The Toronto Raptors select 29th overall in the 2020 NBA Draft next week, November 18th, 2020. In a weak draft, the Toronto Raptors may still find a gold nugget of talent as they seem to every year.
Every year it seems the Toronto Raptors find NBA caliber talent in unusual ways. The organization has become the master of building a competitive franchise without lottery picks. The past seven NBA Playoff competitions have involved the Toronto Raptors.
However, the only significant contributors to the Toronto Raptors’ success in recent years who been lottery picks are DeMar DeRozan (drafted by the Raptors 9th overall in 2009), who was then traded in 2018 for Kawhi Leonard and Jonas Valanciunas, a 2011 lottery pick of the Raptors was traded in 2019 for Marc Gasol.
Finding overlooked and undervalued talent has become a trademark of the Toronto Raptors management team in recent years. Every year, 60 players get added to NBA rosters through an annual draft. Many more players declare for the NBA Draft and either never get a chance or get overlooked for years. Terence Davis is the most recent example of the Toronto Raptors’ successful exhaustive searches through undrafted talent.
In a league that wants to prove that megastars are the only way to win, a franchise like the Toronto Raptors has provided a blueprint to how winning can be achieved in another way.
The Raptors’ management team conducts comprehensive searches for the unwanted or undrafted talent that can provide depth and contribute to their team. There are five times the Toronto Raptors succeeded with this style of acquiring talent.
1. A former Spanish national men’s basketball player
The Toronto Raptors hired an elite level NBA executive in Bryan Colangelo back in the spring of 2006. He made a major impact right away with the direction of the team. In addition to several major transactions that off-season, Colangelo signed forward Jorge Garbajosa, a Spanish national men’s basketball team member.
The six-foot-nine forward played a significant role in turning around the Raptors fortunes in the 2006/07 season. The Toronto Raptors had missed the NBA Playoffs in each of the previous four years.
As one of nine new faces on the team’s roster in 2006/07, Jorge Garbajosa played a significant part in the Toronto Raptors winning 20 more games than they did the previous season when they were 27-55. While his numbers aren’t spectacular, Garbajosa did make significant contributions to the Raptors’ success.
Jorge Garbajosa averaged 8.5 points and 4.9 rebounds per game. He was also a credible threat from three-point range, shooting 34.2 percent. He also played 28.5 minutes a game. His impact was not long-lasting. A horrific injury suffered in a game against the Boston Celtics resulted in a broken and displaced left ankle ending his NBA career.
Jorge Garbajosa was 29 years old when he signed a two year deal with the Toronto Raptors in 2006 and managed to play 74 games-67 in his rookie season.
Jorge Garbajosa was named to the 2007 NBA all-rookie first-team and was highly decorated in Europe and Spain as a champion and all-star before appearing in the NBA. Garbajosa was eligible for the NBA Draft in1999 but went undrafted.
4. Free Agent camp signing in 2007
After returning to the NBA Playoffs for the first time since 2002 in 2007, the Toronto Raptors had what would initially appear to be a quiet off-season. The Toronto Raptors had no draft picks in 2007.
However, this did not stop general manager Bryan Colangelo from adding talent to the roster in an unconventional way. He held a free-agent camp that summer, and on July 10th, 2007, he had signed an undrafted player who was eligible for the 2001 Draft in Jamario Moon. Moon was a six-foot-eight small forward who was extremely athletic.
This transaction was impressive because adding a draft pick to the team roster without actually drafting a player at the NBA Draft was impressive. In an article from the CBC back in 2007:
"“Moon, 27, finished seventh overall in scoring in the Continental Basketball Association last season, averaging 18.8 points in 44 appearances with the Albany Patroons.”"
After leaving his collegiate career behind at Meridian CC and going undrafted at the 2001 NBA Draft, Jamario Moon continued to practice his craft in the Continental Basketball Association, NBA’s D-League, the American Basketball Association, the World Basketball Association, and the United States Basketball League.
Moon competed in the NBA for five seasons with five teams, spending 1.5 seasons with the Toronto Raptors.
3. Canadian talent with the Toronto Raptors
Masai Ujiri has been the general manager or president of basketball operations for the Toronto Raptors since May of 2013 when he won the NBA Executive of the Year award with his previous employer, the Denver Nuggets. Since his hiring, the Toronto Raptors have not missed the NBA Playoffs.
Like his predecessor, Masai Ujiri leaves no stone unturned when seeking new talent. This is the case even in the Toronto Raptors’ own backyard. Quebec native Chris Boucher is yet another undrafted player that Toronto’s management has successfully incorporated into their system.
