This week as our neighbors to the south give thanks, I want to extend a heartfelt thank you, to the wonderful folks who help me scrummage together a newsletter post on days where my brain is fresh out of ideas.
That’s right, it’s a mailbag! I put out the call on Bluesky and in the Sicko Den (aka, the Locked On Raptors Discord, which is fun, come hang out), and as promised, I’ve compiled the best 3 or 4 questions that came in. Here’s what you came up with today.
Andy, a smart ass on Bluesky, asks — Would you prefer 3 or 4? Looking forward to your answer.
I bet Andy, a dear internet pal who loves to cause a ruckus, didn’t think I could churn out a Raptors-related answer to his smarmy reply. Wrong!
In the spirit of the 30th anniversary celebrations of this year, let’s go for a walk down guy memory lane, and compile starting fives of Raptors who’ve worn the numbers 3 and 4 in franchise history. I’m spoiled for choice here, with 16 guys having worn the former, 10 the latter. Here are, in my estimation, the five best/coolest in each bucket.
#3: Kyle Lowry (way back in his first season in Toronto), Juan Dixon, Tracy Murray (in his second, less productive Raps stint), OG Anunoby & Loren Woods.
#4: Lorenzo Brown, Rondae Hollis-Jefferson, Scottie Barnes, Luis Scola & Chris Bosh
Because we’re not getting the full prime version Lowry, or the inaugural season version of Murray, who led the team in win shares, it feels like Team 4, led by a Hall-of-Famer and an All-Star, is the pick here. I think the fit of Team 3 might make up for the talent gap, though, and Team 4’s spacing could be rough. Ultimately, I don’t think I can really bet against Lowry at any stage of his Raptors career. While he wasn’t at his best in year one with the team, he was at his thickest, which has to count for something.
So to answer your question, Andy. I prefer 3.
GFalk86 in the Discord asks — Almost a year on from the RJ/IQ and OG/Precious trade, and following OG’s 40 point haul. Who do you think got the better deal?
What a roller coaster this has been throughout the year. At first, when OG was missing heavy time and about to get a gigantic bag, Barrett wasn’t missing and Quickley was adapting just fine to lead-guard duties, this felt like an absolute home run for Toronto.
At the present moment, however, it seems pretty inarguable that New York got the most impactful player in the deal. OG’s a veritable two-way monster, Barrett’s efficiency is waning, and Quickley’s barely played under his new pricey deal (which I still think is fine, by the way).
I still think in the long run this still goes down as a classic win-win for both teams. I remain a big believer in what a healthy IQ can do to unlock new horizons for this team, and Barrett’s play will even out once he’s back in the third option role he probably needs to occupy. Factor in the Raptors getting my prince Jonathan Mogbo with the pick the Knicks tossed in, and Precious Achiuwa still being Precious Achiuwa, and there’s no need to get up in arms about how things have worked out for the Raptors to this point.
It was a trade that needed to happen. The fit, the vibes, the everything was off with the team last year, and dealing OG, as much as they may spend the next 20 years trying to find a guy like that, was a necessary evil to kick start this new, exciting era of Raptors ball.
PK Lawton on Bluesky asks — I saw some dumb aggregator rank Toronto’s rookies “one month in” collectively as a C-. What would your class average be for our rookies, acknowledging that it is dumb to rank rookies one month into a season.
First off, stop reading aggregator sites! They’re a blight on the online NBA ecosystem and exist largely to elicit these kinds of reactions. Our question-asker has been duped!
If you’re ranking the Raptors’ rookies in the grand scheme of all rookies in the history of time, a C / C- maybe makes sense, because this rookie class on the whole is quite bad. Of course, that’s a silly way to do it, devoid of the context click-bait makers love to skip over.
Compared to the expectation tied to their draft slots, I don’t know how Jonathan Mogbo, Jamal Shead and Jamison Battle don’t end up somewhere in the B+ / A- range, especially Mogbo, who is a legit good NBA defender well before any 22-year-old has a right to be. Ja’Kobe Walter is more of an incomplete, and Ulrich Chomche’s flashed all you could want as a teen playing against men with the 905. Tally it all up, and this rookie class is no worse than a B, and probably closer to an A- considering the Raptors may have found up to four rotation-level players without a pick in the Top-18.
—
Today on the podcast, I’m joined by the Stats Queen of Raptors internet, Keerthika Uthayakumar, to run through some small sample numbers from the Raptors’ first 18 games and sort out what’s sustainable, and what isn’t. Enjoy the show!
