What/Who will have the biggest impact this season?

[allintheeyes]

7) mid-season DeRozan trade

[LJ2]

By biggest impact, I mean greatest positive influence on our win-totals (i.e. no room for negativity here!). Make sure to support your opinions with subjective commentary

1) Demarre Carrol at the 3
2) Kyle Lowry's Weight Loss
3) Jonas Valunciunas Maturing
4) DeMar DeRozan's Incremental Improvements
5) Patterson's Healthy Ankles (w.r.t. Amir Johnson)
6) Dwane Casey (now that he has more defensive-minded players)

1) Lowry - In shape and ready. Rare to see someone make such dramatic strides to both their game and to their body so late into their career. Says a lot of how motivated he is.

2) Luis Scola (if he starts) - It's been a long time since we've had someone with his type of post offence at PF. He could be used at C for stretches of games.

3) Demarre Carrol & T. Ross - I'm looking for Ross to have a rebound year with a simplified role of just defending and shooting the 3 ball. Not expecting Korver or Reddick levels of shooting or Tony Allen level of defense, but something between, and more importantly something reliable.

[DDelight]

I'm changing my mind from Carroll to Lowry/DeMar. At the end of the day we have the same coach and therefore similar to last season if Lowry/DeMar play well, the team will play well. If they play bad, the team will be bad. They're still going to have the bulk of the control on how the offense is run. If the offense doesn't effectively utilize JV/Carroll who are going to need Lowry/DeMar to facilitate the offense and get them the ball in optimal positions on the court, then their impact will be null.

Defensively though, Carroll out there will be a huge bonus.

[Just Is]

Casey's still our coach so the pick is Lowry.

If the ACs do a majority of the heavy lifting; it's a combination of Lowry, Carroll and JV.

[Snooch]

I think its a combination of 3 guys.

Lowry, JV and Carroll.

Those three together(at least right now on paper) should all play off of each other incredibly well on both sides of the court.

[Marz]

I think bench scoring will be better this year than last...or maybe I should say bench +-. GV and Lou could light it up but also put the light out with their defense. Raps are in better shape this year.

If Casey doesn't do hockey lineups, our bench players can provide additional defense while one of our offensive-minded starters stay on the court. One can hope...

[DogeLover1234]

My hope is that an improved JV will ease lowrys load in the regular season so he can stay fresh for the playoffs (which will be easier with his improved physical shape). Having said that i think that Carroll will be the guy who sets us up to succeed in the playoffs because he is one of the top few perimeter defenders in the east, which is nice against the likes of lebron, butler, wade, beal, george, johnson and the probable rise of guys like Giannis, Jabari, tobias harris, dipo, etc. we havent been well equipt to deal with them until now really and i tgink that will be the difference.

[Puffer]

..I am worried about bench scoring

I think bench scoring will be better this year than last...or maybe I should say bench +-. GV and Lou could light it up but also put the light out with their defense. Raps are in better shape this year.

[rightsideup]

Interesting thread.
I think a healthy Lowry is the one I would pick out of the poll options
Hard choice good insights to consider
I am worried about bench scoring

[SkywalkerAC]

It's going to be all of these things combining to give us the best season we've had as a franchise.

[Wild-ling#1]

Why do I kept on reading "masturbation of JV"...

Maybe you should write to him.

[DDelight]

If Lowry were to play like he did for those couple of months before January, then definitely Lowry. However, quite frankly, I don't think the way Lowry played in those 2 months was ever going to be sustainable...so I think the answer is ultimately DeMarre Carroll.

His defense + DeMar/Kyle's ability to drive and kick to him is really going to make it harder on the other team to defend us. Lord knows, last season the drive and kick game to a struggling Ross, GV, and at times PPat at the 3 did nothing for us.

[distorsun]

7. New assistant coaches New systems implemented.

By biggest impact, I mean greatest positive influence on our win-totals (i.e. no room for negativity here!). Make sure to support your opinions with subjective commentary

1) Demarre Carrol at the 3
2) Kyle Lowry's Weight Loss
3) Jonas Valunciunas Maturing
4) DeMar DeRozan's Incremental Improvements
5) Patterson's Healthy Ankles (w.r.t. Amir Johnson)
6) Dwane Casey (now that he has more defensive-minded players)

[draps]

It could honestly be anybody
-Healthy Kyle
-Demar taking that next step shooting more 3s, and getting to the rack better with Patterson spreading the floor
-having a real 3 in Carroll
- jv if he can jump to around a still very efficient 17 ppg
One of these things will for sure improve us I think though

[jerome]

Why do I kept on reading "masturbation of JV"...