The Toronto Raptors are one week into the season and have already played in four games, all of them against teams that made the playoffs a season ago and are expected to do so again this year. They have come away 1-3 in those games, which is likely all that they could have expected coming in.
What storylines have emerged in the first week of basketball? Let's look at stories connected to the Raptors, to the NBA Draft, and then bounce around the league before previewing the week ahead.
It's Tuesday, so that means it's time for Raptors News!
Thriller vs the Nuggets
Nikola Jokic is the best player on the planet, and he was incredible again versus the Toronto Raptors on Monday night, scoring 40 points.
Yet he struggled to get his teammates involved, totaling just four assists, as the Raptors came to play against a superior foe. The Nuggets were at full strength facing a Raptors team without Immanuel Quickley, Kelly Olynyk or Bruce Brown Jr., and with RJ Barrett lacking game conditioning as he played in his first game of the season. Yet they struggled to beat a Raptors team that was supposed to be much worse even at full strength, a testament to the fight in this Raptors squad.
We broke down the game and how the Raptors' key players performed more here.
Rookie Roundup
The Toronto Raptors drafted four players in this June's NBA Draft, and picked up another on a two-way contract. Given that first-round pick Ja'Kobe Walter hasn't yet played a minute in preseason or the regular season as he recovers from a shoulder injury, you might expect that the Raptors have had minimal contributions from their rookies.
That has not been the case at all, as three different first-year players have been in the rotation for Toronto. In fact, only first overall pick Zaccharie Risacher has played more total minutes among this rookie class than Jamal Shead, who went 45th. With Immanuel Quickley being knocked out of the Raptors' season opener and not playing since, Shead has played a significant rotation role for the Raptors. His 4.8 assists per game lead the class, ahead of fourth overall pick Stephon Castle.
Speaking of leading the rookie class, the player with the most steals is another Toronto player, 31st overall pick Jonathan Mogbo. His impact has been more up-and-down than Shead's, who is ready right now for a full-time rotation role, but Mogbo had a dominant outing against the short-handed and undersized Philadelphia 76ers. He ranks fifth in true-shooting percentage among all rookies who have taken at least two shots per game.
Finally, undrafted wing Jamison Battle has been a steady 3-and-D presence for the Raptors, filling in at the back end of the rotation in the absence of Bruce Brown Jr. He has appeared in all four games and is a savvy cutter and confident shooter, and is shooting 38.5 percent from 3-point range, behind only Ryan Dunn (wow) and Bub Carrington in the rookie class.
Battle and likely Mogbo may fade to the fringes of the rotation once everyone is healthy, but they have already proven themselves NBA players, and that's an encouraging development for the Raptors.
2025 Draft Stars
It's still unclear how a full-strength Raptors team will fare this season - including whether they will ever be full-strength - but it's at least in the realm of possibilities that they are among the league's worst teams in terms of record. If that happens, the odds that they can land a top draft pick in the 2025 NBA Draft go up significantly.
Which draft prospects should the Raptors and their fans be watching this season? As college basketball prepares to tip off in less than a week, our own Svyatoslav Rovenchuk took a look at some of the top prospects from a Raptors-colored lens.
Scottie Barnes injury
The Raptors were clinging to a lead over the Denver Nuggets on Monday night when Nikola Jokic splayed out his arms fighting for a rebound and nailed Scottie Barnes in the eye socket with his elbow. Barnes was noticeably dizzy and needed to be helped back to the bench, and a moment later he went to the locker room and his night was deemed over.
The Raptors have been quiet about his status after doing imaging last night; we will update this post when we know more.
UPDATE: As of 2:52 PM ET, Josh Lewenberg of TSN is reporting that Scottie Barnes is OUT for the Raptors' game Wednesday in Charlotte and he will not travel with the team. He is getting further medical assessment and his status beyond Wednesday is unknown.
If Barnes is out for any amount of time, the Raptors will struggle on both ends of the court. The return of RJ Barrett and, hopefully very soon, Immanuel Quickley will help on offense, but the Raptors saw last season what happens when Barnes is out of the lineup for any period of time. This year's team is a bit deeper, but they are still thin at forward and rely on Barnes' shot creation and defensive rotations.
The NBA Standings
As everyone expected, the Cleveland Cavaliers sit atop the Eastern Conference at 4-0, having shellacked multiple teams and beat out the New York Knicks in a thriller on Monday night. They are tied with the Boston Celtics, who are also 4-0 but have struggled to put away a few bad teams after they also boat-raced the Knicks on Opening Night. The Orlando Magic are the only other team in the East with a positive point differential at 3-1. If the season inexplicably ended today, the Washington Wizards and Brooklyn Nets would be in the play-in and the Milwaukee Bucks and Indiana Pacers (each 1-3) would not.
Out West, only the Oklahoma CIty Thunder remain undefeated (in dominant fashion with the league's best defense). The Phoenix Suns knocked the Los Angeles Lakers off their undefeated perch in a back-and-forth game on Monday, and each are now 3-1. The only real surprise in the standings are the LA Clippers at 2-1, and the Denver Nuggets at 1-2, but those are minor things at this point. The West is mostly playing true to form.
What's Next?
The Toronto Raptors will travel to North Carolina to face the Charlotte Hornets on Wednesday night at 7:00 PM ET, then make it back home for Halloween and to host LeBron James and the Lakers on Friday evening. Saturday they host the Sacramento Kings in a back-to-back, then embark on a five-game Western US road trip featuring rematches in Denver, L.A. and Sacramento.