The Toronto Raptors scraped by the Los Angeles Clippers, 125-118, after overcoming a 16-point deficit. This brutal game raised a serious question about the Raptors. What does this team look like when they aren't scoring easy transition points? The verdict: really bad.
But to their credit, they found a way to win, a trait every contender in the NBA needs. Or maybe not to the credit of the whole team, but strictly Scottie Barnes, who put the backpack on despite playing through a hip injury that had him looking super uncomfortable out there.
Even though he struggled to get things going early, the way he closed this game should negate any criticism from me or any other writer publishing post-game thoughts. 15 of Barnes’ 22 points and eight of his 15 rebounds came in the fourth quarter. He also was a plus-23 in the game's final frame and led what was a 47-point fourth quarter for the Dinos.
As much as people like me have been calling for Barnes to bring this level of assertiveness every possession, every night, the Raptors can’t count on miracle performances like this to win games. When the playoffs come around, true contenders separate themselves by getting reliable contributions from all angles, and the Raptors have struggled to find that to start this season.
Scottie Barnes can't keep being the hero every night
As the saying goes, “a win is a win,” but here's my question for the Toronto Raptors: at what cost? That game was an eyesore to watch. Between 31-of-48 shooting from the foul line, 4-of-23 from three-point range when excluding Jamison Battle's shooting, and 26 team fouls, I wondered if a 7th-grade AAU team was impersonating this group. For a minute, I thought that maybe Halloween came late this year and those guys playing the Clippers weren’t actually the Raptors.
Those issues, mixed in with the half-court offense once again being nonexistent, left me and so many viewers questioning if this team even has the tools or talent to be looked at as a contender when Kawhi Leonard is healthy. And that didn’t change with a sneaky last-minute win against a Clippers team that isn’t supposed to be on Toronto’s level.
At a certain point, I was expecting coach Darko Rajakovic to take over play calling or put a stop to the free-flowing offense that produced one turnover or bad shot after another. But he didn’t. It really took Scottie Barnes pressuring the ball at the point of attack and covering almost the entire defensive floor for the Raptors to come away with this one late.
This team can’t continue to be one of those groups that is strictly faith-based.
The front office can’t continue to look at how bad RJ Barrett is defensively and say, “Hey, we have faith he’ll lock in defensively come playoff time.” They can’t keep having faith that in a seven-game series their role players are going to be able to consistently hit open threes. They can’t keep having blind faith that Immanuel Quickley is a good enough decision-maker to be a starting point guard in a contending context.
Bobby Webster and company may not even be able to trust that Darko Rajakovic can adjust on the fly when his physical defensive system rewards the other team with foul call after foul call.
The only piece on this team that still screams, "Have faith in me," is Scottie Barnes, but what happens if this hip issue gets worse and he has to miss time? What happens then? There’s no answer, and that’s my issue with this team.
At the start of this West Coast road trip, I felt this was a great time for this Raptors group to figure out who they were and who they all could be without Kawhi Leonard. Instead, it has only made me more confused about where this team is going to stack up in an Eastern Conference that isn’t slowing down. Still so much time to weather the storm, make trades, and shake up rotations, but my goodness, figure it out soon. My health can’t take games like Monday night against the Clippers.
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