The Brandon Ingram era has arrived in Toronto. The former NBA all-star joined his new Raptors teammates in Oklahoma City for shootaround Friday morning, ahead of that evening’s game with the Thunder.
While Ingram won’t be in the lineup quite yet, he told reporters he’s excited to be a Raptor and for this new opportunity after nearly six years in the Bayou.
Here are some takeaways from what Raptors general manager Bobby Webster had to say over the last two days:
EYES STILL ON THE PRIZE
It was easy to look at the trade for a better scorer and shot-creator than anyone else on Toronto’s roster as the end of the team’s rebuild. Why else add someone of that pedigree now? To paraphrase Webster, chill out Tank Nation, the organization realizes the most important thing that could happen this season is to end up with a high draft pick. Whether that’s potential superstars Cooper Flagg or Dylan Harper, the likely first two picks, or one of the other premier prospects who have been projected as future stars, the organization knows that’s the most likely way to become contenders again.
Ingram is a talent, for sure, good enough to be the No. 2 pick of his draft and someone who has been able to pile up points and assists over the years, and Scottie Barnes is a great talent himself, but it’s hard to make the conference final, never mind get beyond that unless you have someone better than Barnes or Ingram, or at least with someone else on their level who can complement them and other Raptors like Immanuel Quickley, RJ Barrett, Jakob Poeltl and the young players.
“It takes a lot of really good players to win in this league, and so this is just sort of an incremental step along the way, as opposed to some big flag in the sand type move,” Webster said Friday.
On Thursday he had said the team was “prioritizing for the rest of the season” playing the rookies and sophomore Gradey Dick plenty to keep moving them forward. Clearing out Bruce Brown and Kelly Olynyk cleared out pathways for more minutes for them and you can expect Poeltl, who is currently injured, to be treated very carefully, as will Ingram (“we’ll be strategic with it,” Webster said of Ingram). They want to see what they have, including with Ingram, but only to a point. They recognize better lottery odds are far more important long-term than some sort of run for a play-in spot.
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EXPECT A LONG-TERM PARTNERSHIP
The Raptors have liked Ingram dating to his high school years, but knew they had no shot at him in 2016. They also loved Jaylen Brown (who would go on to become a champion and NBA Finals MVP), but Boston snapped him up with the next pick, long before Toronto was up at nine (they ended up with Poeltl, not bad at all). Toronto has worked out plenty of deals with Ingram’s agent with Klutch Sports, Mike George, one of only a handful of Canadian agents representing NBA clients.
“Yeah, Brandon wants to be here. I think this was an intentional effort and decision by him, so we appreciate that,” Webster said. “And, yeah, obviously we’ve been able to talk to his agent and representatives over the last 24 hours or so and so we’re comfortable with where we are.”
Ingram is finishing up a five-year contract that paid him $36 million US this season and an average of just over $31 million per season. With the salary cap going up Ingram will be angling for more, but he missed an average of 25 games a season over his first five years in New Orleans, and all but 18 contests this season. Webster said that injury history might have been “baked in a bit” to the trade, meaning a player of Ingram’s calibre has cost more in terms of assets in other deals, but with a cleaner bill of health.
Ingram reportedly wanted well over $40 million a season from the Pelicans and that wasn’t going to be possible there even if both sides agreed on it with all of the other salary commitments there.
Webster seemed to indicate that paying the luxury tax isn’t the cardinal sin it once was (Toronto’s only done it twice in 30 years, New Orleans never has), so they’re comfortable they can pay everyone moving forward, even with Barnes about to start his max extension. He intoned Toronto will have to figure out if it makes sense to go into the tax for a team that isn’t yet a title contender (which used to be the bar in the past), but one that can compete to win a round or two. Still, they might have to move on from either Barrett or Ochai Agbaji at next year’s deadline or in the summer of 2026 if they decide they don’t want to pay the tax.
“I think that’s sort of the equilibrium and that’s the balance where we need to find but those are probably decisions for future seasons,” Webster said of figuring out what they have and where they can go and whether it is tax-worthy.
THEY’VE GOT FAITH
In Alex McKechnie, the man who led the way in keeping Kawhi Leonard healthy enough to lead Toronto to a championship, the Raptors think they have the man to get Ingram on the floor more often.
“I think we’re expecting a spark as far as a fresh start for him. He’d been in New Orleans for a while, and I think there’s, you know, forever, a string of bad luck too injury-wise down there,” Webster said. Injuries have devastated the Pelicans this season, along with several others.
Webster added, “we feel like we have the best medical staff in the league and so I know there’s been some concerns about games played and whatnot, but I think we’re excited to get to know him as a person, but also his body and physically, and sort of see if we can get an additional jump there.”
AROUND THE RIM
Toronto converted two-way rookie Jamison Battle’s two-way contract to a standard NBA deal Friday, signed Orlando Robinson, who had played through a pair of 10-day deals, to the two-way spot previously held by Battle, and left a roster spot open for another signing or for more 10-day deals … Webster admitted the team discussed trading Chris Boucher, but couldn’t find a match, which was just fine with them. “I would say it takes two to tango. We did have talks but we love Chris. He’s the lone survivor from 2019,” Webster said. “It seems like he’s been here forever. He’s a Canadian kid. He’s got a great spirit and you see it whenever he goes into the game. The energy never falters. And so we love Chris.”