There are seven minutes remaining in the Toronto Raptors’ game against the Charlotte Hornets. Jamal Shead is on the floor. He is a reserve, but with RJ Barrett out injured, Darko Rajakovic has been turning to his bench point guard more and more often in high-leverage situations. And in this one, Shead seizes the reins of the offence. He plays a two-man game with Brandon Ingram, gets off the ball early to give his superstar scorer a chance to dance, and then relocates a few feet further to draw the defence away from Ingram.
Ingram though doesn’t want a monologue and whirs the ball to Shead for a triple. Shead, 1-of-4 for triples to that point in the game, doesn’t want it. But rather than slowing down the pace, he baseball passes directly back to Ingram, who even unbeknownst to the star himself is now in perfect position for a 3-on-2 situation beneath the free-throw line. I had to double-check the screen to make sure it wasn’t Scottie Barnes who threw the pass. There are few players in the league indeed who throw those passes so quickly. Shead has joined their ranks.
Shead has been a revelation for the Raptors this season. Coming into the year, he was the only bench player who wouldn’t have another player with whom to compete for rotation minutes. It’s not clear he entirely earned that trust as the uncontested backup point; last season, he had the second-worst on/off differential on the team among rotation players. He showed promise and was something of a fan favourite, but a minutes winner he was not.
Yet this season he has not just been one of the best bench players on the team. He has been one of the best bench players in the entire league. He is third on the Raptors now in on/off differential and is second on the offensive end. The team hums with him on the floor. Much of that is because of his turbo first step and ability to jet wherever he wants to go. But that doesn’t lead to much scoring; it leads instead to him finding looks for teamates.
Shead is second in the whole league in assist-to-usage rate (behind only late-career Chris Paul, who has played half as many minutes as Shead), meaning he creates more assists with the touches given to him than virtually anyone in the league. Among moderate-frequency drivers, he leads the league in percentage of his drives that end up as passes.
He’s not just passing the ball. He’s passing it to devastating locations. He’s finding shooters, anticipating rotations, creating layups. The best passers don’t just give teammates the ball, don’t just give open teammates the ball. They give teammates the ball in situations and in ways in which they wouldn’t be open otherwise. And Shead has been doing that. He’s finding cutters, especially Sandro Mamukelashvili, from the corners.
This benefits everyone. When Shead plays, 69.0 percent of Barnes’ 2-pointers are assisted, versus just 49.4 percent when he’s on the bench. Virtually everyone’s usage goes up when alongside Shead — because he is so willing to let others score the actual points. Virtually everyone is scoring more per 100 possessions with Shead playing, with the bigs especially seeing their points per 100 possessions skyrocketing.
He’s pushing the pace in transition.
And, on occasion, he’s even creating layups for teammates as the primary creator on possessions.
To be fair, that last category of initiation is rare. The Raptors score 0.92 points per chance when Shead initiates out of the pick himself but 1.11 points per chance when he attacks a closeout. Shead has been a remarkably successful secondary creator, which is helpful for a team that has a number of successful wing initiators on it.
Shead’s value additions offensive are coming largely out of passing. As a scorer, Shead remains limited, though there are portents of improvement. He has shifted a huge share of his shots away from the short midrange, meaning he is relying far less on his floater this season. Some of those looks are going to the rim, but the majority of them have funneled to above-the-break triples. And he’s shooting 44 percent on above-the-break 3s. Which is really the only shot area in which he is above average when it comes to efficiency. Taking more layups and fewer floaters is good. But until he is efficient on any of those looks, he will live and die by the results of his jumper.
In fact, per Synergy, he is in the 30th percentile for frequency of his drives that reach the paint, and he is in the 6th percentile for frequency of drives that end up in his own rim attempts. Shead drives have simply not been dangerous in threatening Shead baskets. But they’ve been fantastic at creating baskets for Mamukelashvili, for Barnes, for Poeltl, for others.
As a result, the Raptors shoot 4.6 percent more shots at the rim with Shead playing versus on the bench, which leads the team. He may not be a terrific rim finisher himself, but his presence makes the team far better at scoring in that area. He assists 6.3 rim attempts per 100 possessions, which is a 93rd-percentile mark leaguewide. And the Raptors actually play less frequently in transition with Shead playing, but they are far more efficient when running in transition.
These are all the things that good point guards do. They impact the way the team plays beyond their own strengths and weaknesses as players. Shead has evolved from a subpar rotation player last season to a backup point guard who improves the team every time he touches the floor. That’s a remarkable leap.
Defensively, Shead remains a work in progress. He may have some highlight steals on occasion, and he is a premier illegal-screen baiter, but he still fouls too much, can give up blowbys, and takes poor angles in rotations and closeouts. He has had great moments of impressive point-of-attack defence. But he has also been party to his fair share of mistakes. I would call his defence to this point less than what was promised coming out of Houston. Guard defence in this modern NBA is remarkably difficult. The high points show that there a level which eh can reach that few point guards are able to get to. But he’s not there yet.
Regardless, he’s not a defensive sieve either. Everyone makes mistakes. Shead has more or less been a neutral defender for Toronto, though he could be much better in time. Combine that with his incredible offensive benefits, and the Raptors have found a gem in Shead.
After Shead’s pass to Ingram against the Hornets, the Raptors didn’t score despite Shead’s genius. Ingram threw the perfect pass to Ochai Agbaji, barrelling to the rim from the corner. But Agbaji couldn’t finish the play. Shead finished the game with just two assists and shot 1-of-6 from the field in Toronto’s first loss in weeks. As he goes, so too does the team these days. His off nights mean rough outings for the team, while his home runs mean the team romps to victory.
He joined the team drawing comparisons to players like Kyle Lowry and Fred VanVleet due to his size, position, and the aesthetics of his defence. But now he is truly starting to show impact like his predecessors. He clearly has an enormous way to go, and it is unreasonable to expect him to end up like those All Stars. But he has taken huge, huge strides this season. In Shead, the Raptors finally have their backup point guard of the future. And if he continues taking steps in his game, ‘backup point guard’ will be just another platform he’ll clear on his meteoric rise up the hierarchy of importance for these Raptors.
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