Player development a huge priority for youthful Raptors

TORONTO – More than two hours before opening tipoff for a rare Saturday night home game at Scotiabank Arena, Toronto Raptors veteran Garrett Temple takes a seat on the team bench in the almost empty arena, looks out on the floor and likes what he sees.

It’s not just that his four-year-old son, Garrett Jr., is behaving himself under the watchful eye of members of the Raptors training staff, though that’s a welcome bonus.

But Temple looks out on the floor and sees the team’s rookies being put through yet another pre-game workout by Raptors veteran development coach Jim Sann and nods in approval.

“There’s a reason why we’re very competitive even though guys are resting, and guys are injured,” said Temple. “It’s because we still have a competitive rosters. These guys compete, they’re competitors, but they do it with a plan.”

They fell short on Saturday night as the Raptors dropped the first of a two-game set against the Washington Wizards 118-117 as Jamal Shead’s runner out a set inbounds play was ruled to have left his hand a split second after the clock expired. It was ruled good on the floor and Shead and the Raptors celebrated what seemed to be their second walk-off win in five days. But the joy was short-lived as the referees ruled the shot was off too late upon video review.

“I was hyped, I thought we won the game,” said Shead afterwards. “And then after the review I was kind of sad. But we play them again Monday. Next-game mindset.”

Shead got his second career start with veteran point guard Immanuel Quickley given the night off on the second night of a back-to-back, and the rookie took advantage, finishing with 11 points, nine assists and a steal in 29 minutes. The 45th-overall pick in the draft last summer out of the University of Houston, Shead is part of an impressive group of rookies the Raptors have assembled this season, along with Ja’Kobe Walter (out with a strained thigh), Jonathan Mogbo (out with a broken nose), and Jamison Battle (11 points and three triples off the bench last night).

It extends beyond that with the Raptors getting productive minutes from the likes of two-way signees Jared Rhoden (13 points) and A.J. Lawson (seven points), who have sharpened their fit while seeing time with both the Raptors and Raptors 905 in the G League.

Shead and the other rookies credit the Raptors’ development approach.

“We push ourselves in those (pre-game) workouts and we get out there in games and try to replicate that,” he said.

It’s been the same scene before every game the Raptors have played this season. After most of the team’s youngest players have done their individual skill development work (usually in the morning on a game day, or in the evenings after practice when they don’t play) and the team as a whole does its film work and game-day walk through, and before the veterans take their floor for their solo warm-ups, the Raptors rookies are on the floor for a 15-minute, high-tempo mini-practice. They sprint through the team’s various sets at close to game speed against the team’s development staff, made up mostly of former college or pro players.

“I think it’s super helpful, just because it helps us develop chemistry, getting a better understanding for each other, where each of us like to be, where we like our spots, and stuff like that,” said Battle. “But also it’s just more repetition, in the end, more game-like reps, which is really good. We’ve developed such a routine where, when I’m shooting pre-game by myself – it’s not that I’m uncomfortable– but it feels different, because I’m so used to being in that group setting. But I love it just because I feel like we’re growing as a team. We’re growing as a young group guys. So it’s helped us a lot in our career.”

It’s not that the program is unique to the team, but in the opinion of pro scouts from other organizations who make a point of watching pre-game workouts to glean any background they can on players’ individual habits and traits, the intensity and level of detail the Raptors go through with their work is a cut above the norm.

It’s no surprise given Raptors head coach Darko Rajakovic’s background as a player development coach and his instantiable passion for the subject that is reflected in his coaching staff.

“What are the paths to how to get to the next level? For each player, it’s going to be different,” said Rajakovic. “What I do know, what’s coming for all of them is that there has to be hard work and there has to be intentional work.

“That’s why I’m hard to work with. When you talk to my assistant coaches, I am sure they are going to tell you that because I’m asking my assistant coaches for every workout, every practice, every time when they get on the floor that they have a plan, that they write it down, there is a thought process behind it and that we’re following the goals that we want to work on and develop.

“And there is a lot of individual work, obviously and that’s part what you guys see over there (but) I don’t want to come to the game and get 10 minutes of shots and get ready for the game. Those 15 minutes for 82 games, if you use it the right way, that helps your player development. Get your shots, but also working on details of your game, adding defensive (work) in there as well.”

There will likely be plenty of opportunities for the team’s youngest and least proven players to show the dividends of their efforts in the coming weeks as the season winds down, the draft lottery remains front and centre, and an even greater emphasis is placed on development over results.

A cynic might point out that the Raptors could be hurting their own lottery chances. The Raptors rookies and other assorted youngsters play hard enough, well enough and smart enough to shift games, especially against some of the league’s bottom feeders. It was Walter hitting a game winner as a crew of youngsters helped the Raptors win at the buzzer over Orlando on Tuesday. Against the Wizards, the Raptors’ closing lineup was Shead, Orlando Robinson, who was recently signed after joining Toronto on a pair of 10-day deals, Rhoden, Lawson and Colin Castleton, another 10-day signee. They brought the Raptors back from down six with 4:15 to play against the Wizards’ starters, just not all the way back.

The loss snapped the Raptors’ three-game winning streak and left them at 21-43 and still with the fifth-best lottery odds. The Wizards improved to 13-49.

Temple, a 15-year veteran at age 38 who gives a lot of his time to helping the team’s younger players adjust to the NBA, thinks the Raptors are on to something, and the payoff will come sooner rather than later.

“The team does a great job, but at the end of the day, self-motivation takes precedence over all of that” he said. “These guys want to get better, and they understand that this helps them get better and they take it seriously, and it shows by how much better they’ve gotten.

“… When I was coming into the league we didn’t have this type of detail in our development and stuff like that it’s great to see.”

• RJ Barrett led the Raptors in scoring with 23 points while adding nine rebounds and three assists. With Quickley out, Barrett played some point guard when Shead sat, and had mixed results. He had two beautiful assists on consecutive plays in the first quarter – a smart bounce pass in transition to Rhoden for a lay-up and then an excellent late find of Jakob Poeltl in transition for another lay-up. But Barrett also had five turnovers, some of them on some poor reads in traffic.

• Poeltl was excellent at both ends. He finished with 21 points, five rebounds, five assists and two steals in 24 minutes. He also helped hold Wizards rookie Alex Sarr, the second-overall pick in last year’s draft, to 5-of-16 shooting. Poeltl is still on a minutes restriction for a hip injury (that’s what the team is saying, anyway) and his night was done with 7:18 left to play, but not before Poeltl had scored nine points and assisted on another bucket in the first 4:42 of the fourth. Had he not been pulled, it’s hard to imagine the Raptors would have lost the game or that it would have been close.

• Castleton has gotten plenty of playing time while on his 10-day deal. He played 23 minutes against Utah on Friday and 26 against the Wizards. At six-foot-11 he’s listed as a centre, but Rajakovic has given him long looks playing four alongside either Poeltl or Robinson, praising the second-year pro’s knack for being able to switch onto smaller players defensively. He had five assists on Friday and scored six points and grabbed six rebounds Saturday.