Raptors Discussion: v97 Raptor's 2024-2025 - Training camp begins Oct. 1

[hockeywiz542]

Raptors' hiring of Darko Rajakovic as head coach refocuses team on youth

After a lengthy search, the Raptors have finally hired Rajakovic as Nick Nurse's replacement.

theathletic.com

Coming into Toronto, he has proven that players enjoy working with him.

“(Rajakovic is) just like one of those dudes (from whom) you don’t what to expect,” Steven Adams, then with the Thunder, said in 2016. “You don’t know whether he’s happy, sad, or just like amped up or nothing. He’s just always wired. So, when he’s trying to teach you something, he’s real serious. And he’s just like, boom! (He’ll) just crack you. Yeah, he’s crazy.”

Rajakovic has close relationships with players including Adams and Grizzlies swingman Desmond Bane. Whatever the Raptors end up doing with their core of veterans, which includes free agents Fred VanVleet, Jakob Poeltl and Gary Trent Jr., as well as extension-eligible forwards Pascal Siakam and O.G. Anunoby, the path to whatever comes next includes making the most of the team’s young players.

The Raptors had been so good at that for so long. However, that organizational strength has faded since the pandemic, with draft picks like Malachi Flynn and Dalano Banton failing to grab hold of rotation spots, and the team recycling through undrafted free agents and two-way players. The result was Nurse playing his starters more than any other coach in the league.

Even Scottie Barnes, the 2021-2022 rookie of the year, took a notable step sideways, if not backward, last season.

The lack of development from the Raptors’ unheralded younger plays was one of the biggest issues between Nurse and the front office. As it stands, the Raptors are out one first-round pick — protected through the top six in 2024 — and three second-round picks. The Raptors are going to have to find some gold, and Rajakovic will be instrumental in that process. He also has a scouting background, and has been coaching in some form since he was 17.

Beyond that, the biggest job for Rajakovic will be building a creative, productive offence for this roster, however it ends up looking in October. He’s known for creating plenty of different looks off pick-and-rolls. He is also charismatic, known for his sense of humour.

How he handles the shift to the big seat is an unknown, as it is with all first-time head coaches. It’s much easier to deal with players as an assistant than as a head coach, when you become responsible for their playing time.

We’ll see how Rajakovic handles the roster when the Raptors open training camp. More intriguing — the roster that will greet Rajakovic. This is the first head coach Masai Ujiri has ever hired from outside his current organization. His instincts have served him well in other areas. Now, we learn a bit more about what, and who, he trusts.

 

[hockeywiz542]

 

[Leaf Rocket]

hihi someone explain what a sign and trade means? Other than the obvious . Who does this benefit and does the team signing and trading every get anything useful?

Thanks

Instead of losing the players who are about to hit RFA/UFA status, sign-and-trade gives the financial flexibility and benefits of getting something in return. The original team is sometimes able to get "kickers" so it incentivizes players to move less, for example in the Free Agency 7 years deal but with the original team's 8-year deal. In this instance to appease both parties player signs a good contract first, then getting traded to their preferred destination with the Original team receiving compensation for working it out with all both parties.

 

[The Nemesis]

If nothing else, teh new coach must be thrilled to get away from the Dillon Brooks/Ja Morant gongshow in Memphis

 

[hockeywiz542]

 

[hockeywiz542]

No surprise to see Raptors think outside the box in hiring Rajakovic as coach

The Toronto Raptors front office is staffed by serious people whose careers followed paths that were less than conventional. The same can be said of their new head coach -- Darko Rajakovic.

www.sportsnet.ca

As coaching prospects go, Rajakovic comes across as long on substance if a little bit short on name recognition. Those who know him speak highly of him, it’s just not everyone knows him.

“I don’t know anything about him,” said one league insider with ties to coaches and players throughout the league.

But he checks a lot of boxes. He’s worked with superstars like Kevin Durant and Ja Morant but has made his mark helping ‘lesser’ players improve, grow, and become stars – Grizzlies shooting guard Desmond Bane being one example.

“Very detailed, respectful, an information seeker,” was how one assistant coach who worked with Rajakovic described him to me, via text. “Great guy, everyone loves him -- players and coaches. Good connector.”

Said a former G-League head coach who squared off against him at that level: “A good coach, his teams were really well prepared. Nice guy as well, I like him.”

