How about those Raptors.
They didn’t miss a beat while I was on vacation did they? The Points Per Game blog returns today, after its first absence of the season owing to my being out of the country and will be in its normal place the morning after every Raptors game.
These have to be heady times for Raptors fans.
An intriguing piece by fivethirtyeight.com shed some light on how much of a high-water mark this post Rudy Gay period has been for the franchise. It’s easy to lose sight of it all and of course the playoff failures have a huge impact in underplaying the regular season success since Gay departed and the Knicks turned down a Kyle Lowry deal. I mentioned when the team traded for Lowry that he had a chance to be the second-best Raptor ever (it will take a lot of anyone to match what Vince Carter did) and that’s with all due respect to Chris Bosh, a fantastic player then and now. Not many shared that view. But Lowry had shown signs in Houston of being a potential two-way terror. Now that he’s added a deadly three-point shot and cut down on bad shot attempts and kind of formed like Voltron with DeMar DeRozan, it’s safe to say Lowry has now exceeded the expectations of Bryan Colangelo and Masai Ujiri. At times, particularly this season and early last year, he has been incredible. Not sure Lowry gets the appreciation he deserves for how well he has played.
That’s not to say DeRozan has been less than praise-worthy. He’s played the best basketball of his career and is a deserving all-star. He’s just not a top 10 NBA player like Lowry.
The trick now is sustaining this level of play (or at least approximating it) in the second half and finally leading the Raptors to at least one playoff series win.
Don’t look now, but Cleveland’s embarrassing effort against Golden State, coupled with Toronto’s tougher than it needed to be win Monday against the awful Brooklyn Nets left the Raptors just three games out of first place in the East. Will they finish first? Unlikely, but second or third is very much in play. The team has played a road-heavy schedule that gets more favourable from here and will be getting DeMarre Carroll back at some point, perhaps sooner than expected, as he talked about here.
Was good to hear that things aren’t as bad as they seemed. Had heard about some scarring and he mentioned inflammation.
- Thrilled that all-star voting is over. The process goes on a bit too long and takes over every broadcast and my Twitter feed.
If you’re asking, here’s who I would pick for the all-star game
EAST
LeBron James
Paul George
Jimmy Butler * I consider Butler a wing, he can play either position and has been a full-time SF in the past. He’s more of a SG now, but I think he deserves to start. If you need me to play by the rules, swap him with Paul Millsap.
Kyle Lowry
John Wall
DeMar DeRozan
Chris Bosh
Reggie Jackson
Andre Drummond
Carmelo Anthony
Paul Millsap
Isaiah Thomas
WEST
Stephen Curry
Russell Westbrook
Kevin Durant
Kawhi Leonard
Draymond Green
James Harden
Chris Paul
Klay Thompson
Dirk Nowitzki
DeMarcus Cousins
Tony Parker
Damian Lillard
Feels really weird leaving Anthony Davis off and Blake Griffin’s injury impacting my choices as well.
AROUND THE RIM
Was sad to hear about the death of Johnny Bach, the long-time Chicago Bulls assistant coach. While away, I read Phil Jackson’s recent book about all of his championships and on meditation and Bach was frequently mentioned. Tex Winter gets the credit for the triangle offence and how effective that was, but Bach doesn’t get enough credit for helping get the most out of Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen and Horace Grant, in particular.
By the way, Eleven Rings and The Breaks of the Game are two fantastic vacation reads on hoops and more.
Always loved watching Jordan doing the “Air Reverse” layup and that was quite the homage DeRozan did to the move against the Nets. The gang at Raptors Republic conveniently provided a clip of it.
Was strange to see James Johnson nail a couple of early three-pointers. He had hit only one in January before this and it was the sixth time in his career he has hit two in a game (he also hit three once). It was also the first time he has hit two in a game in either of his two stints with the Raptors.
Has Patrick Patterson turned things around? He’s hit eight of his past 15 three-point attempts over the previous three games and is up to 35% shooting for the season after being as low as 28%. He has hit at a .514 clip in eight games in January. Pretty timely too, since the team’s other primary three-point threat (aside from Lowry) is Terrence Ross, who is under 30% from three this month.