Boucher, who was draft-eligible in 2017, is a Canadian from Alma, Quebec. He went undrafted due to a torn ACL. He was signed to a two-way contract though by the Golden State Warriors. He is a two time NBA champion because he was part of the Golden State Warriors championship team in 2018.
As a free-agent in 2018, he was signed to a two-way contract with the Toronto Raptors. In his time with Toronto, he was named the G-League’s most valuable player in 2019 and the league’s Defensive Player of the Year with the Raptors 905.
Boucher is a member of the Toronto Raptor’s championship team in 2019 and has played 90 regular-season games and 9 playoff games for Toronto.
2. Spain’s National team success translates for the Toronto Raptors
There is a decent-sized list of Spanish national men’s basketball members making an impact in the NBA. Before Jorge Garbajosa, general manager Rob Babcock acquired via free agency another Spaniard in Jose Calderon. Rob Babcock may be considered Toronto’s worst general manager, but Jose Calderon was a great signing.
Calderon was draft-eligible in 2003 but signed as a free agent by Toronto in 2005. His initial season in Toronto was not great, as his shooting stats will attest, with a three-point average of 16.3 percent and overall just 42.3 percent.
It may explain why when Bryan Colangelo took over from Rob Babcock as general manager, his first move was to acquire a point guard in T.J. Ford to compete with Calderon for minutes. It was a battle Calderon would win with steady, smart play and an attitude that put team results ahead of his own stats. Jose Calderon explained why he gave up his claim to starting in an espn.com article Calderon was quoted saying:
"“I [do] not get caught up in it. “[It was] no big deal, not for me. The team wasn’t working very well at the time, so I just tried to do another thing, something else. I just said to Sam [Mitchell, coach], ‘Let’s try it. Let’s try to change things.'”"
By the time Jose Calderon’s seven and a half years were over in Toronto, many other guards tried to supplant him as the quarterback of the raptors offense. Jarret Jack, Jerryd Bayless, and T.J. Ford are just a few names who failed to best Calderon’s high IQ, sharpshooting, ball security, and great passing game.
Calderon, who played 13 seasons in the NBA, came close to joining an exclusive NBA club in his third season (2007/08) when he shot 50-40-90 (51.9 percent field goals, 42.9 percent three-pointers, and 90.8 percent on free throws). He was 16 free-throws shy of the NBA minimum requirement, but he was a steady high-efficiency player.
Kyle Lowry became Toronto’s all-time assists leader this season, and it was Jose Calderon, who has 3770 assists as a Raptor who Lowry surpassed.
1. The Toronto Raptors’ biggest free-agent decision in years
The year 2016 was a great time for acquiring talent for the Toronto Raptors. They held the ninth and 27th picks at the NBA Draft. Not only did they select Jacob Poeltl and Pascal Siakam with the draft picks, but they also acquired point guard Fred VanVleet as a free agent.
Fred VanVleet was eligible for the 2016 NBA Draft but went undrafted. In his rookie season, Vanvleet played 37 games averaging 7.9 minutes per game. However, he did help the Raptors 905 win the G-League championship in 2017.
In his four years in the NBA, he has played 231 regular-season games, 48 playoff games and was a significant contributor to the Toronto Raptors winning an NBA title in 2019. He became an unrestricted free agent at the end of this season and could be due for a massive salary increase from the 9 million he earned in 2019/20.
The theme that connects these five former undrafted players is Bryan Colangelo, and Masai Ujiri selected four of them. Masai Ujiri was hired as a scout and then upgraded to assistant general manager between 2008-2010 when he understudied for Bryan Colangelo before his current role.
After Masai Ujiri’s stint with the Denver Nuggets, he returned to Toronto as the general manager in 2013 following Colangelo’s firing.
In 2008, there was a plan being pursued by Bryan Colangelo to purchase a G-League team affiliate, then known as the D-League.
A Toronto Star article quoted Bryan Colangelo back in 2008 saying:
"“We’re exploring possible involvement similar to what you see in Los Angeles and San Antonio,”"
Since acquiring the Raptors 905 in 2015, Masai Ujiri has used the G-League affiliate to develop both drafted and undrafted talent. It’s a managing system that helps to develop fringe NBA players into rotational and all-star caliber talent.
The Raptors 905 have been to two consecutive G-League Finals in 2017 and 2018. Fred VanVleet, Pascal Siakam, Norman Powell, Chris Boucher, Bruno Caboclo, and Oshae Brissett are a few of the Raptors 905 alumni that have contributed to the Toronto Raptors success in recent years.
If Bryan Colangelo could have worked out the logistics back in 2008 to attempt what Masai Ujiri has accomplished now with player development, the current seven-year run of Raptors’ success may actually have been longer.