Raptors Discussion: V67 | DeRozan puts the ball through the hoop with regularity

[tp71]

My point with the Porzingis comparison is that Knicks coach Hornacek has more faith in his 2nd year player than Casey EVER has in JV even after his performance in the playoffs last season. There is absolutely NO REASON why JV can't in his 4th year average at least 30 mins per game shooting at least 10-15 shots. Absolutely NONE other than Casey is stupid and refuses to run any plays for him to score easy points.

And I disagree that Casey is a good coach when he consistently gets out coached by his counterpart. And no good coach wouldn't utilize JV who's a high percentage shooter who is also a high percentage FT shooter. It should be a no brainer to just dump the ball into him and let JV either score or get fouled and get easy points through him rather than let Demar and Lowry make bad shot after bad shot and lose winnable games for us.

People can talk about JV being 'too slow' all they want, but its pretty damn clear that playing 'small ball' isn't working and often isn't improving our defense so why wouldn't you play JV and run plays for him for easy points and on defense just let him simply plug up the paint and be a big body that's hard to push around? A good coach should be able to utilize his player's strengths and also make the other team adjust to him as someone else pointed out. Casey doesn't neither which is why we will never beat the best teams in the league consistently.

I mean really there's something seriously wrong when your coach states publicly that he'll 'ride or die' with Demar and Lowry rather than look to the rest of his team to pick up the slack when our 'stars' are sucking the big one. That is just one DUMB AND STUBBORN coach who refuses to adjust and adapt as the game is going on and things change.

If you feel that strongly then surely you have some suggestions on coaches to replace him and reasons why they would be a better coach and a better fit for this team, right? I'd love to hear of these suggestions and reasons personally.

 

[Amadeus]

One.Bad.Quarter.

That's the game.

 

[Swervin81]

The reason small ball isn't working for us because Patterson can't hit a ****ing 3 and we're the 29th ranked team in the league in 3 pt shooting. It's pretty much become a defense only lineup with Carroll and Patterson being as bad as they are this year.

 

[GQS]

If you feel that strongly then surely you have some suggestions on coaches to replace him and reasons why they would be a better coach and a better fit for this team, right? I'd love to hear of these suggestions and reasons personally.

I don't know all the coaches that are currently available, but Jeff Van Gundy wouldn't be a bad choice and right now I'd take ANYONE over Casey as long as they're experienced, can run a balanced offense which we're more than capable of doing and can get this team to play some half decent defense.

Casey has had plenty of chances to take this team to the next level and he's continually failed because he REFUSES to force his team to play a balanced game offensively while reigning in Lowry and Demar and stopping them from taking so many stupid shots that so often take us out of games. Again JV and now Siakam have both shown that they can score so there's no excuse not to use them more especially when Patterson and Carroll are playing like utter GARBAGE in addition to Demar and Lowry becoming low percentage chuckers again.

It just boggles my mind that in most games in the 1st quarter and sometimes 2nd our offense looks great when our bigs get touches and the points are coming easy and then all of a sudden in the 3rd and 4th quarters we go back to being a jump shooting team with Lowry and Demar usually taking the bulk of the shots and we start tanking. I'll just never understand why Casey so often goes away from what was working for us early in the game and that's why he needs to go.

 

[EpochLink]

Awaiting Drakes diss track to KD

 

[zeke]

Not really. It's Golden State going small and running Green at center. Going small to match them.

I disagree with that philosophy of matching though, drive the ball into JV and tell Green good luck defending him as much as JV may struggle with Green's speed.

But that's the idea of what Casey is doing. It has nothing to do with hating JV and everything to do with Golden States insanity lineup.

but it is a lack of appreciation for how good Val is, and the problems he could create for GS if used properly.

 

[Giuseppe Sallo]

Awaiting Drakes diss track to KD

Wonder if Westbrook can put in a few bars... Seems like he loves doing it all on his own, clutchzilla!!!

 

[Giuseppe Sallo]

The reason small ball isn't working for us because Patterson can't hit a ****ing 3 and we're the 29th ranked team in the league in 3 pt shooting. It's pretty much become a defense only lineup with Carroll and Patterson being as bad as they are this year.