Rajakovic, who began his coaching career as a 16-year-old in Serbia, will become just the second European to become an NBA head coach, following in the footsteps of fellow Serb Igor Kokoskov, who lasted one year with the Phoenix Suns in 2018-19.

He was a head coach at the youth level in Serbia and at the lower rungs of men’s professional basketball in Spain before joining the Oklahoma City Thunder as head coach of their G League team in Tulsa in 2012. He did that for two years – crossing paths with several NBA players along the way – before being promoted to the big team for the 2014-15 season.

Interestingly, that was the last year in OKC for Scott Brooks, but when Billy Donovan was hired to replace him, Rajakovic was retained and worked for Donovan for the next four seasons before leaving to become an assistant coach with the Suns. His head coach there was Monty Williams, who was the associate head coach in OKC during Donovan’s first season on the bench with the Thunder. When building out his staff in Phoenix, he reached out to Rajakovic.

He clearly knows how to make a good impression.

As for playing style, he’s been known to be an adherent of ‘conceptual offence’ where players are empowered to make decisions on an almost equal basis, depending on what the moment calls for, rather than according to a more bench-driven approach. But Rajakovic is a proponent of those decisions being made quickly. When he was with the Suns, he appeared on the Basketball Immersion podcast, hosted by former University of Windsor head coach and basketball clinician Chris Oliver.

“We described our offensive identity as playing basketball with 0.5,” said Rajakovic. “Which means making quick decisions in 0.5 seconds -- you take a shot, put the ball on the floor and drive it or make a pass. You got to make quick decisions; there is no holding onto the ball there, is no playing a lot of [one-on-one or isolation] ball and we just wanted to play fast.”

The challenge now will be how the 44-year-old can alter the trajectory of a Raptors team that seems to be stuck in a certain kind of NBA limbo – good enough to nibble at the playoffs but with some significant structural flaws that would seem to prevent the current group from going much further, a persistent lack of perimeter shooting chief among them.

 

[trellaine201]

Instead of losing the players who are about to hit RFA/UFA status, sign-and-trade gives the financial flexibility and benefits of getting something in return. The original team is sometimes able to get "kickers" so it incentivizes players to move less, for example in the Free Agency 7 years deal but with the original team's 8-year deal. In this instance to appease both parties player signs a good contract first, then getting traded to their preferred destination with the Original team receiving compensation for working it out with all both parties.

Basically player A chooses his team(s) and contract? Then the team needs to agree on the players etc returning? If player A chooses one team your kinda hooped?

 

[hockeywiz542]

 

[Ale Brew]

Basically player A chooses his team(s) and contract? Then the team needs to agree on the players etc returning? If player A chooses one team your kinda hooped?

Yes and no. If the team he wants to sign with doesn’t have cap space, the team must work out a trade or they can’t sign him.

In the case of Kyle Lowry, the franchise kind of felt obligated to help him get where he wanted given everything he did for the Raptors. Doesn’t have to be that way though.

 

[hockeywiz542]

Josh Lewenberg: Rajakovic hiring gives little indication of where the Raptors are heading | TSN

From the little we know about the process, it’s not hard to see what made Darko Rajakovic stand out above the rest. The 44-year-old checks off several boxes for a team looking to re-stabilize after missing the playoffs in two of the last three seasons. But what comes next?

www.tsn.ca

The Raptors were never believed to be considering the more established names on the market. They wanted to find the next great coach, somebody who fit the organizational ethos and could grow with the team.

There’s an inherent risk to hiring any first-time NBA head coach. You can do your due diligence, hold interviews and check references – which is the answer to: “what have they been up to over the past seven weeks?” – but you never really know how somebody will fare under the pressure of being the primary play-caller at this level until they go through it firsthand. But for a rookie head coach, Rajakovic comes with a wealth of experience, which may help alleviate some of that risk.

Rajakovic started coaching in his native Serbia at the age of 16. Nearly three decades and several stops later, he’s paid his dues. He spent a couple years coaching in Spain. He worked as a scouting consultant for the San Antonio Spurs during their Tim Duncan-led championship heyday of the early 2000s. He became the G League’s first-ever head coach born outside of North America when he took a job with the Oklahoma City’s affiliate in Tulsa, and he’s served as an assistant in the NBA with the Thunder, Phoenix Suns and most recently the Memphis Grizzlies.

