Toronto Raptors Exorcising Last Year's Demons and Wednesday NBA Takeaways
If you're reluctant to buy this year's Toronto Raptors as viable threats in the East, you're forgiven.
That's what they were supposed to be last year (and, for the most part, were) until a second-half collapse and postseason fold called their credentials into question. It was fair to strip them of the benefit of the doubt after all that.
Following a 103-99 home win over the East-leading Cleveland Cavaliers, though, it might be time to consider these Raptors afresh, to not hold last year's failures up as reasons to discredit this season's successes.
That's not to say Toronto is an entirely different team.
Kyle Lowry, for example, is still the same driving force he was a year ago, albeit slimmed down and (hopefully) capable of sustaining his star-quality production for a full season. He scored 27 points, handed out six assists and snatched four steals in 38 minutes, and his relentless drives to the hoop and dives on the floor propelled the Raptors in the second half against Cleveland.
Lowry has been phenomenal all year, and he'll get serious consideration for Player of the Month in November.
For some, like the National Post's Eric Koreen, he's already earned high honors:
With Lowry a constant, Toronto has made key changes around him—changes that make it easier to believe this year's Raptors can deliver on the promise they so briefly showed last season. DeMarre Carroll has provided the smart play and defensive versatility the Raps have long lacked on the wing, and he was instrumental in hassling LeBron James into a 6-of-16 shooting night.
LBJ still put up 24 points and delivered eight dimes, but there were more than a few one-on-one sequences against Carroll in which the Raptors small forward forced tough shots and turnovers. Put Carroll on the short list of opponents who can legitimately bother the East's best player.
Another new development: Bismack Biyombo in the starting lineup.
Pressed into starting duty because of Jonas Valanciunas' fractured left hand, the defensive-minded Biyombo logged 11 points and 12 rebounds. And while he didn't block a shot, his presence in the middle (and reputation as a premier rim-protector) was a factor in deterring drives.
Valanciunas is a big part of Toronto's future, but his inability to defend kept him on the bench for many fourth quarters last year. Biyombo gives Toronto a new, tougher look on D. And it's not crazy to suggest he'll represent an improvement—especially if his nonexistent offensive game leads to the Raptors moving the ball more and not dumping it on Valanciunas for post-up attempts.
And look: If you get past the constant of Lowry and the change of Carroll and Biyombo, there are more concrete reasons to buy these Raptors as a threat in the East. They've notched quality wins, according to Josh Lewenberg of TSN Sports:
It'll be tough to shake the disappointment that followed a torrid start last year, but maybe this version of the Raptors is poised for a steadier run and, hopefully, a better finish.
Jason Kidd Is Getting Fined
Book it.
You can't swat the ball out of the official's hand, berate him and generally make a scene without the NBA coming down hard—especially not after Atlanta Hawks coach Mike Budenholzer just incurred a $25,000 penalty for making contact with a referee.
Kidd lost it, and then his Milwaukee Bucks lost the game—a bad one, by the way, at home against a Sacramento Kings team missing DeMarcus Cousins.
Milwaukee's defense has been abysmal this year after ranking second in the NBA a season ago. Surrendering 129 big ones to the Kings is a terrifying sign, and it drives home the point that a young Bucks team so many thought was on the rise may be in for a step back this year.
A Little Wednesday History
According to Basketball-Reference.com, eight players in NBA history have matched or exceeded the 27 points, 13 assists, six rebounds and five steals Russell Westbrook amassed in a 110-99 win over the Brooklyn Nets on Wednesday.
Any guesses as to how many put up all those numbers in just 35 minutes on the court?
One: Westbrook.
The Oklahoma City Thunder still have to shore up a porous defense, figure out how best to genetically combine Andre Roberson and Anthony Morrow (thereby creating the best shooting guard in the league) and install something that resembles an offensive system.
But, man, are they good with Kevin Durant (30 points; ho-hum) and Westbrook healthy.
You probably already knew that.
The Wizards Are Freezing Themselves Out
If it's painful to lose a game by giving up 19 made threes, which the Washington Wizards did against the Indiana Pacers on Nov. 24, what does it feel like to surrender a 25-0 fourth-quarter run in a loss to the Charlotte Hornets the very next night?
Painful-er?
Washington went surface-of-Pluto frigid from the field at the wrong time, hitting just one of its 20 field-goal attempts in the fourth quarter. Charlotte outscored the punchless Wizards, 27-6, in the period, turning a good-sized third-quarter deficit into a laughable 101-87 win.
Wizards analyst Kyle Weidie captured the shocking nature of a drought that lasted almost 10 minutes of game time:
Credit the Hornets for heating up to secure their ninth win of the year behind a dramatically improved offense. After ranking 28th in scoring efficiency last season, they're comfortably in the top five through 15 games this year, per NBA.com.
The Wizards' struggles have come mostly on the defensive end this season, as they've failed to sustain the stopping power that helped them win 46 games a year ago. But now it seems the offense is slipping, too.
In an Eastern Conference boasting a bloated middle tier of at least a dozen playoff-worthy teams, declines on both ends aren't a great look. Washington has to find its footing on one end or the other...fast.
The Sixers: Comfortably Numb
So close, Sixers. So very close.
The Philadelphia 76ers scored just 33 points in the second half of an 84-80 loss to the Boston Celtics, frittering away what was easily their best chance to log that elusive first victory of the season.
