouldn’t even think about he’s telling me to focus on, and it makes a difference.”
Raptors head coach Nick Nurse said he doesn’t poke his nose into McKechnie’s department. When he tells the coach a player is ready to go, Nurse knows he can feel “100 per cent” about the decision because it’s rooted in science.
McKechnie did not speak after Tuesday’s announcement but, in an appearance on the local soccer podcast Footy Prime earlier this month, he touched on last season.
“Last year was incredible,” said McKechnie, who spent years working in Canadian soccer and consulting for the Vancouver Canucks before he made the move to the NBA. “From a personal standpoint, one of the most challenging years I’ve had professionally and without question one of the most rewarding.”
McKechnie tries to take a proactive approach to treating athletes, setting players up on preventative programs that include sleep management, travel management and diet. Everything is about recovery, he said, even if that means taking a game off.
“What (the Raptors championship) did, it reinforced what I was I doing,” Casey told Michael Lee of The Athletic earlier this month. “And that group took it over the hump and finished it. The foundation, what we were building, how I was building it, was good. Running the same offence, same defence, same philosophy, same things we built there for seven years, so it enthused me. I was happy for the players, for the country and the team. It really energized me, that what we were doing was right. I took that with it, more than jealousy.”
More than jealousy, sure, but maybe not wholly free of jealousy, which is only human. If Casey and DeMar DeRozan and Jonas Valanciunas were nothing but unconditionally happy for their ex-colleagues after they had spent years in Toronto as key pieces of the program, they wouldn’t be competitors. All of them helped define an era in franchise history. It couldn’t have been easy to watch from a distance as the franchise made history.
So as much as there are those connected to the franchise who have whispered condemnations for what they’ve seen as Casey’s post-championship show of bitterness, it’s hard not to appreciate a consummate battler for being real.
“I wasn’t there to see it through fruition but you can’t take away the numbers and what we accomplished. Again, it’s not a championship. But I don’t know if we were really ready or built for a championship with that group,” Casey told Lee. “They had to add (Marc) Gasol, and Danny Green and Kawhi to that foundation that was there, to go ahead. That’s what I want to do (in Detroit).”
Maybe the urge for such accounting stems from a hard truth. When it comes to doling out credit for NBA success, coaches don’t always find themselves near the top of the list.
Q&A: Vince Carter on battling Allen Iverson, his biggest “what ifs” and what he told Zion | NBA.com
What was it like going head-to-head against Allen Iverson in that legendary 2001 playoff series?
Going against him brought the best out of me. As far as that playoff series, it was probably one of the best in my career. I remember Game 1 just having to be sharp. I knew I had to bring it after obviously playing him in the season. I think he lit us up for 50 a couple times. So I knew what to expect. I didn’t have to be out of character, but I had to play well. I was the center of attention for [the Raptors] as he was for the Sixers. I knew I had to score, and that didn’t mean going shot for shot, point for point. Couldn’t do that. Allen Iverson is Allen Iverson.
So if he scored 55, 56, I just needed to be solid to where we could win. I think I had 42 the first game, a good night. When he scored 54 going into Game 2, my response was that we couldn’t get too far behind on this team. [Both teams] felt like the winner of that series could go to The Finals. No disrespect to Milwaukee. (Editor’s note: Carter scored 35 in Game 1, but responded to Iverson’s 54 points in Game 2 with a 50-point game in Game 3.)
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