Speaking to people who have worked with Rajakovic, especially in Memphis over the past three seasons, one of the first things that comes up is his knack for player development. By all accounts, he’s been instrumental in the growth of Desmond Bane, the Grizzlies’ breakout third-year guard, as well as 23-year-old big man Jaren Jackson Jr., the NBA’s reigning Defensive Player of the Year.

If there was an area of emphasis for Ujiri when he addressed the media after the Nurse firing and before the coaching search began it was the lack of development at the backend of the Raptors’ roster in recent years, as well as the need to rediscover the culture he watched slip away last season. Look no further than the two teams currently competing for a championship, the Denver Nuggets and Miami Heat, both of which feature a collection of home-grown talent and boast established organizational cultures. That those clubs are led by two of the NBA’s four longest tenured coaches in Michael Malone (who’s been in Denver since 2015) and Erik Spoelstra (who’s in his 15th season at the helm of the Heat) isn’t a coincidence.

Given what was at stake and the importance of getting this hire right, it’s hard to blame the Raptors for taking their time. This is a big offseason for the organization, with the 13th pick in the June 22 draft, three rotation players (Fred VanVleet, Gary Trent Jr. and Jakob Poeltl) hitting free agency the following week, and another two going into contract years with uncertain futures (Pascal Siakam and O.G. Anunoby). Finding a head coach who can navigate them through all that was a crucial first step.

But what comes next? If you were hoping that the coaching decision would be an indicator of their intended direction you might be left disappointed.

Had they brought in a veteran coach – somebody like Mike Budenholzer, Doc Rivers or Monty Williams, before he signed his mega deal with Detroit – it would’ve been safe to deduce that they were planning to contend in the near future. Whereas, hiring a younger coach with less experience than the well-travelled and highly regarded Rajakovic may have made more sense in a retooling scenario.

But one of the things the Raptors like about Rajakovic is that he gives them some flexibility in choosing a path, and for better or for worse, this is a front office that values flexibility. If free agency doesn’t go as planned or they decide to pivot and rebuild around Scottie Barnes, they believe Rajakovic is the right guy to work with and bring out the best in a young team. If they keep their veteran core together, or add to it, they’re confident that Rajakovic’s experience and expertise have prepared him to lead a competitive team.

He’s not just a player development guru; he’s been around winning teams and winning players his entire career. In his nine seasons as an NBA assistant coach, his teams have only finished below .500 once. Over the past couple decades he’s worked with the likes of Duncan, Kevin Durant, Devin Booker, Ja Morant and Nikola Jokic, who he coached as a member of the Serbian national team in 2019 (when they finished fifth at the FIBA World Cup). Those who know him best say he has the rare ability to relate to rookie second-rounders and superstars alike.

What his roster, or even his staff, will look like for next season remains to be seen. With the draft around the corner and the start of free agency shortly after that, there are still more questions than answers. The Raptors are at a crossroads without a clear path in front of them and with some possible roadblocks ahead. At least we finally know who will be at the wheel.

 

[hockeywiz542]

 

[hockeywiz542]

Darko Rajakovic's first job? Figuring out the Raptors' languid offence

New coach Darko Rajakovic has the background to suggest he will do what he can to get more out of the Raptors’ attack.

theathletic.com

In the wake of the news, I wrote that Rajakovic’s hiring signals the Raptors are particularly well suited to go in a more youth-oriented direction, which would put the futures of VanVleet and Siakam, in particular, in doubt. I stand by that, but there is an obvious counter to that: making foundational-altering moves is extremely difficult, and Raptors president Masai Ujiri has proven to be on the conservative side when it comes to moving on from his best players. It’s fine and good to say the Raptors will move Siakam for a package of young players and draft picks or allow likely free agent-to-be VanVleet to earn around $30 million annually elsewhere — this easy! — but the Raptors have shown little inclination to blatantly tank. I’d expect them to set a high price for teams looking to acquire Siakam, and be fairly aggressive in attempting to retain VanVleet. Even if it looks like roster wheel-spinning from the outside, the front office has to know they can’t afford to simply lose, or sell low, on their most accomplished players.

The June 22 draft, when Siakam (or O.G. Anunoby) is most likely to be moved, and free agency will clear up the roster picture. However, there is a real chance the team’s core remains intact heading into October, with bigger moves to come at some point in the undetermined future. If that is the case, the question is how does Rajakovic employ those players to create something more functional than what we saw in the last two years, when Nick Nurse tried to game the system by prioritizing offensive rebounding and turnover creation in order to avoid half-court basketball.

