The new-look Toronto Raptors finally take their show on the road this week after being able to workshop their material almost exclusively in the friendly confines of Scotiabank Arena for the first two-plus weeks of the NBA season.
The initial reviews are overwhelmingly positive. Not only are the Raptors 7-1 (6-0 at home), but they’ve shown signs that they can be a dominant team. They rank fifth in scoring (117 points a game) and fourth in opponents’ field goal percentage (42.2) and in six games with Kawhi Leonard in the line-up they’re even better on both sides of the ball.
But no team has played more home games in October than the Raptors and that script flips in November as nine of their 15 starts will be on the road.
What will we learn as the Raptors hit the bricks? Here are five things to look for as they skip town for four games beginning Friday night in Phoenix, with stops in Los Angeles to play the LeBrons on Sunday, followed by Utah Monday and then Sacramento next Wednesday:
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1. How many games will Kawhi Leonard play, and which one(s) will he miss?
As swimmingly as the early days of the Kawhi Leonard era have gone (he is the only player in the NBA averaging at least 27.3 points, 7.8 rebounds and two steals with a true shooting percentage of .610 or better. Translation? He’s on track for an MVP-type season), his health and availability will be an ongoing story, given he’s already been sat for the road portion of two back-to-back sets.
It will be interesting to see if Leonard plays against Utah on Monday night following what will be an intensely scrutinized Sunday evening showing in Los Angeles. Or maybe he’ll troll the whole NBA and skip out on a showdown against LeBron — a year out from free agency — on Sunday to play in Utah Monday? As Raptors head coach Nick Nurse has said about Leonard’s ‘load-management situation’ — “It’s fluid.”
Leonard sounds like he’s open to playing in back-to-backs as a rule — “I enjoy the back-to-back games, feels like your body is already going, the second game you already played last night and you’re just ready to go” — but has been around long enough to understand the merits of taking it slowly as he gets back to full speed after missing 73 games last season.
“[I] just don’t want to overdo it too early since I missed out on a year. It’s just injury prevention, so just not playing back-to-backs for right now,” he said Thursday before the team left for Arizona. “You want to play, but I’ve been through the league long enough to know where the important games are, and that’s April, May and June.”
The Utah game would be the last of three in four nights and require a long flight to Salt Lake and then back to Sacramento. Will Leonard play in Utah? Will he even travel to Utah? Or will his ‘load management’ involve him putting his feet up in LA for a couple of days?
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2. Is Deandre Ayton the new Joel Embiid?
The big Bahamian has done a convincing impersonation as a proper No.1-overall pick in his first seven games with the Phoenix Suns. It’s early, but he’s on pace to become the first rookie in NBA history to average 16 points, 10 rebounds and three assists while converting 60 per cent of his field goal attempts.
Concerns about Ayton’s defensive acumen/interest may be legitimate, given it seems odd that the Raptors six-foot-six wing Danny Green has twice as many blocks this season (eight) than Ayton. If Ayton proves to be a less-than-elite defender going forward, he’ll fit right in on the Suns, who are allowing 117 points per 100 possessions (28th in the NBA).
The Raptors catch a break of sorts in that the Suns’ high-scoring shooting guard, Devin Booker, remains out with a hamstring injury. It’s hard to know how much resistance the Suns will be able to put up in any case. There are dreams of a playoff spot after adding veteran role players Ryan Anderson and Trevor Ariza in the off-season, but the Western Conference is no place for a playoff team to get off to a 1-6 start as the Suns have.
It will be interesting to see what Nurse does with his centre rotation against Ayton and the high-paced Suns. Jonas Valanciunas’ minutes (18.3 compared with 22.4 last season) are down as he plays off the bench for the first time in his career but his production is not. On a per/36 basis his numbers are the best of his career and will put Valanciunas in the discussion for the Sixth Man award if they come anything close to the 26.9 points and 14.3 rebounds he’s generating on 53 per cent shooting so far.
3. Are the Los Angeles LeBrons a playoff team?
I think they will be, and the Raptors will be the last team on the planet to suggest that LeBron James can’t get an otherwise shaky team deep into the post-season. The young Lakers are 3-5 under James’ tutelage and bear some resemblance to the Cavs club he was able to get to the Eastern Conference Finals last year.
