The Toronto Raptors could use some stability, an organizing principle. All good teams have some version of it.
For years the Raptors orbited around Kyle Lowry and DeMar DeRozan, and it worked really well, with five straight playoff appearances, a run to the Eastern Conference Finals in 2016 and 59-win season in 2017-18.
They won a title with Kawhi Leonard as their focal point in 2018-19, and they were on pace for 60-wins during the pandemic-shortened 2019-20 year playing an agreed upon up-tempo, ball-sharing style that meant more than any single player.
Subsequently, they were a team built around Fred VanVleet and Pascal Siakam, with mixed results, most recently a disappointing 41-41 season that ended with a loss in the play-in tournament. And now VanVleet has left in free agency and Pascal Siakam has been prominent in off-season trade speculation.
It follows that what form the Raptors take as they head into 2022-23 remains up in the air.
Head coach Darko Rajakovic has yet to coach his first NBA game and in the absence of VanVleet, the Raptors have added veteran journeyman guard Dennis Schroder to replace him along with Jalen McDaniels, a rangy, 6-foot-10 defender. Neither are considered reliable perimeter shooters, but the Raptors – one of the poorer shooting teams in the NBA the past two seasons – are used to that.
But Toronto will at least have a centre they can rely on, something that had been missing for multiple seasons and the benefits of which were demonstrated when the team finished strongly with Jakob Poeltl starting after the one-time Raptor was acquired at the trade deadline in February.
On Thursday Toronto made official the singing of Poeltl to a four-year contract widely reported as worth $80 million with a player option for the 2026-27 season.
Poeltl re-signing avoided the worst-case scenario Toronto was facing as free agency approached: the possibility that both VanVleet and Poeltl – who the Raptors traded a top-6 protected 2024 first-round pick and two second-round picks to the San Antonio Spurs to acquire – would leave for no return in free agency.
Was it possible that Poeltl could have joined VanVleet in Texas, albeit returning to San Antonio, who had plenty of cap space and the potential need for an experienced centre who could take the load of No.1 pick Victor Wembanyama?
“San Antonio was definitely a team on my radar,” Poeltl — who played four-and-a-half seasons for the Spurs after Toronto, who had drafted Poeltl 9th overall in 2016, traded him as part of the deal to acquire Kawhi Leonard in the summer of 2018 — told reporters at a media conference in Toronto on Thursday. “There were some conversations. We always had an understanding where I think they were really happy with my time there and I was really happy with my time there, but at the end of the day, just with the way this team is set up right now and the outlook, especially for the next couple of years, I felt like this would have been a better fit for me which is why I ended up coming back here.”
The Raptors are thrilled to have him and view him as a crucial part of a team that can win and win big. It’s why the Raptors zigged at the trade deadline and made the trade for Poeltl (after trying and falling short at the trade deadline in 2022) when many expected them to zag and sell off their some of their top players as part of a rebuild they have been loath to undertake.
“With Jak, I know a lot of people questioned what we were trying to do at the trade deadline. But to explain it again, the way the NBA is situated now is there is a lot of parity in the league. You don’t necessarily have to tear down your team to build it back up,” Raptors president Masai Ujiri said at his end-of-season press conference in April. “I understand the draft and I think there are ways that we can get into there. I think we have the abilities to draft well but getting a top 10 centre in the league that I think fits with our team in terms of a lot of the things we needed to address — No. 1 being selfishness; No. 2 I think Jakob has a lot of high basketball IQ and he’s a pass-first centre. I call players like that a championship piece because you can put him on any of the teams [in the playoffs]— except the one’s that already have great centres — but you can put a player like that on that team and he fits in right away.”
He certainly seemed to fill a need for the Raptors, who went 15-10 down the stretch with Poeltl starting as he averaged 13.1 points, 9.1 rebounds, 2.2 assists, 1.1 blocks and 1.2 steals while shooting 62.8 per cent from the floor in 27 minutes per game.
“I mean, listen, he gives us a little bit in a lot of areas,” said former Raptors head coach Nick Nurse early in Poeltl’s return. “I think he strengthens our IQ, I think he strengthens our toughness, our rebounding, our rim protection, our screen setting. You know, there’s a lot of little things he does that any team would like to have and he certainly helps us.”
The Raptors new head coach, Rajakovic, agrees.
“I talked to Jakob the other day and he’s excited to build something special,” Rajakovic said after the Raptors Summer League team practiced in Las Vegas Thursday. “He’s a player who does a really great job of protecting the rim. He does a great job on the defensive end but also I want to use him in more different ways, putting the ball in his hands and making him more of a decision maker.”
The hope is that the Raptors can pick up where they left off, even with the change at point guard.
Poeltl and VanVleet were one of the better pick-and-roll combinations in the NBA late in the as they combined for 1.34 points per possession when the big Austrian centre screened from the crafty point guard.
Did VanVleet’s departure a factor in his decision to return?
“I was talking to Fred obviously, neither of us really knew going into [free agency]what was going to happen,” he said. “There were definitely some options for the both of us and obviously I would have liked to keep playing with Fred like, he’s definitely a big part of my success here in Toronto as well. I feel like we really, we created some good chemistry here.
“But I mean, that’s the NBA,” the seven-year veteran said. “Like you’re gonna have free agency, you’re gonna have trades, you’re gonna have changes mid-season, and you’re just gonna have to roll with the punches.
“And I think we still have a really talented team like we have some really good point guard replacements already. I’m not really too worried about it. Yeah, and I think, really, going into this analysis is going to make more sense once the season actually starts.”
In that respect, Poeltl couldn’t be more on point. It’s like a lot of things in an off-season where the Raptors future is till unfolding. But at least with Poeltl back and under contract, they have one thing they can rely on, which is no small thing.