Rajakovic has talked about players making the decision about whether to pass, dribble or shoot within a half-second, the philosophy the Spurs used to earn their fifth title in 2014. That makes sense, as he was a scouting consultant and Summer League assistant with San Antonio from 2004-11, as the Spurs transitioned from a plodding offence built around the brilliance of Tim Duncan to a European-style attack predicated on ball movement, player movement and, above all else, rapid-fire decision making. That Rajakovic was part of identifying some of the players who could be part of that is encouraging.

Also, look at the players who were vocal in their happiness for Rajakovic upon his hiring, or mentioned as players who benefitted from his coaching: Devin Booker, Desmond Bane and Mikal Bridges. All three have become core parts of playoff teams, with Bane and Bridges in particular growing from off-ball threats to players who can create advantages with the ball in their hands. Now or later, the Raptors will need that growth from inside OVO Athletic Centre, and Rajakovic is as good of a choice as any to spearhead the attempt to facilitate that.

Alas, there remains the obvious question: Can a coach radically change the Raptors, as constructed? All three of those players came with, at the very least, serviceable jumpers. Three of the Raptors’ five starters range from non-shooters to merely inefficient ones. They have just spent the last two years favouring isolations and mismatch hunting. When they couldn’t create an opportunity in transition, the Raptors have been one of the slowest teams to manufacture a shot. Typically, the closer you get to the end of the shot clock, the worse percentage you will shoot.

That all stems from two facts: They lack dynamic outside shooting and a player who can get downhill and put consistent pressure on the rim. It is not as if Nurse, who spent years preaching the merits of the “flow” offence, wanted to put something out there that was so laboured.

There is a degree of reprogramming that will have to go on with the Raptors, and that will come with a lot of drilling and re-drilling. It is not as if the Raptors lack players with solid basketball IQ; they have the know-how to play differently. Do they have the ability to do it? If the core remains together, answering that question for Ujiri is Rajakovic’s first job.

 

[DuklaNation]

Darko prioritizes ball movement and offense. Something this roster sorely lacks. I'd expect this means Fred is toast as he is the antithesis of ball movement offense.

 

[trellaine201]

Yes and no. If the team he wants to sign with doesn’t have cap space, the team must work out a trade or they can’t sign him.

In the case of Kyle Lowry, the franchise kind of felt obligated to help him get where he wanted given everything he did for the Raptors. Doesn’t have to be that way though.

Aww ok. From what I know or recall teams get very little in return?

 

[tmlms13]

How many people first read the article as Darko Milicic hired by Raptors?

 

[The Nemesis]

Aww ok. From what I know or recall teams get very little in return?

Generally yes, though it depends on how over the barrel the other team is in terms of the cap (and thus how many/few alternative ways they could get that player or fill holes in their roster) and how dead set the player is on that one destination to set how much leverage the trading team has. When the Raptors traded Bosh to Miami they got 2 1st round picks (Miami's and their own which they had traded away long before then) because Bosh only wanted to go to the Heat and Miami signing LeBron meant they had no wiggle room except to accept whatever terms Toronto had if they wanted him. But that was a rare occurrence and it's almost never that slanted in the trading team's favor. Trading Lowry only got the Raps a young project player (Achiuwa) and Goran Dragic for salary-matching purposes

 

[Bjindaho]

Just looking around, Houston can sign FVV without needing a sign and trade (and there appears to be smoke there).

Trent has been linked with Orlando, who do not have cap space (per https://www.spotrac.com/nba/cap/, there are 4 teams with cap space). They would need to convince Toronto to take back salaries to make the trade work.

Special note: If you have cap space, like the 4, you can sign free agents free and clear up to the cap. Beyond that, teams have the ability to sign their own free agents to go above (bird rights rules), which is why sign and trades are common.

 

[hockeywiz542]

 

[hockeywiz542]

 

[Clark4Ever]

Management really screwed up at the trade deadline. Hopefully we can arrange a sign and trade and recoup assets for FVV.

 

[hockeywiz542]

 

[Dr.Funk]

Let him walk

 

[saska sault]

Let him walk

Or sign and trade and get something in return...

 

[al secord]

How often do sign and trades happen in the NBA?

 

[Dr.Funk]

How often do sign and trades happen in the NBA?

Several times an offseason

Or sign and trade and get something in return...

Sure, whatever. As long as he is gone.