First off, James is still James. At age 34 he’s averaging 27.8 points, 8.6 rebounds and 8.0 assists on 51 per cent shooting, all of which are in line with his career averages or even a little better. The exception is his subpar three-point shooting (27.3 per cent through eight games) which will likely normalize as the season progresses. Like the Cavs of old, the new-look Lakers can score at their leisure — they are third in the NBA in scoring, averaging 121 points a game — but give away almost as many as they get, as their defensive rating of 112.4 is 23rd in the league. Not quite as porous as the Cavs were a year ago (and are again this year), but close.
One difference? While the Cavs successfully surrounded James with three-point marksmen, the Lakers are lacking in that area and are 19th in three-pointers made. Another factor working in the Raptors favour? Los Angeles plays in Portland on Saturday night so Toronto will be resting, waiting for them having had the day off after arriving from Phoenix, Hollywood distractions aside.
Los Angeles has had a challenging schedule in the early going and they will need to reel in some teams on the way to the post-season, but between the Lakers’ youth and the time it will take for James to get fully acclimated, I remain optimistic the Lakers will find their way.
4. What will the Raptors bench look like?
The backbone of the team a year ago as Toronto raced to 59 wins, getting steady, game-changing production from their reserves has been a minor area of concern through eight games. With Pascal Siakam elevated to the starting lineup, the second-unit has been without one of its key playmakers — that much was evident early on. But what wasn’t anticipated was how much uncertainty the bench has been playing through in the early stages.
Delon Wright strained his groin in the Raptors second-to-last exhibition game and didn’t return to the floor for two full weeks, when the Raptors hosted Minnesota, and that was just a cameo as it only revealed he wasn’t quite ready. He sat out another game and finally got a steady run of minutes in Toronto’s blowout loss to the Milwaukee Bucks on Monday – the only blemish on the season so far. Wright wasn’t great but it seemed to shake some rust off and he looked more his penetrating, ball-hawking self against Philadelphia on Tuesday — although he’s been minus-37 in his 32 minutes of floor time so far.
But just as Wright was returning to form, his backcourt partner with the ‘Bench Mob’ last year, Fred VanVleet went down with a strained big toe that kept him out for three games. And OG Anunoby — coming off the bench in Siakam’s spot — has been in and out of the lineup since training camp dealing with a personal matter at home in Missouri. All three are expected to be on the court together for just the first time this season over the course of the road trip and Nurse can’t wait:
“I think we’ve been fairly unhealthy here, right? Like, Fred and OG and Delon have hardly played for us this whole time … those are three really good players, and Fred and Delon kind of go together a little bit, so I think it’ll help us a lot. I think our second unit has been a little disjointed … I think it’ll help [to have] all of those guys to be back.”
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5. How scary can the Raptors be?
Before heading out on their road trip, the Raptors had a Halloween party at Casa Loma. Leonard went as a Navy Seal. Fitting, as Leonard has shown that he’s had the ability to slip behind enemy lines and wreak havoc almost at will on the defensive end, even as he’s still getting up to speed.
Apart from their blip against the Bucks, Toronto has held teams to under 42 per cent shooting in every game this year and it doesn’t even feel like they’ve scratched their potential, other than some periods when they’ve nearly shut other teams out for five and 10-minute chunks.
“I think we’ve had some really scary stretches [of solid defensive play] and I think it started in Montreal [in the Raptors second-to-last exhibition game] in that third quarter where we were just flying around,” said Nurse. “It looked like there was just nowhere to go for anybody and we were coming away with the ball in something like 11 straight possessions or something like that. And we had a few of those runs the other night as well. So just extending that out.
“I’m not silly enough to believe we’re going to play that way for 48 minutes or any of that kind of stuff [but] we’re going to try to extend that out over the course of the season. It’s early and, again, we keep interest level there and our excitement for doing those kind of things and understand that there’s moments where we’re going to have to play a little harder and call on that to carry us through some games.”
