The Toronto Raptors have been in an ugly spot over their last four games, going 1-3. The Dinos have dropped games to the Orlando Magic, Los Angeles Lakers, and Denver Nuggets, with their only win coming from a late-game comeback against the LA Clippers. A lot has gone wrong for the Raptors in this stretch. Their half-court offense has looked putrid without Kawhi Leonard, Immanuel Quickley and RJ Barrett haven’t stepped up the way many of us wanted, and their depth has been super shaky.
However, the biggest issue may be their defense. During this four-game stretch, the Raptors have the third-worst defensive rating in the league and have allowed an average of 124.5 points per game. I understand that in two of these games Toronto faced off against two of the greatest offensive players ever, Nikola Jokic and Luka Doncic, but that can’t be an excuse. Coming into this season, this team was supposed to be elite defensively with or without Kawhi Leonard in the lineup, and they have looked far from it lately.
There was a lack of engagement, aggression, and intensity in their last home game before the start of their road trip, and it’s carried over into the road trip. If this group is hoping to get on track, it starts on the defensive end.
Raptors' defensive issues are the root of all their struggles
The crazy thing about this stretch where the defense has really struggled is that typically it would mean your two anchors, Scottie Barnes and Collin Murray-Boyles, were underperforming. But that’s just not the case. Yeah, Barnes has had his moments where he wasn’t super engaged, and CMB's discipline has wavered, but for the most part they’ve given the Raptors exactly what was expected of them on that end.
Right now it’s everyone else.
The craziest individual drop-off over this stretch has to be Ja’Kobe Walter, who was looking like a fringe All-Defensive Team candidate to start the season, but that agenda has been reality-checked. I don’t even really know how to describe it, but for Walter, he just looks insanely overwhelmed on both ends since being propelled into the starting five. He’s not getting into his stance or staying disciplined. As a result, Walter has been committing a lot more bad fouls and getting beat off the dribble more often.
Hopefully, he can get back on track, and it’s just the jitters from taking over for Leonard in the starting five.
The biggest issue defensively, from a team perspective, has been the lack of activity and not knowing when to be aggressive and when not to be. Given the style Darko Rajakovic wants this team to play on the defensive end, there will be nights when the team fouls a ton, because it’s a system built on generating a ton of steals. However, that isn’t an excuse for a lack of awareness and understanding of when to be aggressive. There have been so many times when the shot clock is down to single digits, and someone commits a dumb foul because they decide to reach.
Between the dumb fouls and the lack of turnovers being generated, the Raptors' offense has been seriously impacted by the defense. When this four-game stretch started, Toronto was second in the league in points off of turnovers and first in fastbreak points per game. Over this stretch, they have been 13th in fast-break points and ninth in points off of turnovers.
That might not sound like a drastic drop-off for some teams, but for a Raptors team that is limited in the half-court, the fast break is where most of their efficient offense comes from. To get that back to the norm, they need to regain their engagement defensively, because they’re very much a defense-to-offense team.
Add us as a preferred source on Google