The Boston Celtics beat the Toronto Raptors 126–114 on the shoulders of Jayson Tatum’s 40-point effort. The Celtics were short handed, mind you, with Marcus Smart and Kemba Walker sidelined due to injury. The Raptors’ season record is 2-6 as of January 10 — ranking them 13th in the Eastern Conference.
It’s time to panic, right?
Well, it really depends on how you look at it. The season is early. The ball is round, and all the other clichés about early predictions still apply. However, based on the preconditions heading into this season, two rough but logical scenarios arise.
Scenario one: trust the process
I realize that “Trust the Process” is patented by Joel Embiid and the Philadelphia 76ers, but hear me out. This is the shortest turnaround in Raptors’ history: they lost former Defensive Player of the Year Marc Gasol and rim-protector Serge Ibaka — though admittedly his block numbers have fallen precipitously since his days in Oklahoma — and their former assistant coach Nate Bjorken, who is currently finding success as the head coach of the Indiana Pacers.
As a team that prides itself on high-effort and hard-nosed defense, there will be natural growing pains that come with the loss of stalwart defenders like Ibaka and Gasol. The latter provided the ever-underrated and intangible service of post and top-of-the-key playmaking for the Raptors. On top of this was the loss of Bjorken, one of Raptors coach Nick Nurse’s top lieutenants, as well as a short offseason to get acquainted. This is not to excuse a 2-6 start, but it wasn’t going to be particularly pretty.
However, former NBA champion and reigning Coach of the Year Nurse has done enough to earn the benefit of the doubt. Adjustments need to and will be made — say, for example, playing and developing rookie Malachi Flynn, reducing Stanley Johnson’s minutes, letting Chris Boucher start over Aron Baynes, and further staggering the minutes of Fred VanVleet and Kyle Lowry.
The bright core of OG Anunoby and Pascal Siakam, with the help of VanVleet and the wily Lowry, should be enough to make a run at the middle bottom of the eight Eastern Conference seeds. This assumption is made with the knowledge that the Milwaukee Bucks, Brooklyn Nets, 76ers, and Celtics are the cream of the crop.
So, despite the start of the season, it would not be far-fetched to posit that the overall talent in coaching and personnel will result in, at the very least, a semi-competitive team once they settle into the new norm.
The question is: do they want to?
Scenario two: back to the future
On the inverse, with a poor start to the season and veteran guard Lowry in the last year of his contract, perhaps it may be time to cash in the chips, so to speak.
It is probably wildly unpopular for me even to suggest it, but if the Raptors do choose to stray away from a semi-competitive, mediocre limbo, trading Lowry to a contender during the trade deadline for assets could be instrumental for a rebuild. This both clears salary for a big-ticket free agent in the coming offseason and allows the Raptors a potentially poor record for a reportedly good draft.
What makes this season’s predictions so special is that, while you may disagree with my analysis and method, the Raptors are undoubtedly at a crossroads. The season thus far has been quite strange and will probably only get stranger. So, we’ll wait and see.