Hundo. We suck at threes. Where's Jason kapono?

 

[tp71]

There is absolutely NO REASON why JV can't in his 4th year average at least 30 mins per game shooting at least 10-15 shots.

Just going to throw this out there as well for you that Jonas is averaging 29.1 mins per game and 9.5 shots per game. So he's basically hitting the averages that you want him to through 8 games.

Fire Casey.

 

[tp71]

The reason small ball isn't working for us because Patterson can't hit a ****ing 3 and we're the 29th ranked team in the league in 3 pt shooting. It's pretty much become a defense only lineup with Carroll and Patterson being as bad as they are this year.

The Raptors shot 40% from 3pt tonight vs the Warriors 36%. Just thought I'd throw that out there.

 

[Pete Dunham]

I'm surprised they didn't exploit the weakness the warriors have in the middle. JV would've dominated.

 

[Giuseppe Sallo]

He would have... but we still would have lost. I have a feeling JV might be traded if Ujiri goes all in, team is too good now and need that one piece.

 

[GQS]

Just going to throw this out there as well for you that Jonas is averaging 29.1 mins per game and 9.5 shots per game. So he's basically hitting the averages that you want him to through 8 games.

Fire Casey.

A couple of things you don't mention. While JV is AVERAGING 29 mins a game, his minutes from game to game are wildly inconsistent and often for no apparent reason other than 'matchups'. For example in his last 5 games he's only had ONE game where he played over 30 mins, one game where he played 27 mins and then 3 GAMES where he averaged less than 23 mins per game. So he isn't getting a consistent 29 mins every single game the way Demar will always get his minutes every game.

Also he may be averaging 9.5 shots per game, but many of them are from offensive rebounds and cleaning up the bad shots of his teammates. Namely its not like the Raptors are consistently running plays for him and looking for him, but rather just that he often was able to grab the ball and make a shot attempt for himself. And you have to remember that in the vast majority of games, most of the plays that his teammates run for him will probably come in the 1st half. In the 3rd and 4th quarters he'll be lucky to get even a couple of plays run for him in those 24 mins because as I said the 3rd and the 4th is always jump shooting time starring Demar and Lowry with the hero ball. That's why our offense which usually looks good to great in the 1st half often looks like trash in the 2nd half when all the shots we jack up keep missing and Casey refuses to go back to what worked for us early in the game.

 

[Gary Nylund]

I agree JV isn't being utilized properly. I don't know how many times I've seen him have something like 8 easy points in the first 5 minutes and then not see the ball on offence for the next 12 minutes or so. There have also been a number of occasions where DD has the ball, a wide open JV calls for it under the basket and DD ignores him. I don't know if it's DD's hero tendencies or it's the coach or what but it's sooooo frustrating to watch this game after game. We don't need a trade to reach that next level, the answer is sitting right in front of our noses. Feed the JV beast more often for crissakes. Not only is he capable of scoring some easy points but going to him more often will free up space for everyone else (I'm talking to you DD). Every now and then the Raptors move the ball around well and when they do, they look unstoppable until they just ... stop.

Free JV!

 

[tp71]

A couple of things you don't mention. While JV is AVERAGING 29 mins a game, his minutes from game to game are wildly inconsistent and often for no apparent reason other than 'matchups'. For example in his last 5 games he's only had ONE game where he played over 30 mins, one game where he played 27 mins and then 3 GAMES where he averaged less than 23 mins per game. So he isn't getting a consistent 29 mins every single game the way Demar will always get his minutes every game.

Also he may be averaging 9.5 shots per game, but many of them are from offensive rebounds and cleaning up the bad shots of his teammates. Namely its not like the Raptors are consistently running plays for him and looking for him, but rather just that he often was able to grab the ball and make a shot attempt for himself. And you have to remember that in the vast majority of games, most of the plays that his teammates run for him will probably come in the 1st half. In the 3rd and 4th quarters he'll be lucky to get even a couple of plays run for him in those 24 mins because as I said the 3rd and the 4th is always jump shooting time starring Demar and Lowry with the hero ball. That's why our offense which usually looks good to great in the 1st half often looks like trash in the 2nd half when all the shots we jack up keep missing and Casey refuses to go back to what worked for us early in the game.

