Raptors ‘keeping their options open’ one month from NBA trade deadline

TORONTO – Much of the league is paying close attention to the Raptors with the Feb. 9 NBA trade deadline fast approaching.

It’s no secret and it’s also not hard to see why. Toronto is tied for 11th in the East and sits a couple games back of the final play-in spot just ahead of the season’s halfway mark, having lost 14 of its last 20 contests. There’s no shortage of reasons why the team has underperformed, but it’s not for a lack of talent at the top of the roster. If any of those guys – star quality players on team-friendly deals in or just entering their prime years – were to become available, they would be highly coveted in what’s looking like a seller’s market.

So, naturally, interested teams are waiting and wondering what approach they might take. One month out from the deadline, nobody seems quite sure and there’s a reason for that. The Raptors still aren’t sure themselves.

“[They’re] trying to figure s*** out,” said a source with knowledge of the situation in Toronto.

By all accounts, the team’s decision makers – led by president Masai Ujiri and general manager Bobby Webster – have yet to definitively commit to a path. It seems increasingly unlikely that they would be looking to buy, given how the first half of the season has gone, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they’ll operate as aggressive sellers either.

Currently, they don’t appear to be shopping any of their core players, according to multiple league sources, but they do seem willing to listen to offers.

“They’re keeping their options open,” as one source described their process, which means they also haven’t ruled out anything.

Assuming that’s the case, the coming weeks will be a crucial period of evaluation for an organization at a crossroads. Internally, they believe they’re better than their 17-23 record and there’s still hope that they can go on a run and turn their season around.

As bleak as things have felt at times during their recent slide, games like Sunday’s 117-105 win over the Trail Blazers offer that cause for optimism, a reminder of what they look like when things are clicking.

The Raptors held Portland without a field goal for nearly nine minutes in the first half and then again for four and a half minutes in the third quarter. They hit 39 per cent of their three-point attempts, all five starters made an impact, and they finally got something out of their struggling bench. It was one of their most complete outings of the season and their first win of 2023, snapping a three-game losing skid. They’ll have a chance to build on it with the 11-30 Charlotte Hornets – one of the five teams below Toronto in the league standings – coming to town for a two-game set this week.

Their regular starting lineup is gelling again since they were reassembled last week (they’ve outscored opponents by 8.7 points per 100 possessions in 106 minutes over the last four games), the defence has looked better, and they’ve got the easiest remaining schedule in the NBA. Of the 16 games they’ll play prior to the trade deadline, 10 of them come against teams that are currently at or below .500.

Whether they can take advantage of this stretch and continue to show signs of life could determine what happens next. Time is no longer on their side, with Tuesday’s game marking the official halfway point of the campaign, and decisions need to be made.

“Look at our record, we’re just trying to chip away,” Pascal Siakam said after practice on Monday. “In the grand scheme of things we obviously know we’re not where we’re supposed to be but we can’t get ahead of ourselves. We’ve got to focus on every single game, treat it like it’s our last, and try to stay together… Nobody feels sorry for us. And I feel like I’m tired of talking about it. We’ve just got to go out there and do it, and hopefully we build a little momentum and get some wins in a row.”

It’s a precarious time. Even as they were putting the finishing touches on Sunday’s impressive win, a video showing Scottie Barnes and Thaddeus Young locked in a heated verbal exchange during halftime warmups began to surface. Both players downplayed it afterwards, with the sophomore calling it “a little disagreement” and the 16-year vet saying it was “no different than brothers going back and forth.” They hugged it out and smoothed things over quickly.

Although they rarely play out on camera as this one did, these types of minor disputes are not uncommon over the course of a long season, with any team. However, as tensions boil over on a team that’s fallen short of expectations, like the Raptors, it tends to happen more frequently – differences of opinion between player and player, player and coach, or coach and coach.

Now, with the trade deadline looming, it’s going to be even harder to block out the outside noise and stay together.

“At the end of the day, I could care less,” Siakam said. “Unless my phone starts ringing and you're going somewhere, that’s the only thing. But other than that, I'm here, I'm coming to work every day, and I let the people that do their job do their job.”

Even in the midst of his uneven second season, the belief is that Barnes – the NBA’s reigning Rookie of the Year – remains the Raptors’ only true untouchable, though it would take a “king’s ransom,” as one source put it, for them to consider parting with Siakam or O.G. Anunoby. Fred VanVleet is having a down season and expected to opt into free agency over the summer, but the sense is that Toronto still values the soon to be 29-year-old point guard as a part of the core moving forward.

Gary Trent Jr. would appear to be the team’s most available player and presumably its most likely to get traded given his contractual status. Assuming he opts out of his deal, the 23-year-old guard should be in line for a big raise this off-season. Whether they choose to buy, sell or hold at the deadline, testing the waters on Trent could be appealing if the Raptors don’t anticipate bringing him back at his projected cost, likely north of $100 million. He’s not a prefect player, but at his age and with his ability to shoot and score the ball, in addition to his strong play of late, there should be a market for him.

One way or another, the Raptors aren’t likely to stand pat on Feb. 9. Change seems inevitable, in some form. It’s just a question of what they’ll do and how the league’s dominos will fall from there.