Raptors are 3-2, pretty good outcome considering who they played and the injuries they’ve already endured. I yammered this week. So you’re getting Three Things and a few tidbits.
Let’s roll.
1. Clutch Boys
I know I know, it’s early yada yada yada. Small sample size, yada yada yada. Just let me rejoice. Let us all rejoice.
Games have been tight for the Raptors. The first four included “clutch minutes” – a lead of five points or less with five minutes or less left in the game.
Clutch as a data point requires high-volumes of input, for sure. There’s so much variance and arbitrariness with 5 minutes versus 5:05 minutes, or being down 7 and hitting a huge shot versus being down 5 and the same shot. Without a long view, we’re not necessarily able to pinpoint who is or is not clutch.
Case in point, OG is 3/3 from the field with one three-pointer in his clutch minutes this year. That fails to include a trey he bombed in the Miami game at the 5:10 mark – ten seconds before “clutch” is considered clutch – when the game was tied.
Still, our [us fans] long view spans seasons upon seasons. Pascal Siakam, in that time, was unfairly purported as unclutch. Thus, in the few clutch minutes he’s played this season, Pascal deserves his due.
As of Thursday, of players who have played at least 2 clutch games and 4 clutch minutes, Pascal was 5th in total clutch points on 57% shooting and 4th in assists with only 1 turnover.
Scoring in the clutch is difficult. The psychology of execution more precarious and the defences, like activated white blood cells, more inhospitable to the scoring virus. Throughout games, Pascal’s becoming unstoppable (PJ Tucker learned that most recently). Maintaining that, when all attention and expectation is upon him at the vital moments of a game, validates so much of what we’re seeing.
There’s a sense of confidence Pascal wields now. One, that I, as an observer, also feel as time ticks down and the ball finds Pascal’s hands. I still have the nerves. Like a mother bird nudging her hatchling into the sky. I want him to succeed so badly, but should he fail when it counts, the haters will attempt a return to their pulpits of irrational blasphemy.
My nerves are milder now: I both believe the doubters’ recourse becomes less potent by the day and that Pascal’s likelier to succeed than ever before.
We saw that most clearly against Miami, on Monday. For the majority of the game, Pascal struggled. Until the 4th quarter, he was 4/15 with 2 assists. Then, playing the final 12 minutes of the quarter (fatigue is unquestionably also a factor) he went 3/7 with 4 assists – including this game-closing fadeaway even after missing his previous two shots.
I did say boy(s) in the title. Shoutout to Raptors clutch D.
Of players who have played at least 3 clutch games and at least 2 clutch minutes the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th players in defensive rating (out of roughly 45 players) are: Precious, Freddy, Pascal, Gary, and O.G.
Woosh.
2. O.G. Blockage
I’ve nitpicked a lot of O.G.’s offence lately. Probably, unfairly so. I blame my high expectations. Samson has cautioned us all to temper them.
Offensively, Anunoby is a tantalizing mix of overwhelming advantages gained by strength and undone by balance issues. He is a bull in a china shop that racks up endless offensive fouls but still maintains a 40-percent 3-point touch and finesses crisp live-dribble reads to his teammates. He gets two feet in the paint to shift the defense, and then he falls over.
O.G. Anunoby’s game is a Rorschach test
This is all true. I will HAPPILY take what O.G. is giving us over what he has failed to provide. I will also add something Samson didn’t mention in his concluding tirade: O.G.’s failure to protect the ball in high-percentage opportunity areas.
In five games, O.G. has already had 5 of his 18 shots within 5 feet of the hoop blocked (28% of those shots). For comparison, league leaders in blocked attempts, Zion Williamson and Kevin Porter Jr., have had 7/51 attempts within 5 feet and 4/28 blocked respectively.
Getting blocked is sometimes just bad luck. Better defence overcoming solid offence. Still, looking at O.G., he’s clearly struggling to do the right thing at the right time. The concern being that this is nothing new; last year, 35 of O.G.’s 224 shots within 5 feet were blocked (16%).
There’s three general reasons for O.G. getting blocked or stripped. One, lack of balance (we’ve talked about this a lot, and I’ll not go into it). Two, poor ball protection, exemplified by the two clips below.
In the first clip from exhibition, Marcus Smart may have fouled O.G. Regardless, you’ll see how the ball is low and extended out from his body, ripe for a strip. Instead, like protecting a rebound, O.G. needs to keep the ball high and close to his chest – something bigs learn early in development, guards less so – as he powers up for the finish.
In the second clip, O.G. leads with his shoulder leaving the ball to the side. Strus reads and avoids O.G.’s attempt for contact and has an easy swipe at the ball. The ideal, if O.G. is to lead with his shoulder, is to spin off the point of contact and finish to his right. Or, O.G. could Euro step over and through to his right swinging the ball high and tight or pro-hop, corral the ball, and go up.
Much of the poor ball protection stems from lack of control. The two are part and parcel. Still, there are underlying fundamentals O.G. can work on to ensure that when he is in traffic the ball is not so vulnerable.
