| The East’s Most Fateful Clash Authored by Matthew Gordon - April 21, 2008 - 1:37 pm
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Were this a prediction (for the record, I think the Raptors can win it in seven), it would be necessary for this column to appear prior to the series. However, this isn’t about the winner, and what that winner can do to advance further in the playoffs. This is about the loser, and the inevitable teardown that loser will face this summer.
Despite the teams’ records, Orlando at 52-30 and Toronto at 41-41, they’re evenly matched. In that way, this series is much like last year’s 3/6 match-up, when the 47-win Raptors played the 41-win Nets. If that series is any indication, record might not mean everything. Indeed, it doesn’t; the Raptors played far below their abilities for much of the season due to injuries to TJ Ford and Chris Bosh.
Orlando and Toronto have both had bright spots this season. Orlando’s 52-win season has made people believe in what was a relatively unsuccessful franchise for a number of years, and has at least slightly muted the critics (me included) of Rashard Lewis’s nine-figure contract. Even though Toronto finished with a worse record than last season, the acquisition of Jamario Moon has been one of the league’s best surprises. Failing to win the division twice in a row can only be blamed on Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen.
Both teams have significant problems that will be addressed regardless of the series outcome. Orlando has great shooters in Lewis and the emergent Turkoglu but lacks a player who can draw attention by getting into the paint and hitting high-percentage shots to get the offence going. The Raptors have a similar need, with their wing positions being very deep but without that one star player who can give Bosh some much-needed scoring aid. Dwight Howard, while one of the best centers in the league and my personal favorite for MVP, needs some help defensively because neither Lewis nor Turkoglu is a true power player. Toronto has a power player in Bosh but needs a player who can attack the glass. These needs should and will be met, so the issue is the extent that Orlando’s Otis Smith and Toronto’s Bryan Colangelo will overhaul the roster in meeting them.
Watching this series takes a different tone. The keys for each team to win the series are fairly simple, given the collective propensity toward jump-shooting. The series will ultimately be a shootout tempered by the star-studded Howard/Bosh match-up down low. Defensively, there will be a premium on closing on the shooters and neutralizing the other team’s star. Instead of looking only at these conventional factors, though, the potentially dire situations facing the teams necessitate a perspective based on basketball and on management.
The Magic on the Perimeter
Orlando has a solid point guard in Jameer Nelson and role-playing off-guards in Maurice Evans and Keith Bogans. These are rotation-worthy players, perhaps starters alongside a star player. As the underpinning of a contending backcourt, they aren’t sufficient.
Right now, the most appealing people on the Magic who are under about 6’8” are the cheerleaders. Nelson would be a great third guard, a player who can come off the bench and provide much-needed energy, but shouldn’t have to bear the load of being Howard’s point guard. Evans has been shooting an unbelievable 48.9% from the field and 39.6% from three-point range as a member of the Magic, also averaging over a steal per turnover, but only averages nine points and three rebounds per game. What he does is valuable to the team but he doesn’t do enough of it to be the solution at shooting guard. Bogans’s stats (8.7PPG, 3.2RPG, slightly over a steal per turnover) are similar to Evans’s but with significantly worse percentages (41.0% from the field, 36.2% from three). The overlap between the two is so considerable that there might not be enough playing time for both players next year if the Magic strike a trade before then.
The Magic do need some more veteran leadership at the point but that’s attainable through the mid-level exception or through a minor trade. What’s more urgent is getting a shooting guard who can force the defense to recognize his presence on the court. Rumors from previous years involving Vince Carter-type players wearing Magic uniforms were spread for a reason, and the reason is that the Magic need that type of player.
One who can also defend would be especially enticing. Raptors announcer Leo Rautins made the comment today that “being down seventeen to Orlando isn’t like being down seventeen to Detroit”, referring to Detroit’s great defensive capabilities. While Orlando doesn’t have most of the pieces that make Detroit so good at shutting down opponents, one particularly glaring omission is the lack of a wing defender who can use his quickness and intelligence to disrupt opposing scorers. Detroit has two such players in Richard Hamilton and Tayshaun Prince; barring Lewis becoming a great defender in an offseason, the Magic will need one too. This is a luxury, as most perimeter stars aren’t incredible defenders, but it is something for Smith to keep in mind.
