Raptors encouraged by Barnes’ progress as a leader

TORONTO – The numbers don’t tell the full story; they never really do.

Coming off his 2023-24 breakout, the common misconception is that Scottie Barnes has plateaued or even taken a small step backwards in his fourth NBA season. At least that’s what the statistics might suggest.

On a per 36-minute basis, the counting stats are virtually identical to his production from last year: 20.7 points, 8.4 rebounds and 6.4 assists. The only other players to average at least 20-8-6 per 36 this season are Nikola Jokic, Giannis Antetokounmpo, LeBron James, Luka Doncic, and Zion Williamson. Not bad at all.

If there’s a concern, it’s the decline in efficiency across the board. Barnes is shooting 44 per cent from the field and 27 per cent from three-point range – both career lows and down from 48 and 34 per cent, respectively, last season. He’s also turning the ball over at his highest rate ever.

The 2024-25 season has been a mixed bag for the Raptors star. It started with an inadvertent Jokic elbow to the face, fracturing his orbital bone and costing him 11 games, and will end this week with a nagging hand injury that has limited him and contributed to his shooting woes.

To appreciate the 23-year-old’s progress over the past 12 months, throw the numbers out the window. The most obvious area of growth has come on the defensive end, where Barnes has really blossomed, especially since the turn of the calendar.

Notably, but not coincidently, Toronto ranks inside the top five in defence since the start of January and its best player is most responsible for the drastic improvement – it was a bottom-five unit over the first couple months of the season.

With his size, athleticism, versatility, and defensive instincts, he’s always had elite upside. Unlocking it required a more consistent level of effort and focus, as it often does with young players. Now that he’s shown what that looks like, it’s reasonable to think he could continue developing into one of the league’s very best defenders.

But in speaking with people around the organization, the area of growth that excites them most is something that’s hard to quantify and won’t show up in the box score.

When Pascal Siakam was traded last winter, Barnes was thrust into an unfamiliar role as the leader and face of the franchise. He simply wasn’t ready for it, nor was he expected to be at that stage, and what we saw was a 22-year-old learning and adapting on the fly.

Since then, he’s signed a $225 million maximum contract extension. He became a father, which has a way of expediting the maturation process. He went through multiple sessions of media training, something he wanted to do to ensure that he’s representing the club the right way publicly. 

“I think in this league you naturally mature pretty fast,” Barnes told TSN. “Things that have happened to me at a young age, not a lot of people go through. And I think just being able to take that step to learn, develop and grow from it, it just helps me out. So, I think I’ve been maturing at a fast rate. I think I’m ready for those steps and I embrace it. I enjoy it. It’s fun.”

The Barnes that arrived at training camp in the fall was better prepared for the responsibility he’s inherited and everything that comes with it on and off the court. He's always been a vocal player, but according to his teammates he’s far more assertive during timeouts, at practice and in the locker room. He’s organized various team dinners throughout the year. In December, when the team was in the middle of its worst stretch, he called and led a film session with the starters to make sure that everybody was on the same page. He’s held himself and his teammates accountable behind closed doors and in front of the microphone, where he’s looked more confident and been more engaging. Each night, before they take the floor, he gives his team a pre-game speech.

“I mean, the first time I heard it I didn’t want to laugh,” joked rookie Jonathan Mogbo, who has known Barnes since they were AAU teammates in the fourth grade. “It was like, oh, I guess this is what he does. It was different seeing that side of him, but it’s important and it kinda sets the tone and gets our mind right before every game. That definitely speaks to his leadership.”

“I always believed and trusted that he has that leader in him and he was really able to showcase that this year,” said his head coach and most ardent supporter, Darko Rajakovic. “[We’ve had] a lot of conversations [about] how he needs to talk to his teammates, how he needs to lead, what kind of example he needs to set. This whole season he was always the hardest playing player in every practice we had. He was always the one setting the tone for everybody and that’s something that I do not take lightly, and I really appreciated.”

“His commitment to the organization, to the team, to his teammates is through the roof.” 

Planning a team event, picking up the tab at dinner, speaking up in a film session or in the pre-game walkthrough to share something he can see but others may not – these are small, subtle areas of leadership that go a long way on a young and rebuilding club, things Barnes may not have been comfortable doing earlier in his career.

The Raptors locker room that he came up in was a divided one. It was never contentious, but the veteran holdovers from the team’s championship era were used to doing things one way and Barnes, the precocious fourth-overall pick and 2022 Rookie of the Year, was of a different generation. It was only a matter of time before the team handed him the keys. The vets knew it, could see the writing on the wall, and it never sat well with them, which made for an awkward dynamic. When they were winning, it was manageable. When they started losing, it wasn’t.