They bucked the odds to stay winless, according to ESPN Stats & Info:
Head coach Brett Brown has seen his team drop an NBA-record 26 straight games dating back to last season, and he's doing everything he can to ignore the pain and focus on the process, per Derek Bodner of PhillyMag.com:
Saints wish they had Brown's patience.
All this losing is part of the plan, though, and the Sixers only get closer to those top lottery odds with every defeat. One potential problem is that the high picks they've already made don't work well with one another.
Coming into Wednesday's game, Jahlil Okafor and Nerlens Noel had logged 255 minutes together, posting a net rating of minus-25.9 points per 100 possessions, per NBA.com, nearly a dozen points worse than the Sixers' 30th-ranked rating overall.
Noel and Okafor make bad worse, and while both have clear value, it's probably time for Philly to scrap the idea of those two being compatible cornerstones.
Bright side: Philly can keep trotting them out together knowing it's the surest way to lose more games...and get another shot at the star it wants.
Clearly, We Know Nothing
The Detroit Pistons' 104-81 win over the Miami Heat served as a reminder that even though early-season signs can point strongly in one direction, every trend is subject to normalizing.
The Pistons came into the game with the league's second-worst offense, facing a Miami defense that had been better than anybody's through the first month of the year. You would have assumed that Detroit's abysmal long-range shooting and the Heat's stifling D meant a blowout was in order.
It was. Just not the kind most expected.
The Pistons hit a season-high 16 triples on 31 attempts, getting four long-range makes apiece from Reggie Jackson and Anthony Tolliver—a surprising outcome against a Heat unit that had defended the three extremely well coming in.
Except, again, it's early. Ethan Skolnick of the Miami Herald had it right:
Let's not overreact, though. Miami's defense looks legitimate, perhaps even good enough to make it a real threat to do playoff damage. And the Pistons' personnel just isn't outfitted to consistently knock down triples.
This game emphasized the fact that we're still at the point of the season where we've got a lot to learn.
Porzingis Snuffs Out Oladipo, Stokes Fires of Hope for NYK
Victor Oladipo took to his new bench role well, coming off the pine for the first time this year with some serious get-to-the-hole aggression. He made just five of his 15 field-goal tries but managed to get to the line 15 times in only 26 minutes.
Attack mode has its drawbacks, though, and Oladipo's first night as bench spark will mostly be remembered for the way the New York Knicks rookie/beam of light from heaven extinguished it.
This is a big deal for Kristaps Porzingis, who had six blocks and continues to prove he can impact games when his shot goes missing. A 3-of-13 night looks a lot better with highlights like that to go with eight rebounds and three assists as well.
Porzingis continues to show mobility, competitive instincts, raw skill and polish that so many expected would take years to arrive. He's as intriguing as any prospect in the league, and it really doesn't even matter that the Knicks lost this game by a final score of 100-91.
What matters is Porzingis keeps flashing new facets. Tune in next time—when, probably, he'll hit seven threes and log nine steals.
There's No Fixing the Rockets
Or at least it seems that way.
After firing Kevin McHale, the Houston Rockets have gone 1-3, with the latest defeat coming at the hands (paws?) of the Memphis Grizzlies on Wednesday, 102-93. They're now just 5-10 on the season, hitting double-digit losses on Nov. 25 after making it all the way to Jan. 2 before losing their 10th game in 2014-15.
Ty Lawson played fewer than three minutes in the first half and then sat the entire third and fourth quarter, proving the team's biggest offseason signing is now out of the rotation.
It's hard to pin this result on him, though. Houston was awful as a team, going without a field goal for the first 10 minutes of the fourth quarter and finishing with some horrid overall numbers, per Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle:
Worse still, James Harden's 40 points came in an isolation-heavy manner that seemed to sap the will of his teammates, per Kevin Pelton of ESPN.com:
This is bad. This is really bad.
Clippers and Jazz Headed in Opposite Directions
It feels redundant to follow the morose Rockets item with a similarly dour assessment of the Los Angeles Clippers’ ongoing devolution. But, hey, the facts are what they are. And right now, the Clips are capital-S struggling.
Blake Griffin hung 40 points on the Utah Jazz, needing only 23 shots to get there, but L.A. still fell by a final of 102-91 that actually made the result seem closer than it was. After falling behind by two in the first period, Utah outscored the Clips by two in the second, five in the third and six in the fourth.
The result was never in doubt down the stretch.
In addition to a general pall blanketing the team (seriously, nobody seems to be having fun), the Clippers simply couldn’t defend a Jazz offense that, to this point, hasn’t been all that potent. Yet there was Gordon Hayward putting up a tidy 33 points against a revolving group of Clippers wing defenders—Wesley Johnson got the start—who couldn’t contain him.
Los Angeles’ offseason overhaul was supposed to address the depth issues that plagued it during last year’s postseason breakdown. Instead, none of the new additions have adequately replaced the departed Matt Barnes' defense and three-point shooting.
But you know what: Let’s leave the Clips alone and credit the Jazz, who played phenomenal defense and re-established a few key points of their identity, per Ben Dowsett of SaltCityHoops.com:
After a brutal early schedule, Utah is headed in the right direction. So let’s focus on that instead of dissecting a Clippers team that’s starting to smell a little rotten.
Stats courtesy of NBA.com unless otherwise indicated. Current through games played Nov. 25.
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