It would be nice for any team to acquire a top-flight player, so why is this such an issue? Players capable of delivering what the Magic need tend to be difficult to obtain unless through a blockbuster trade. It’s absolutely right to question whether a team on the rise that just won its division should be making such a drastic move. The team’s expiring contracts can no longer be trade, and Lewis’s contract has rendered him untradable, so Orlando’s wealth of assets is not as great as its record. Turkoglu could hypothetically go but would be a difficult loss to accept, and the notion of dealing Howard is absurd.
If the Magic make it to the second round, matching eight figures’ worth of salaries to bring a player who might be a disgruntled veteran might not be such a priority. A first-round exit, especially to a team that many labeled as a group of underachievers, could change what Smith has to do in order to ensure that Orlando’s momentum isn’t compromised prematurely.
The Raptors on the Perimeter
The Raptors have their own weakness on the perimeter. It’s similar to the Magic’s, in that there isn’t a discernible star at the off-guard position, but Parker (12.5PPG, 4.1RPG, 2.2APG, 47.6FG%, 43.8 3PT%, 1.0SPG, 1.06TPG) is better than anyone the Magic have to offer. He’s smarter, a better defender and precisely the kind of positive influence who leads by example. He’s also capable of becoming a scorer when required, as evidenced by his twelve 20+ point performances this season. Even that is a deceptive number though; he’s put up 19 points on five other occasions. Rautins’s designation of him as “a pressure player” is equally fitting, as he stepped up in game 1 by scoring 24 points. His all-around game that allows him to step up as a scorer or as a defender, while always playing within the team and under the control, gives Toronto a dimension that Orlando doesn’t have.
Where the need lies is in streamlining the rest of the wing spots. Moon is a bargain and should be kept, but every other player is a question mark. Carlos Delfino had a frustratingly up-and-down season and is a free agent this summer, Jason Kapono has shown his limitations just as much as his strengths, and Joey Graham is clearly not factoring into Colangelo’s vision. With only two players of the bunch, Parker and Moon, as sure-fire rotation players, the Raptors will need to add a player to that mix. The question facing Colangelo is what sort of player that will be.
Simply drafting a wing player would be a help but not enough of one. A player like Brandon Rush could have an immediate impact on defense, and would be a good pick at #17, but won’t give Toronto much offensive punch. Chris Douglas-Roberts, another highly-touted college prospect who is more in that scoring mould, would also be a help but shouldn’t be expected to carry an inordinate amount of the scoring load right away. These players and others, while encouraging, should be viewed as partial, not full, solutions.
Ultimately, the Raptors need a physical player who uses his body to score. The Raptors’ wing players are too content to camp out on the three-point line, with Delfino being especially guilty, 49.7% of his shots in the regular season having been three-pointers. Moon and Kapono were good about not overusing the three-pointer, only shooting threes on 21.2% and 23.7% of their attempts respectively, but that only says so much. (Parker sits at 36.6%, acceptable for a player with his stroke.) None of the Raptors’ four key wing players went to the line twice or more per game in the regular season; by comparison, a single foul on a shot attempt will generate more free throws than any of those players average. The Raptors do not have a single wing player who can be counted on to be fouled while shooting once per game.
The Raptors also have an enormous gap between Bosh’s scoring average (22.3) and the next-highest scorer on the team (Parker’s 12.5). Orlando has Lewis and Turkoglu at about eighteen points per game in addition to Howard’s twenty-plus, to draw a contrast to an equivalently talented team. Ford and Jose Calderon are great point guards but neither is a pure scorer, nor would the Raptors want either to be one. It makes more sense, then, to put either Parker or Moon on the bench and to trade for a player who can get to the free-throw line en route to a healthy, fifteen-plus scoring average.
Needs in the Post
The Magic’s post play is defined almost entirely by Dwight Howard. He’s a go-to scorer (20.2PPG, 25 points in game 1, .599FG%, over 10FTA), the best rebounder in the league (14.2RPG, 22 rebounds in game 1) and a shot-blocking threat (2.2BPG, 5 blocks in game 1). He’s only one man, though, and the Magic need to put a suitable player beside him.
