Scottie Barnes is key to Toronto Raptors reaching their defensive ceiling

TORONTO — Precious Achiuwa knew exactly what he had said, and he had no intention of backing down.

After the Toronto Raptors’ final preseason game last week, Achiuwa spoke about his defensive ability. Let’s just say he has the utmost confidence in it. On Tuesday, the day before the regular season started for his Raptors, he was asked why he thought he could be one of the best defenders in the league.

“No,” said Achiuwa, stopping the questioner in his tracks. “I am one of the best defenders.

“My athleticism, my quick feet, my speed, my agility: I think that is what separates me. I know I’m not an average defender. There’s not five guys in the NBA that guard one through five. I don’t care what team you go look at, but I know I’m one of those five guys. I’ve guarded MVPs that are fives, MVPs that are fours, point guards that were All-Stars.”

After the Raptors’ opening-night win, Achiuwa’s claims had clearly made their way around the team’s locker room.

“Obviously, we know how athletic he is,” Pascal Siakam said. “I think he told you guys he’s the best defender in the league.”

Not quite.

“He said top five? Yeah, yeah, yeah. He told y’all. I think he’s focused. He wants to continue to get better.”

The Raptors have the talent to be a defensive beast, and they hinted at it on Wednesday, holding the Minnesota Timberwolves to 94 points on an effective field goal percentage, which accounts for the extra value of 3-pointers, of 38 percent. That is worse than any of the Raptors’ opponents shot from the field in any game over the last two years.

Before anybody gets so far out over their skis that they do a very dangerous summersault, the Timberwolves shot 8-for-31 from 3-point range on Wednesday. Per NBA.com, the Timberwolves shot 7-for-26 (26.9 percent) on 3-pointers when the closest defender was four feet away or further from the shooter. The Timberwolves were without Jaden McDaniels, their starting forward who shot 40 percent on those looks last year. One game.

Disclaimer over. Wednesday was, at least, proof of concept.

“We should be top five defensively,” said Scottie Barnes, who had five blocks, “with all these guys and (their) long-ass arms.”

The easiest way to understand Nick Nurse’s hyperaggressive defensive strategy over the last two years was by, counter-intuitively, focusing on the offence. Nurse’s calculation was that the Raptors could not outscore most teams on pure offensive talent — shooting and playmaking in the half court — so not only did he want his team to have far more shots than his opponents, but he wanted many of those extra opportunities to be in transition, where efficiency is typically highest. Part of the way to do that is to try extra hard for deflections and steals, but that left the Raptors giving up some of the most desirable shots to their opponents when they could not turn them over. The Raptors finished 29th in opponents eFG last year, and that rose to just 23rd after the acquisition of Jakob Poeltl.

The takeaway: If the style goosed the Raptors’ offence, it likely hurt their defence, too. The Raptors didn’t have as much offensive talent as their 13th-ranked offensive rating suggested, but they probably had more defensive talent than their 11th-ranked defence. Whether the results basically cancelled each other out? Well, that is part of what we will learn this year.

Darko Rajaković’s bet is simple: He believes the Raptors are long and physical enough to create enough turnovers and misses to help spur the offence without heading over to the extreme. It is easy to poke fun at Achiuwa’s statement, but he, Scottie Barnes and O.G. Anunoby are three of the small group of players with quick feet and overall strength to guard across the positional spectrum. When Poeltl is out there, the Raptors will play more conservatively, obsessed with making their opponents shoot over them. When he’s not — assuming someone like Achiuwa is his replacement — they will switch assignments liberally to encourage the same effect.

While new point guard Dennis Schröder isn’t the help defender that Fred VanVleet is, he is quicker when defending on the ball. Anunoby is the best bet to guard the best non-centre offensive threat on the opposition, leaving the likes of Barnes, Pascal Siakam and Achiuwa to roam in their most imposing defensive lineups.

Poeltl referred to Barnes as the team’s defensive wild card.

“Scottie, sometimes he’ll see a situation where he feels like he can come double (team) a guy that’s ball-dominant (who) is not really going to find the right pass,” Poeltl said. “And I think the rest of the team is quick enough to pick up on stuff like that. So when he does go and double, even if it might not be part of the system at that moment or it’s not a play call or anything like that, everybody else is on string and then can react to it.”

Barnes has spoken about his ambition to be a Defensive Player of the Year contender. He has the playmaking ability to do that, but needs to refine the decision-making Poeltl talked about, as well as sustain his effort throughout a game. So, normal young player stuff.

When it all clicks, it is electric. In the fourth quarter, Barnes helped off his man, sharp-shooting big man Karl-Anthony Towns, in order to crowd the paint. He trusted Gary Trent Jr. to be able to make the rotation to Towns if the ball got to him in the corner. It didn’t. Poeltl maintained ideal positioning on the driving Naz Reid, and Barnes was there to block the attempt, starting a fast break.

It was a good gamble to take, given Reid isn’t the most natural of playmakers.

“That’s where my game starts — on the defensive end, being able to go out there and guard anybody, taking pride in it,” Barnes said. “That’s just my mentality going into every game, trying to start off on defence. That leads to great offence with transition and that just leads me to stay on lockdown throughout the game.”

Barnes can’t assume everything will go as smoothly as it did on Wednesday. Sometimes, you have to make your own energy, and bounce back even if your opponents are hitting tough shots. If Wednesday was the starting point for Barnes and the Raptors, their defensive ceiling is clear. They can be one of the best defensive teams in the league.