Everything 2021-2022 Season

[golden]

Watching the Heat game.... Lowry getting everybody eeeeeasy buckets. What a contrast from our stuck-in-the-mud offense.

[MixxAOR]

Watching the Heat game.... Lowry getting everybody eeeeeasy buckets. What a contrast from our stuck-in-the-mud offense.

Kyle made Freddie look better lol

[slaw]

The offense has been stuck in the mud for the last 2 seasons. It was stuck with Lowry and without him. The style doesn't accord to the players or their strengths. Nothing will be different this season. Lots of standing around and lots of threes.

[inthepaint]

The offense has been stuck in the mud for the last 2 seasons. It was stuck with Lowry and without him. The style doesn't accord to the players or their strengths. Nothing will be different this season. Lots of standing around and lots of threes.

There will be several winning streaks and losing streaks like every year, but I said before pre-season: this team will likely end around .500. It's a promising, but raw group, and ultimately that's not a terrible place to be 2 years after a championship. They got a lot of runway ahead.

That could change for the better this year though, if they (a) find a natural scorer, and/or (b) start developing a Siakam/Barnes pick and roll where they BOTH improve their 3pt shot and alternate handling and rolling. Siakam iso's vs set defences and end-of-the clock logo shots from Fred won't take us anywhere.

We need a bread-and-butter go-to solution in the half court, especially now with Lowry gone. If they find it this year, they will be over .500 and make the playoffs. If they don't, they should focus on addressing precisely that on the next draft.

[TrueTorontoFan]

There will be several winning streaks and losing streaks like every year, but I said before pre-season: this team will likely end around .500. It's a promising, but raw group, and ultimately that's not a terrible place to be 2 years after a championship. They got a lot of runway ahead.

That could change for the better this year though, if they (a) find a natural scorer, and/or (b) start developing a Siakam/Barnes pick and roll where they BOTH improve their 3pt shot and alternate handling and rolling. Siakam iso's vs set defences and end-of-the clock logo shots from Fred won't take us anywhere.

We need a bread-and-butter go-to solution in the half court, especially now with Lowry gone. If they find it this year, they will be over .500 and make the playoffs. If they don't, they should focus on addressing precisely that on the next draft.

I agree 500 ball is where we are... but that is still outside of the play-in game. It is some where between 5-6

[slaw]

There will be several winning streaks and losing streaks like every year, but I said before pre-season: this team will likely end around .500. It's a promising, but raw group, and ultimately that's not a terrible place to be 2 years after a championship. They got a lot of runway ahead.

That could change for the better this year though, if they (a) find a natural scorer, and/or (b) start developing a Siakam/Barnes pick and roll where they BOTH improve their 3pt shot and alternate handling and rolling. Siakam iso's vs set defences and end-of-the clock logo shots from Fred won't take us anywhere.

We need a bread-and-butter go-to solution in the half court, especially now with Lowry gone. If they find it this year, they will be over .500 and make the playoffs. If they don't, they should focus on addressing precisely that on the next draft.

The head coach thinks the first bolded part is the solution to the second bolded part. The personnel isn't the biggest issue. The biggest issue is that the offensive philosophy sucks and the tactics suck. Unless and until that changes, this will be a middling offense moving in the wrong direction.

As for the team record, too early to tell for me. Need Siakam back as well. Will know more 30 games in or so.

[MixxAOR]

The head coach thinks the first bolded part is the solution to the second bolded part. The personnel isn't the biggest issue. The biggest issue is that the offensive philosophy sucks and the tactics suck. Unless and until that changes, this will be a middling offense moving in the wrong direction.

As for the team record, too early to tell for me. Need Siakam back as well. Will know more 30 games in or so.

Siakam isolated more times than Durant. That just shouldn't happen

[TrueTorontoFan]

Siakam isolated more times than Durant. That just shouldn't happen

Siakam did just fine. We haven't seen him with OG this season yet so I am not sure what is the issue there.

I also think I have to agree. Nurse is trying stuff right now but if we are honest the offensive schemes aren't the best. The guys are either not passing fast enough on to rollers, or its part of the scheme. Fred did that several times. We do not and have not ever really run enough pick and roll.

It could be that he wants to implement that over time and focus on the defensive principals but yeah we have clear cut deficiencies on this team. First is we have an offensive deficiency ESPECIALLY with Pascal out.

[golden]

The head coach thinks the first bolded part is the solution to the second bolded part. The personnel isn't the biggest issue. The biggest issue is that the offensive philosophy sucks and the tactics suck. Unless and until that changes, this will be a middling offense moving in the wrong direction.

