“Yes,” says Darko Rajakovic, before Toronto’s game against Cleveland. He doesn’t elaborate. He’s excited. He looks it. He’s smiling. The Raptors haven’t smiled much recently. The question was whether he was excited about new possibilities for this team’s playbook with the new additions. All he needed to say was yes.
After all, we’re all excited.
The crowd is excited. Immanuel Quickley and RJ Barrett get the biggest cheers of the night in the introduction. They are cheered virtually every time they touched the ball. It was the most excited Toronto’s crowd has been for years. Well, weeks. Feels like years. Rajakovic says after the game the juice the crowd gives the team. Specifically how the hometown kid love for Barrett invigorates them.
It doesn’t take Quickley long to validate the excitement for the newcomers. He waits in the corner while Barrett runs a pick and roll with Jakob Poeltl. He catches the ball, hits a triple. Seems normal? Not for the Raptors. A shooter you can trust? Whew.
It becomes much more tantalizing in a rapid flurry of events. Quickley pushes in transition, hits ahead to Pascal Siakam, who drives and finds Scottie Barnes for another corner triple. Quickley stays underneath a driver, attached, forcing an extended gather, which allows Poeltl to clear the shot away with a block. He runs his own pick and roll with Poeltl, forcing defenders to step high because of his shooting ability, and hits Poeltl with the pocket pass for the dunk.
He does all this in moments. It is in a blur, an instant of joy and awakening. Is this what watching basketball is supposed to be like? Fun? Is it supposed to be fun?
“Yes,” said Rajakovic. Yes indeed.
It is supposed to be fun. The Raptors score 41 points in the first quarter, the most of any first all season. It’s loud. The loudest it’s been in a while.
“I was coming here with teams in the past, and those arenas were rocking. We want to get back to that,” says Rajakovic when I asked him about it. He conceded this was the loudest the arena has been since he joined the Raptors.
Barrett, too. He cuts. He drives. He pushes in transition on consecutive possessions to force a timeout. He’s strong. He looks as strong as OG Anunoby. Surely he can’t be. But he looks it. The new home is good for him. Old home. But he fits in with fewer touches, finds the space to inject himself rather than take what he shouldn’t. The crowd loves him.
“This was special,” says Barrett, after the game. “Man, it meant a lot, y’know? It meant a lot. I’m the hometown kid and just coming in and trying to get a win for the fans. Trying to win for the country, it felt great.”
Quickley runs back in transition. He runs back as his teammate shoots. Does he know the Raptors don’t play transition defense? Maybe they do now. He sure does. But his teammates gather the offensive rebound, hit a triple before Quickley even crosses the half-court line to play offense again. He pumps his fist.
Poeltl catches the ball in the post. He has space, and he draws the defense, and the finds Quick in the corner. Can I call him Quick? I feel like I know him now. We can call him that. He’s a friend already. So Quick catches it in the corner. Pump fake. Drive. Floater. A sigh of relief, a breath of air, having a guard who can hit a floater. Not just hit it. Is consistent, is reliable from there. It’s good to have a reliable scorer from a conceded area of the court.
Siakam falls on the first play of the second half. Poeltl throws him an alley-oop, and he falls as he misses. His teammates run to pick him up. All of them. All. They all run to pick him up. This is new.
“I think that’s a part of who I am, how I was raised,” says Quick after the game. “Being a great teammate, being a leader any way you can. That’s what having a team is about. When your brother falls, pick him up. When he need encouragement, encourage him.”
It already was a new era, but now it’s really a new era.
An ugly possession. Jump passes thrown astray. Lobs thrown askew. Dribbles dribbled askance. The Raptors keep possession, somehow. Quick has the ball late clock. He gets the and-1 to fall, of course. He can do no wrong. It’s a lofting, twisting jumper that drips from the top of the glass onto the rim, into the net. He turns and high-fives fans in the crowd, waits for the kid to work up the courage to high-five him back. Made that kid’s night. His whole childhood, maybe. He high-fives his teammates, too. After his own makes. After his teammates’ makes. During timeouts and breaks in play. On the bench. Have the Raptors high-fived each other at all this year? He looks happy. He plays happy. The Raptors needed an infusion of joy like soy needs garlic. Quick is joy in a long, bursty package who can shoot besides.
It extends to moments without the new players. Barnes and Siakam are in transition, Barnes throws a touch pass to Siakam for the dunk, and he dunks it. Really dunks it. Hangs on the rim, tries to tear it down, just a little. He leaps for blocks, monster blocks. He doesn’t get them, but he’s really trying out there for the monster play.
Poeltl is a mammoth inside. Remember when he was outplayed in successive games by far worse centers? Yeah, me neither. He’s too big this time. Too strong. Cleveland guards Siakam with Jarrett Allen, so Poeltl sees forwards. He posts-up, plows through a smaller man for the and-1. Turns, flexes. Looks happy for the first time in a long time.
The Raptors commit a turnover, and Barrett sprints back, shouting, pointing, calling out coverages. The Raptors get the stop, he runs down and draws free throws. He finishes with eight, a boon for the team with the 26th-ranked free throw rate. The Cavs make a little run, so he hits a triple. He won’t always hit his triple, bu– fuck it, maybe he will. Dream big.
Maybe the new guys are too excited for their new team, new opportunities. They both foul a lot, four apiece in the first three quarters. The Cavaliers come back as they sit. There’s tangible tension in the arena as the Cavaliers come back. The crowd quiets, angsty like teens at a dance with no partner.
The Cavaliers are hitting triples now. It’s a close game. When did it become close? Toronto’s offense is stalling out to nothing, actions grinding empty. Barrett forces a few in the post, drops one, draws free throws on the next. The Cavaliers keep making shots. Tough shots, then easy ones. It’s five. It’s three. Turnover. It’s one.
This is real tension. Previously a Raptors loss was nothing. They were already lost. Who would have hoped before? But now there’s hope. Losing now would be losing hope. That’s always worse.
Quickley isolates, hits a floater. He’s got this. Tough shot maker. A dog.
But the Cavaliers keep hitting. Triple after triple, contested, it doesn’t matter. They’re all falling.
But Quickley grabs a rebound, hits ahead to Barnes, who draws a foul, which waves off his layup. The crowd boos like they just found out Christmas was canceled. It’s changed to a clear-path foul, and oh, how they cheer. This crowd is invested. Siakam drives, and-1. Toronto leads. The de-fense chants ring out.
Your heart drops for the first time all season. Or rises. It’s aflutter, whichever way it’s going. You care about this game. Yes, said Rajakovic. It would be exciting. You’re in this game, can’t look away, transfixed. You care, ready to get hurt again. That’s fandom, already ready to dive back into the shallow end head first.
A Siakam post turnaround. Barnes drives and swoops through, pterodactyl, to curl his finger roll onto the other side of the rim. It’s enough. The Cavaliers miss some open 3s, and it’s enough. Barnes drops from the ceiling to steal a rebound in a crowd, is fouled. Heart up. Misses one. Heart down. Barrett closes it out with free throws. It’s enough to win. Barely.
For the first time, you care. For the first time, you’re excited. It feels new, like falling in love all over again. Scraping over the finish line is the best the Raptors have made you feel in weeks. Years. Yes, said Rajakovic. It’s exciting again.
