You could excuse RJ Barrett for being a bit superstitious on Sunday afternoon.
After all, the Raptors forward had just gone through a spirited practice and was itching to return to action after missing three games due to a severe flu bug. More than that though, he and the rest of the team were ecstatic at the thought of finally having the preferred starting lineup all available for the first time since last March 1. “Don’t jinx it, don’t jinx it,” a smiling Barrett told a handful of media members post-practice.
“We’re happy. We’re going to go out there and see what we got,” Barrett said.
It’s been a long time coming.
Barrett, Immanuel Quickley, Scottie Barnes, Jakob Poeltl and Gradey Dick have played a grand total of four minutes together (Gary Trent Jr., coincidentally back in town Monday with the Milwaukee Bucks, started over Dick in that March 1 game), but the thinking heading into this year was they’d be together plenty as Toronto’s rebuild continued.
But Barnes has been sidelined by two significant injuries, the same goes for Quickley, Barrett has been in and out, Poeltl too and even the 20-year-old Dick has had calf and hamstring injuries that forced him out of action.
Most extremely, Barrett and Quickley, the former New York Knicks who came to Toronto just over a year ago in the OG Anunoby trade, have played only two games, totalling 46 minutes, alongside each other this season — “‘I haven’t played with you in a long time, buddy,”‘ Barrett said he told Quickley today — Quickley and Barnes, the two highest-paid Raptors, only three games totalling 70 minutes, while Quickley and Dick and Quickley and Poeltl have played five games together.
Toronto has sent out 16 different starting lineups. Only one five-man Raptors group has played more than 63 minutes together so far and two players in that mix, Ochai Agbaji and Davion Mitchell, will now likely shift to bench roles.
The result has been a near NBA-worst 8-27 start, with the league’s 26th-best defence and 24th-best offence.
“It’s been like 35 games of us having different lineups,” said Raptors head coach Darko Rajakovic. “It was on one hand also a blessing to take a look at all other players and them being in expanded roles. I think in the long run that’s going to benefit them. That’s how they learn. Maybe it’s not the outcome you want right away but you really learn a lot.”
Can things start to change in the wins department with the Raptors finally able to get a look with the core group?
We’re about to find out.
“It’s very, very annoying, but we’re here now,” Barrett said of the wait. “And the team spirit that we’re all going to have because we’re all back, don’t underestimate that,” he added.
How will it all work? “We’ll see. Because we don’t even know,” Barrett said.
“It’s the first time this year we were actually able to put our projected starting five and see what it looks like on the court,” added Rajakovic. “Really I hope that now we’re going to be healthy enough so that we can really develop that unit and see what we have.”
Rajakovic spent the summer plotting out how Dick’s shooting could complement the veteran foursome which actually looked quite promising (+10.8 net rating) in 14 games together in 2023-24 and now will finally get to see it in action.
“You go into your summer you’re making your playbook and what you can do, you’re building around what you think you have, so now it’s actually a really good time for us to start implementing all of those things and maybe grow this together,” Rajakovic said.
He’ll also have to figure out the rest of the rotation and the other four players who will get consistent minutes (Rajakovic indicated a 10th player could vary from game-to-game). It makes sense that Agbaji and rookie Ja’Kobe Walter should get plenty of time, but how do Mitchell and fellow point guard Jamal Shead fit in? Or Jonathan Mogbo, or veterans Bruce Brown, Kelly Olynyk and Chris Boucher with a month to go until the NBA’s trade deadline?
“It’s going to be really fun to see when everyone falls into their roles how that affects each other,” Rajakovic said.