No no no. You can't move the goal posts now. You said he should average 30 mins and 10-15 shots. He's averaging 29.1 and 9.5. He's right at the cusp of what you want.

There's also this:

The Raptors had held Valanciunas below 25 minutes in both of his first two games back from a left knee contusion,

Maybe he doesn't want to see his knee blow up game 8 so he can have him ready, available and healthy when it matters. Precautions can sometimes be a thing.

He averaged 21, 22, 34 and 18 from when he came back from the knee contusion. The first two after coming back and both sets also being back to backs, which could give us a bigger insight to why he might be getting his minutes restricted a bit.There's reason here that it could be precautionary measures and you'll see his minutes uptick higher as it progresses.

Before his injury he had 35, 31, 31, 31, 28. Which is pretty consistent and a 31.2 mpg average. If you want to keep on moving the goalposts though, you go ahead. But I know this doesn't fit your narrative.

Fire Casey.

 

[tp71]

I agree JV isn't being utilized properly. I don't know how many times I've seen him have something like 8 easy points in the first 5 minutes and then not see the ball on offence for the next 12 minutes or so. There have also been a number of occasions where DD has the ball, a wide open JV calls for it under the basket and DD ignores him. I don't know if it's DD's hero tendencies or it's the coach or what but it's sooooo frustrating to watch this game after game. We don't need a trade to reach that next level, the answer is sitting right in front of our noses. Feed the JV beast more often for crissakes. Not only is he capable of scoring some easy points but going to him more often will free up space for everyone else (I'm talking to you DD). Every now and then the Raptors move the ball around well and when they do, they look unstoppable until they just ... stop.

Free JV!

That sounds like Derozan. Demar has tunnel vision sometimes. It's not just JV he overlooks, it's his whole team.

And that's what Demar and Kyle are doing. Fire it inside to him early, make them respect the post. It's opened up after those first few baskets.

Demar doesn't have the vision needed to move the ball around like you want. He's an iso ball player.

 

[ryno23]

I agree JV isn't being utilized properly. I don't know how many times I've seen him have something like 8 easy points in the first 5 minutes and then not see the ball on offence for the next 12 minutes or so. There have also been a number of occasions where DD has the ball, a wide open JV calls for it under the basket and DD ignores him. I don't know if it's DD's hero tendencies or it's the coach or what but it's sooooo frustrating to watch this game after game. We don't need a trade to reach that next level, the answer is sitting right in front of our noses. Feed the JV beast more often for crissakes. Not only is he capable of scoring some easy points but going to him more often will free up space for everyone else (I'm talking to you DD). Every now and then the Raptors move the ball around well and when they do, they look unstoppable until they just ... stop.

Free JV!

You watch JV go a team that realize his potential and he could be one of the top players at his position and be a beast.

 

[al secord]

Unless you're going all in with Cousins, i don't see a need to move JV. I don't mind preserving his body for the playoffs. He was our best player before he was injured.

But man, can we work on the pick and roll? lol

 

[BayStreetBully]

I just saw Durant say "I don't give a damn about no Drake night."

Good for Durant. I can't be the only one who thinks Drake is embarrassing for the Raptors.

 

[rdawg1234]

Unless you're going all in with Cousins, i don't see a need to move JV. I don't mind preserving his body for the playoffs. He was our best player before he was injured.

But man, can we work on the pick and roll? lol

I think you gotta go all in for cousins

Yes we are a great team, but it's clear we don't have that star player to match up against these GSW and Cleveland teams, Cousins potentially gives us that shot, at least for a couple seasons.

I like JV, but Cousins is a clear upgrade imo. I dont see JV becoming a hall of famer or top 5 in his position, top 15 sure, but cousins is a top 3-5 PF/C in the game.