TORONTO — Offensive precision wouldn’t necessarily have been used to describe RJ Barrett earlier in his NBA career.
Managing possessions was not exactly his thing. Barrett was more about using his confidence, will and physicality like a hammer to break the defence over and over again.
Sometimes it worked, but not always.
And over his still-young career, he’d developed a reputation, fairly or not, as someone who looked at offensive opportunities as something that came in volume.
Brandon Ingram said as much earlier this year, when asked who among his new teammates with the Raptors had surprised him. “I thought (Barrett) was just a gunner,” Ingram explained. “I thought he just shot the ball a lot. But watching his game and seeing him work … I’ve seen what he works on, and how it transfers to the game. And he’s steady, you know, scoring the basketball, on the defensive side, he’s aggressive. He’s a guy who doesn’t complain about not having a basketball. It just kind of attracts to him. He’s been showing me a lot … “
More and more, Barrett is showing everybody.
Seven games equal a small slice of an 82-game season, but Barrett has arguably been the most consistent among the Raptors starters and arguably the most effective in his role. Instead of a ball-dominant blunt object, he’s morphed increasingly into an off-ball ninja, capable of doing damage behind enemy lines before anyone can see him coming.
He was at it again in the Raptors’ 117-104 win over the visiting Memphis Grizzlies on Sunday night, as Barrett led Toronto with 27 points while adding six rebounds and six assists on 10-of-19 shooting.
The win improves the Raptors’ record to 3-4 after having lost four straight, with the team seemingly coming apart at the seams defensively. Wins over the short-handed Cleveland Cavaliers on Friday night and against the Grizzlies, which were without Ja Morant, who was serving a one-game suspension for “conduct detrimental to the team,” don’t make a season, but losses to either or both wouldn’t have been a good look either.
What stood about Barrett’s performance — and about his season so far, really — is that it didn’t stand out all that much. He had a pair of splashy dunks — one on a putback and another left-handed dunk off two feet on a nice feed from rookie Colin Murray-Boyles — but for the most part, his contributions seemed to come easily and without friction.
Much of the handwringing as the Raptors put together their lineup of slightly overlapping parts was that someone among the Raptors wings — Scottie Barnes, Ingram and Barrett — would have to take a back seat, or that there wouldn’t be enough opportunities for all three to shine. The betting would have been on Barrett, given the Raptors’ investment in Barnes and Ingram.
Instead, Barrett has shown himself to be just what the Raptors have needed: an adaptable puzzle piece that can find a fit in almost any scenario by sprinting out in transition, making himself available for open catch-and-shoot threes and attacking one-on-one when needed, but not forcing himself into the action or into multiple defenders.
His stat line tells the story, as Barrett is averaging 20.4 points a game on 56.0 per cent shooting (37.1 per cent from distance). With an uptick in his free-throw shooting (78.3 per cent, compared to 63.0 per cent last season, his worst since his rookie year) and his true shooting percentage is at 64.8 per cent, which would be a career best (his career average is 53.1). All with a usage rate of 22.5 per cent, which represents the lightest load of his NBA career.
He’s doing more with less.
“With (Ingram) coming here, shots are a lot easier for me,” said Barrett. “There’s another threat out there that the team has to worry about. So, I think we’re doing a good job of, you know, everybody sharing the ball, being in the flow. And we’re kind of, we’re all kind of all shooting the ball well, to be honest.”
The Raptors shot pretty well against the Grizzlies as they connected on 50.6 per cent of their field-goal attempts, although their red-hot three-point shooting — coming into the game, the Raptors’ 40.6 per cent conversion rate was tied for fourth in the league — cooled off with an 11-of-37 clunker even though many of the looks were makeable and wide open. The process was still solid.
Which describes Barrett’s game to this point in the season. It shows up not only in the shots he does make — more right-hand finishes, the solid balance on his three-point attempts — but the ones he doesn’t even try. The determined drives into heavy traffic are gone, instead replaced by precise, paint-touching attacks that are often followed by crisp passes to the next open player.
“I mean, he did put in a lot of work this summer. I do think that he’s a better shooter from the three-point line and that he’s taking really good threes as well,” said Raptors head coach Darko Rajakovic. “He’s not forcing anything that’s coming off the dribble or taking some tough shots.
