What Ujiri's presser informed about the Raptors' 2024 off-season

Patience with a rebuild, credit to Rajakovic, and getting help at PG, wing defence

First off, apologies for the long wait between the previous post and this one. Life and work have been crazy the last few weeks (in a good way) and with the Raptors season having ended as well as the playoff preview content plus Cricket Canada work I was doing I figured it was best to put this on the back burner for a bit.

I recently received a promotion with Cricket Canada to be the team’s Media Manager during the upcoming men’s T20 World Cup and so there definitely won’t be any ‘Raptors in 7’ posts between May 25 - June 15 as I’ll be travelling with the team. I’m sure you’ll be too occupied with the NBA Conference Finals and NBA Finals during that time anyway.

Ideally, I would have liked to put together my immediate reactions to the different end of season pressers here but time just didn’t leave me with enough wiggle room and I had to prioritize the stuff I actually get paid to do.

For now, I will focus squarely on the Ujiri presser and the little nuggets that lend to how the front office may approach the off-season. I will keep the player/coach pressers for individual season evaluations to follow. Let’s get to it.

PATIENCE IN REBUILD

This has been a consistent theme of Ujiri’s in recent pressers, reminding the public that a rebuild will require patience and that most rebuilds take on a three to six year process. He did explain that he doesn’t intend on reaching the far end of that timeline, but the reality suggests that three years (one year having already just passed) is a minimum.

The likes of Boston and Milwaukee (the Bucks should rebound next season) are not going away any time soon, Philadelphia and Miami remain forces to reckon with, while New York, Indiana, Cleveland and Orlando are well positioned in the here and now. It’s entirely plausible the Raptors are at least another couple seasons away from being a top four team in the East again.

Of course, injuries/suspensions can derail any team’s season and so we see surprise teams regularly (Memphis being bad this past season for example), but health being equal, I’d have to put the two-year outlook of those aforementioned teams ahead of Toronto.

PATH WITH FUTURE PICK RAISES EYE BROWS

There was a Michael Grange question that some people had fun with, and while I agree the framing wasn’t the greatest, it was an important question to ask and Ujiri did provide an important answer to it (whether he goes against his words as he has in the past remains to be seen. See: Saying big deals are for the off-season and then trading both Anunoby and Siakam in-season).

Grange’s question was effectively asking whether the Raptors would commit to being bad next season if the team doesn’t end up conveying the pick to San Antonio in this year’s draft. For those wondering, if Toronto is awarded a pick in the top six at the draft lottery on May 12, then the team keeps the pick. If the pick lands outside the top six, the pick conveys to San Antonio as part of the Jakob Poeltl trade. In that scenario where the Raptors keep the top six pick, the organization has a serious decision to make on committing to being bottom-four bad next season because of the quality of next year’s draft. 2025 is not the year you want to be conveying a pick to San Antonio. The team would be at significant risk of doing so if the team picks in the top six this year and plays competitive basketball next year. Hence Grange’s question.

Ujiri implied that if the team performed well out of the gate, then they would ride it, and that if the team was playing well, everything else becomes secondary. For me, if the Raptors end up keeping this year’s pick and convey next year’s pick, that would be an absolutely terrible outcome and would have a serious impact on the quality of rebuild. There has already been one blunder in trading Siakam for pennies on the dollar and this would represent another one in my eyes.

If the Raptors keep this year’s pick, they should absolutely commit to being bottom four bad next year instead of gifting San Antonio pick in a stronger draft. If Toronto doesn’t keep this year’s pick, we should all be breathing a sigh of relief.

BACKUP PG AND WING DEFENDER TO BE ADDRESSED

Ujiri explicitly stated that the team will look to add both a quality backup point guard and a wing defender. As we saw this season, both are desperately needed. Rajakovic was able to incorporate a lot of good concepts offensively, but the defence — especially on the perimeter — has a long way to go.

While Barrett’s transformation as an offensive player since putting on a Raptor uniform was fully praised, Ujiri did make note that strides need to be made defensively. Scottie Barnes and Jakob Poeltl did a great job protecting the rim and deterring some of the dribble penetration conceded in front of them, but if this core is going to be a contender-worthy one, Barrett and Quickley have to be able to defend their position better than their current level.

Now, this wouldn’t be my newsletter if I didn’t make mention of the fact that Ujiri expressed a lot of belief that Ochai Agbaji can be one of the best defenders in the league and needs time to develop.

NON-COMMITAL TO THE JUNIORS

Ujiri was asked about both Gary Trent Jr. and Bruce Brown Jr. and said they are still in the process of assessing their fits. What’s left to evaluate at this point? Let’s put it this way, if Ujiri and the rest of the front office saw them as clear fits he would have at least been comfortable enough to say they are priorities for the summer.

Trent Jr. is an unrestricted free agent this summer. I get the feeling that the Raptors have a specific range in mind in terms of what they’d be willing to keep him around for and if another team is willing to exceed that range, then so be it. I’ve stated before that if the Raptors are willing to offer Trent Jr. a three or four-year deal then it probably shouldn’t exceed $15M/season but there is good sense is paying more for a deal of two years or fewer.

Brown Jr. has a team option for next year and, barring some significant free agent plans that would shock all of us, it would probably make most sense to pick up the team option in the hopes of recouping some type of asset by next season’s trade deadline.

CREDIT TO DARKO

Ujiri had a lot of praise for Rajakovic’s work as head coach this season despite being dealt an awful hand. He specifically commended Rajakovic’s communication skills across all departments at all levels and expressed satisfaction with implementing an offensive system and trending the organization back towards where it wants to be from a player development standpoint.

I will get into my full thoughts on Rajakovic in a separate column, but I lean in favour of Ujiri’s assessment. Rajakovic has had to coach four different iterations of the roster and that is a terrible set of circumstances to hand any head coach, let alone one taking on the role for the first time at the NBA level.

Among the developmental stories, Rajakovic deserves a lot of credit for Barrett’s excellent offensive play as a Raptor. This version of RJ has simply not existed in the past be it for the Knicks or Canada. Again, I’ll get into more of Rajakovic later down the line but Ujiri’s words on Rajakovic show that patience will be key with the head coach just as much as it is with the roster.

PROGRAMMING NOTE

Planning ahead, I’ll probably have the Rajakovic piece ready for next week, followed by something post-draft lottery. I’ll probably do a couple player evaluations as well before I’m off for the T20 World Cup.