As for the team record, too early to tell for me. Need Siakam back as well. Will know more 30 games in or so.

The core philosophy is giving the players the responsibility to read & react on the fly to what they are seeing the defense giving them each possession. In Theory, that is supposed to make your offense more un-predictable and harder to game-plan in the playoffs and high-leverage moments.

In Reality, most players tend to fall back into repetitive habits based on their talent ceiling & limitations, which makes them even more predictable than if the coach was calling every play - especially in high pressure situations.

The intangible positive of this philosophy is that the players feel trusted by the coach. It builds confidence and they have more freedom and room to expand/develop their games, so it builds strong buy-in from your top players and gets them paid. Now, like anything else, that works a lot better when you're winning.

[LJ2]

Why are we making these judgements off two preseason games? Games where we've had more new players learning the system than we've had vets that are familiar with it. New guys are learning, old guys are adjusting to playing without Lowry and everyone is just starting to shake off the rust after the summer layoff and lack of meaningful play time. It's going to take a minimum of 10-15 games after Siakam gets back to get a clear picture of how good/bad this team is and if the offense or defensive schemes are working or not.

Next step if figuring out the starters/rotation. They've got a long ways to go before showing the best version of themselves.

[slaw]

The core philosophy is giving the players the responsibility to read & react on the fly to what they are seeing the defense giving them each possession. In Theory, that is supposed to make your offense more un-predictable and harder to game-plan in the playoffs and high-leverage moments.

In Reality, most players tend to fall back into repetitive habits based on their talent ceiling & limitations, which makes them even more predictable than if the coach was calling every play - especially in high pressure situations.

The intangible positive of this philosophy is that the players feel trusted by the coach. It builds confidence and they have more freedom and room to expand/develop their games, so it builds strong buy-in from your top players and gets them paid. Now, like anything else, that works a lot better when you're winning.

I appreciate what they are trying to do but the lack of structure has been exposed as a big weakness and it more often looks unsure, unsteady, repetitive and slow than confident, assured, unpredictable and adaptable.

And the lack of structure would not be as big of an issue if the tactics were sensible and effective but everything is totally reliant on Fred and Pascal doing all the work while the other 3-4 guys stand around and watch, waiting to jack up threes. When someone else does get involved, it's basically just their turn to isolate one-on-one. Then you have the insistence on forcing square pegs into round holes and refusing to concede when it isn't working (Siakam vs. Boston for instance).

[S.R.]

The offense has been stuck in the mud for the last 2 seasons. It was stuck with Lowry and without him. The style doesn't accord to the players or their strengths. Nothing will be different this season. Lots of standing around and lots of threes.

Team doesn't have an elite one on one player to break those moments and control game flow as needed, also they don't put a lot of pressure on the rim on drives.

[Dvdvideo]

The idea of Lowry leading anything on any other team seems like sacrilege at this point. He should refusee to play and demand a trade back.

[S.R.]

Why are we making these judgements off two preseason games? Games where we've had more new players learning the system than we've had vets that are familiar with it. New guys are learning, old guys are adjusting to playing without Lowry and everyone is just starting to shake off the rust after the summer layoff and lack of meaningful play time. It's going to take a minimum of 10-15 games after Siakam gets back to get a clear picture of how good/bad this team is and if the offense or defensive schemes are working or not.

Next step if figuring out the starters/rotation. They've got a long ways to go before showing the best version of themselves.

This roster has just undergone A LOT of transition and has gotten significantly younger and less experienced. Forget a couple preseason games, it's going to take half the year for some of this to gel and it's years before some of these guys peak.

Really looking forward to the panic-induced fire sale threads after each 3 game losing streak /s

[KeonClark]

Assuming good health, I have the Raptors at 45-37, around 4 to 7 in competitive East. This team is not much worse than the 60 win pace from 2 years ago, you're essentially swapping Lowry and Powell for Dragic and Trent (down a few wins there), Gasol/Ibaka for Birch/Achiuwa (down a few wins there), and then swapping end of bench guys Mccaw, Hollis Jefferson and Terrence Davis for Scottie Barnes, Flynn and Chris Boucher. Up a win or 2 there.


All in all, people are thinking WAY too hard about last year, which could honestly be crumpled up and tossed in the trash for evidence of who this team is. Even if you average last teams disaster situation (30 wins) and the year before more normal setting (60 wins), You end up back at 45 wins.