But over the past 16 months, the front office has cleaned house and built a roster around Barnes, empowering him in the process. More often than not, teams inherit the personality of their best player, and you can see a lot of Barnes’ best qualities in the Raptors. They have a passion and desire to compete. They take the game seriously but not too seriously; there’s typically a looseness and joyous energy on the floor and in the room. They’re resilient; they’ve had to be to navigate the ups and downs of the past two seasons.

That’s the Barnes effect. Outside of Chris Boucher, who likely played his final game as a Raptor in February, he is their longest-tenured player. The other guys look to him for guidance, even the older ones. It’s one of the first things that Brandon Ingram picked up on when he joined his new team after being acquired at the trade deadline.

“From the first time I stepped in, I noticed that his teammates follow him, they follow his voice,” Ingram said during his introductory press conference back in February. 

“[Leadership] is never easy but I’m really willing to learn,” said Barnes. “And then you take things that you see from other people, as well, and you find ways to [implement] it. It’s all about being comfortable and I feel comfortable talking to these guys. We’re a great team and we get along with each other really well, so it makes it easy.”

If the Raptors are going to level up next season, Barnes will need to do so, as well, and he knows it. 

He’s been dealing with a metacarpophalangeal joint (or knuckle) bruise on his dominant right hand for a while. Neither he nor the team is quite sure when it started to bother him, but it’s almost certainly been a factor in his recent shooting slump. With that said, it’s not like he was shooting the lights out earlier in the season – he was only hitting 45 per cent of his shots and 27 per cent of his three-point attempts before the all-star break.

In a rebuilding year and with the team prioritizing development and draft positioning, they could afford to give Barnes the ultimate green light: fire away and get as many reps as possible to see what works and what doesn’t. It was an interesting trial. We learned that his mid-range turnaround on the baseline, a shot he previously struggled with, could end up being his signature move. We were reminded that, in rhythm, he’s a capable outside shooter. 

But when he’s settling for the jumper – particularly above the break, where he shot 26 per cent, down from 35 per cent last year – it detracts from the other more important areas of his offensive game.

He’s taken nearly twice as many mid-range shots as he did last year but only 4.1 attempts per game in the restricted area, down from 5.0. He’s at his best when he’s attacking the rim to score, get to the free throw line or make plays for his teammates. The jumper, or at least the threat of it, has always been an important part of his continued development, but he needs to be more efficient with it.

Determining what’s a good look for Barnes, and what isn’t, is part of the team’s evaluation process going into the off-season. Rajakovic has indicated they could prioritize spot-up shots over certain off-the-dibble ones that haven’t yielded positive results.

“He improved his post-up game this year, but he needs to be efficient,” Rajakovic said. “He’s been working [on his three-point shooting] and getting almost five threes a game, but he needs to improve percentages there. Everything comes down to that. Taking care of the ball more. I think it comes with, obviously, teammates that he has around, more chemistry between those guys, knowing each other and what they need to do, how they need to play. But also, it comes with maturing. There were moments [where] he was rushing things a little bit this year. But he was also searching for the answers and that’s something that I believe is really going to help him going into next season.”

Of course, there should be some natural regression from simply having a healthier and more complete lineup around him – he only shared the court with the trio of Immanuel Quickley, RJ Barrett and Jakob Poeltl in nine of his 63 games this year. The addition of Ingram, who will debut for the Raptors next season, could also help. With another proven scorer on the court, defences won’t be able to key in on Barnes.

With his trajectory as an elite defender, his playmaking ability and emerging post game, he can still be the team’s leader and most important player without necessarily being the No. 1 option offensively. Ingram’s presence in the lineup, presuming he can stay on the floor, may take the pressure off and bring out the best in Barnes. Even if they occupy similar spots on the court, they’re different enough and good enough for that pairing to be effective. If nothing else, the Raptors are confident that their franchise player will do everything he can to make it work. 

“To be honest, I just love playing the game of basketball,” Barnes said. “I think that’s what it really comes down to for me. At the end of the day, I really love playing basketball and I really love to win, so I’m willing to do whatever it takes when I’m out there on the floor. Everything else just goes with it. My passion, you see it each and every single game. I’m ready to guard, defend – that’s where my mentality starts first. But I just love the game and I’ll do anything to just try to win.”

For a 23-year-old going into the first year of an expensive new contract, these are all encouraging steps. They’re among the reasons why the Raptors are viewing Barnes’ fourth NBA season as a resounding success, regardless of what the numbers say.