In my article on the Memphis/Kansas game earlier this month, I mentioned that there are two types of post defenders: ones who alter shots and ones who block shots. Neither is necessarily better than the other, and a great defensive team tends to have at least one of each. Howard is clearly in the latter category.
Tony Battie, a 6’11” power forward whose basketball IQ and positional man defense brought a lot to last year’s Magic squad, unfortunately missed the entire 2007/2008 season due to injury. Although he’s slated to return next season, he’s thirty-two and has only played all eighty-two games once in his career (in 2005/2006). He’ll also be exceedingly rusty. His absence has forced Lewis and Turkoglu to play out of their comfort zones on defense, often having to guard much stronger players, but his return won’t necessarily guarantee anything.
Having a man defender in the post, whether Battie or an upgrade, will allow Howard to play more of a help defender role and will keep him out of foul trouble. Howard’s 3.3 fouls per game put him at ninth in the league, a number that isn’t overwhelming but that could still make the Magic nervous. If Howard is unable to play aggressively due to foul trouble, the Magic lose the most important part of their team on both sides of the court.
Toronto’s situation is similar again yet also noticeably different. Bosh’s 22.3 points, 8.7 rebounds and 49.4% shooting are impressive, but he doesn’t have a wide frame and he can’t guard some of the East’s big centers. A player like Howard or like Cleveland’s Zydrunas Ilgauskas can cause fits for the Raptors, as Howard did today. Rasho Nesterovic is effective but isn’t an intimidator, and neither Primoz Brezec nor Andrea Bargnani has shown enough to be classified as a full-time starting centre on a contending team.
Like the Magic, the Raptors need a post defender, but the Raptors also need a rebounder in that role. Aside from Bosh, only Moon (6.2RPG) has been respectable on the backboards this season among Raptors frontcourt players. (Moon’s combination of jump-shooting and rebounding at the small forward position place him in both the wing and frontcourt categories, if awkwardly at times.) Nesterovic (4.8RPG in 20.9 minutes) and Kris Humphries (3.7RPG in 13.2 minutes) are putting up good numbers by bench-player standards but don’t approach the kind of prolific output the Raptors require.
A particularly disappointing aspect to the Raptors’ rebounding is the offensive end. A few times against the Magic today, and many more over the past few seasons, Raptors have taken shots while there is no one under the hoop to get the rebound. Whether this is player deficiency, a coaching strategy to get more men back on defense or a combination of the two, it’s one of the most discouraging things I’ve ever seen on an NBA court. If the Raptors miss a shot, they don’t get another one. This should be one of the primary problems addressed when the Raptors go centre-shopping this summer.
Finding a legitimate starting centre who and rebound and defend is arguably the Raptors’ most pressing need; while Parker and Moon can relieve Bosh’s pressures at least somewhat, Nesterovic needs to be reinforced.
Improvement… At What Cost?
It’s no secret that Orlando would like to pick up a shooting guard this offseason (or even a point guard), that Toronto needs a secondary scorer, or that both teams need man-on defense in the post. Shrewd moves this offseason could secure those pieces, whether through mid-level signings or trades. The team that wins this series can afford to make some moderate tweaks in order to meet these ends. The team that loses this series might be forced to make a drastic change.
The inalienable rule of any big trade is that even the team acquiring the best player has to make a sacrifice. The Magic, drained of assets, will have to manufacture opportunities to put together trade packages. The Raptors, replete with expiring contracts, will have to choose which assets should see the court and which should leave town. To obtain an impact player, the Magic might have to part with Nelson or even with Turkoglu. The Raptors are in an especially difficult position because their most crucial veterans are also their tradable expiring deals. In a perfect world, Nesterovic ($8.4 million) or Parker ($4.6 million) could be traded and then reacquired, like Brent Barry on the Spurs this season. There’s no guarantee of such a generous situation, though, so the Raptors will have to decide who’s really important to them.
The team that wins this series will be in the East’s final four, and if that team loses in the second round, it will likely be to Detroit. There’s no shame in losing a second-round series to Detroit, and that result could be seen as progress for either team. The Magic don’t want to become a 50-win team coughing up a first-round series with home-court advantage, and the Raptors don’t want to bow out early for the second straight year. The winner can be patient, if ambitious. The loser has no choice but to examine the possibility of upheaval. |