“And, also, his teammates are doing a really good job. He has such a good feel to get in the right spot of the court, to get in the open window, and his teammates are doing a really good job of moving the ball and finding him open, so that’s great.”
A perfect example came in the early in the second quarter when Barrett hit Barnes with a behind-the-back pass in a pick-and-roll. It was a nifty effort, but it was a tough catch for Barnes, who missed the lay-up. But he kept with it and grabbed one of his five offensive rebounds, and as Barrett relocated to the corner, Barnes rifled the pass out and Barrett knocked down the three.
“Me and (Barnes), we look for each other,” said Barrett. “He has a very, very high basketball IQ, so when he has the ball, I’m definitely going to try to make something happen, and vice versa.”
The Raptors’ win had several contributors. Most prominent in the box score — in addition to Barrett — was Ingram, who scored 26 points on 10-of-15 shooting, Barnes, who had 19 points, 12 rebounds, eight assists and five blocked shots and rookie Colin Murray-Boyles, making his third straight start in place of Jakob Poeltl (back) as he added 15 points, nine rebounds, five assists and three steals.
In all, the Raptors were never really threatened as they won the first three quarters and tied the fourth, pulling away after the Grizzlies cut what had been a 16-point lead to six with 4:54 to play. But a Barrett triple — assisted again by Barnes — cooled the threat.
And while wins are better than losses at this stage of the season, it’s still early enough that process matters perhaps even more, and through seven games it’s clear that Barrett has found one that is working for him: doing more with less.
“That’s experience, for sure,” said Barrett. “I think earlier on in my career, I would have had a hard time playing in this lineup, not being mature, stuff like that. Now being here, it’s Year 7 (of his career), being older, having some experiences, now it’s really about the team winning. How you can help the team win is by how you can adapt to how the team is playing. It’s not necessarily just what you do or what you want to do. It’s what the team needs.”
Both the team and the player have a lot to gain from Barrett’s newfound perspective. The Raptors, as designed, won’t function if someone doesn’t play Barrett’s role and fill in the gaps in an efficient manner, and if the team doesn’t function, changes could come sooner than later, and no one wants things to work out here in Toronto more than the proud son of Mississauga, Ont.
“I’m up to the challenge,” he said. “I mean, whatever they’re trying to ask me, I try to do 100 per cent every night. I’m just really putting my heart into this.”
And it’s showing.
Grange for three
1. Murray-Boyles impresses again: First-year players generally are able to make an impact — if at all — through effort, athleticism and enthusiasm. Murray-Boyles has all that but also has an uncommon level of basketball intelligence compared to his level of experience. Starting at centre in place of the injured Poeltl, Murray-Boyles was making plays out of the pick-and-roll like a younger, bouncier Draymond Green. It’s impressive to watch.
“He’s a very talented basketball player. He has such a good feel for the game,” said Rajakovic. “Spacing. He’s really good in his rolls and pick-and-rolls. Tonight, he had one lob dunk that Brandan Ingram threw to him. He just does a good job of being in the right place, and he competes in a really, really high level.”
2. Raptors share Blue Jays’ sadness: A number of the Raptors were at the Rogers Centre for Game 7 of the World Series on Saturday night. They were as engaged as everyone else in the building. Raptors veteran Garrett Temple, perhaps more than others, was impressed by how many players the Blue Jays had who had struggled the way he did to establish careers at the top level. “That team is full of guys who started in the minors and had to work their way up, I definitely resonate with those guys,” said Temple. “The group had a lot of underdogs that made their way, and to be fighting for the World Series. … The atmosphere was electric and that was easily the best baseball game I’ve ever seen in my life.”
3. High hopes for Zach Edey: The big Grizzlies centre from Toronto remains out of the lineup for Memphis after off-season ankle surgery, with a return projected for later this month or early December. Memphis is undoubtedly looking forward to having the seven-foot-four former Purdue star back for his second season sooner rather than later. “Zach is a great fit. He’s another one of those young guys who is incredibly committed to the craft, and just seeing him attack his rehab (it’s impressive),” said Grizzlies head coach Tuomas Lisalo. “He learned a lot of skills last year and we expect him to pair well with Ja and our other ballhandlers. One of his biggest strengths is anchoring the defence but also rebounding. He’s a tremendous defensive and offensive rebounder, and that’s something we are sorely lacking.”