The third reason for O.G.’s at-rim foibles, which also factors into the ball protection challenge, is his inability to analyze situations quickly while on the move.
A founding feature of O.G.’s game is his power, which he uses to blast up and through dudes. That doesn’t always work. Particularly, when O.G. is not in a position to leverage his strength – like in a double team or in the air or rampaging rimward. O.G. needs to both recognize those situations and adapt.
O.G gets the pass with Strus in his field of vision. Yet, once he turns around and faces Tyler Herro’s helpside, it’s as though O.G. forgot Strus exists, or, perhaps, he’s undaunted by his presence. Either way, he’s buried too deep to rise up over both defenders. The correct play would have been to never dribble and loft a quick floater, or drop a pass to Precious or zap a baseline skipper to Gary.
O.G. slips by Caris LeVert (good for him!). As O.G. gallops downhill, however, two very large men converge upon him. At the point of lifting off, O.G. faces both Jarrett Allen Consulting and Dean Wade LLP at the rim with LeVert right on his hip. Precious is wide open. I get that O.G. is probably giddy as all Hell burning LeVert, but he has to recognize his lack of invincibility and bail on the attack for the wiser play.
All of this is easier to say and advise in retrospect. These plays happen extremely fast; I even had to rewatch the footage multiple times before figuring out what the right play was. That said, this is what differentiates the elite: making the right decisions in fractional moments.
There was a time when Pascal was doing everything right but for final execution. O.G. is on a similar progression. More and more, he’s getting where he wants to go, now he just has to make the right decision once there.
3. Ill Tidings
Not to kibosh the catharsis of being 3-2 after five hard-fought games – however, cathartic that might be – or anything. But something to be wary of.
One of the reasons Toronto’s been so competitive has been its three-point shooting. They’re, essentially, 3rd in percentage alongside Charlotte, Cleveland, and Dallas. That must feel weird to read, recalling that threes were harder to come by than a perfectly ripe avocado (Raps were 20th last year).
That’s mostly thanks to being 2nd in the league in catch + shoot three point percentage (46% on 121 attempts). To add to the, huh? Toronto 3-point experience, the Raptors are in the bottom 3rd in wide-open 3-point attempts taken, but 2nd in shooting percentage (49%!!!) and are 10th in “open” threes taken and 3rd in percentage.
You can look at that one of two ways. Either, they’ve been lucky hitting as many threes as they have despite the lack of volume and it’s like to drop. Or, mayhaps, there’s a world where attempts increase compensating for a subsidence in accuracy and maintaining a level of success.
Regardless, 46% is a variance most certainly to regress. It’s just way too high (1st place last year was 39%). When you combine that with the Raptors poor shooting percentage at the rim and their reliance on transition points (you’re probably experiencing déjà vu right about now; no, this isn’t a Christopher Nolan plot) premonitions of trouble are abound.
We saw in the preseason how stagnant and lifeless this team’s offence can look when shooting vanishes. That’s true for most teams – cough cough, Lakers. The anomalous success from three, thus far, does get my Spidey Senses tingling. And while I do believe this team is better equipped than last year to adjust to sudden three-point fragility (Otto Porter Jr. should also bolster it some), we should all brace for the eventuality of normality.
TIDBITS
BOUCHÉRBUT
Welcome back, Boucci Baby. In two games since Boucher’s return Toronto’s bench scoring went from 29th in the league (19.7) to 27th (25.5). (Also, correlatively, Thaddeus Young two DNPs in those same two games [eyeball emoji]).
We’ll take it!
Boucci is also 4/6 from three so far. Honestly, he gets anywhere near that rate along with his usual Junkyard-like contributions and this bench won’t be looking so bad after all…
…maybe…
Masailly
Goddamn, I’m still riled up.
We all know how this went down. We don’t even need to see the footage.
Koloko gets tackled for literally doing nothing other than trying to stand up.
Somehow, Koloko get’s ejected too.
(That’s just utter laziness by the referees. “Ennhhh fuckit, let’s toss’em both out.”)
Masai hears the ruling. Goes berserk. Charges from his back perch. Presses past the flapping assistant coaches and aides desperately trying to hold him back. Charges straight for the referees’ heads. And yells a mess of vulgar vernaculars their way in place of physical violence.
I love his loyalty to this team.
NEW MORTAL ENEMY
It’s refreshing, and extremely human, to find someone I can focus all my hatred towards. It allows me to be more empathetic to everyone else, even those who happen to grind my gears.
For that reason, thank you Tyler Herro for being, at least from where I’m sitting, a cocky, bratty, petulant, little shit. I thought him arrogant to begin with; whatever, you gotta have some swagger to hoop in the NBA.
But then, out of nowhere, he pulled the small-man mockery on Precious after an And-One, and then for good measure, stared him down hard and thick. Boyyyy did that get my blood boiling!
Precious is better than I, but maybe he knew to wait patiently. And when it came, vengeance was delectable. An And-One, this time on Herro’s head, returning the gesture in full.
I can’t WAIT until we play the Heat again.
