New TVs have terrible speakers. I spent a long time watching movies on a new, tinny-sounding television, not caring about the sound quality. Then I bought a cheap sound bar and marveled at the depth and range of the audio… for approximately the length of time it took to watch one movie. By the end, the new and great had become old hat once more. All this to say, it doesn’t take long for what’s new to become old once more.
The Toronto Raptors might be in that boat once again. Immediately after making the trade for Immanuel Quickley and RJ Barrett, the Raptors were more fun than a trampoline. Then, very quickly, they were good. They won their first two games after the trade. Now Toronto is, once again, not particularly good. They are now 3-5 since the trade with, yes, solutions to old problems — but also plenty of new problems, too.
And the Raptors actually played quite a solid game against the Boston Celtics.
Thad Young is not the most mobile defender, but he found his way into the game. He drew charges as the tagger by getting to his spot exceptionally early. He tipped away entry passes and dribbles for steals.
Darko Rajakovic also found impressive ways to improve Toronto’s defense. Defensive rebounding has been a huge problem in recent games without Jakob Poeltl (and playing lots of zone to protect undersized centers), and it has been made worse with Scottie Barnes having to guard smaller players and finding himself out of defensive rebounding position. Rajakovic addressed it pregame, and the switch was to match Barnes with Jayson Tatum rather than a guard, keeping him closer to the rim.
He finished with nine rebounds in the first half — more than he had in any single game since the trade. And in the second half, Toronto conceded the switch far less easily, with Barnes fighting through screens to stay with Tatum rather than picking up opposing smalls. Instead it was RJ Barrett often switching onto bigs, banging with Kristaps Porzingis and Al Horford for Toronto. Toronto finished with 52 rebounds, its most since before the trade. It held Boston to just five offensive rebounds.
Barrett cut and drove and danced his way to an efficient 24 points. Even God rested on the Sabbath, and so too did Barrett with a stinker against the Utah Jazz; he still bounced right back to perfection against the Celtics (excepting missed triples). He and Jontay Porter displayed exceptional screening chemistry, as Porter loves to flip screens, and Barrett loves to hold his potion to wait for the new angle before doubling back and keeping his man in jail.
“They go under, or they try to send me right, just flip the screen and go play,” explained Barrett.
“[Porter] finds a good angle, how to free up RJ, how to free up Quickley and what he does also is he’s setting those screens higher up the floor,” added Rajakovic. “When he does that it opens up just more room for all of those attacks.”
Eventually, Rajakovic found a very successful lineup with Barnes and Pascal Siakam sharing center duties. The defense played fast and forced turnovers, and Barnes and Quickley dusted defenders off the dribble on a spaced-out court. That was likely always going to be the team’s best lineup with Poeltl out — and likely for stretches even after he returns — and it is valuable that Toronto is gaining experience with small-ball lineups now that Quickley and Barrett are on the team.
But Toronto just didn’t have the juice. Jalen McDaniels, despite some nifty shot-making in the first half, didn’t help Toronto punch with Boston in the second. Chris Boucher couldn’t stick with Boston’s drivers in isolation and didn’t make shots the other way. Dennis Schroder didn’t find cracks in Boston’s enormous defensive back line through which he could score, at least not until a fourth-quarter comeback that came up short.
The team as a whole shot 4-of-32 from deep, which is just about a guaranteed loss in today’s NBA. If Siakam and Barrett and Boucher and Barnes and Schroder aren’t on above-their-career-average hot streaks from deep, the team still doesn’t have nearly enough shooting, even with Quickley on the court. And to prove Murphy’s Law, he shot poorly too in this one, just 2-of-7 from deep. (He really needs to get up more triples.)
Toronto’s starters all had their moments, but the team didn’t have the depth or the talent to punch with the best in the league. Especially missing Poeltl and Gary Trent jr. and Otto Porter jr. An enormous drought spanning the end of the third quarter and start of the fourth saw the Celtics take a large enough lead to make the rest of the game academic. The Raptors battled, and effort was certainly not an issue. They even used a full-court press late in the fourth to pull back within a few possessions before Derrick White knifed Toronto in the gut with a corner triple that Siakam couldn’t match on the ensuing offensive possession. Toronto lost, and it lost proudly, but it lost.
“We don’t really want a pat on the back for hanging around,” said Quickley after the game. “We want to be known for winning.”
Losing to the best is no great shame. But there was an important negative: Toronto’s two stars did not insert themselves into the offense with nearly enough consistency. Siakam and Barnes finished with 27 points combined, and both had fewer shot attempts than Quickley or Barrett. The hierarchy is not yet settled. While the new duo initiated plays, drove into the lane, and kept the chains moving, Barnes and Siakam frequently waited in the corners. Siakam got his touches flying around pindowns and dribbling into the lane, but he missed a number of midrange pull-ups and didn’t do enough to create better shots to supplement. Meanwhile, Barnes didn’t see much of the ball outside of transition, particularly not in the first half. The offensive load sharing requires some tweaks — and the team still looks like Siakam is not in the long-term plans.
And so Toronto may be more fun, because good offense is always more fun than paralyzingly bad offense, but it’s not a whole lot better than it was before the trade. At least not without Poeltl and key bench cogs. Still, fun is good. There is a future that makes sense, and that is good. Barnes found a pretty ideal guard pairing in Quickley, and that is good, too. Best of all, the team is trying hard now. But the roster is still unsettled, and it traded old problems for new ones. The Siakam question must be answered, and soon, either with an extension or with a trade.
A new sound bar is only exciting for as long as it takes you to forget the sound of the old speakers. Which can last for much less time than you’d think. And a new Raptors team is only fresh for as long as it takes you to forget the strange way the team has treated Siakam this season. Which might not take any time at all. There is certainly a future for Toronto, and it is very visible and enticing. But we’re not there yet.
