mediocre, play-in territory<\/a>, it raises the question of whether Toronto could have a better outlook by trading Scottie Barnes, as some believe he isn’t suited to be the franchise\u2019s main leader.<\/p>\nHow confident should we be in Scottie Barnes as the franchise player?<\/p>\n
I certainly share the same reservations about Barnes’ aggressiveness on offense and his ceiling in that area, which seems to be lowering with each passing game. On the other hand, there’s the argument that Barnes was not supposed to be the primary option to begin with, and I get that. <\/p>\n
Even if his career-high just stands at 35 points, Scottie Barnes is far from an incapable scoring threat. Many have believed that Barnes could truly thrive if he had the drive and opportunities to play to his strengths, and I share that optimism. However, given the current roster construction, that just isn’t a role he can consistently take on and he’s leaned in more to being a passer as of late than anything. <\/p>\n
It\u2019s no secret that the front office\u2019s decisions around roster construction and fit have largely set him up for disappointment \u2014 though I wouldn\u2019t go as far as calling it \u201cfailure,\u201d since the team has looked fairly competent overall this year. There\u2019s a notable lack of consistent shooting around Barnes and he has been forced into playing various roles, as Toronto simply doesn\u2019t have the reliable players to fill those spots from the start. As a result, we\u2019ve seen Barnes step up as a point guard, a center, and a traditional combo-forward at different times throughout the year.<\/p>\n
Still, we knew sooner or later we’d face tough questions about just how high this core\u2019s ceiling really is in the playoffs \u2014 and now, that\u2019s exactly where we are.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s definitely a dark cloud hanging over this squad right now, and some fans might be slipping into a pessimistic mindset. But like I mentioned earlier, rushing to trade Scottie Barnes in a panic isn\u2019t the answer. Instead, maybe we should look at the front office first, the coaching staff, and especially the pieces around Scottie before we place all the blame or single him out for criticism. <\/p>\n
That said, I wouldn\u2019t advocate for leaving him unaccountable \u2014 when he fails to show up or take over for the team he’s expected to lead, I believe that\u2019s justified criticism. Still, this is a very serious issue being discussed within Raptors Nation, and if the team shows little momentum in the playoffs, a major Scottie Barnes trade might not be out of the question. For now though, we might have to give Barnes a bit more grace before jumping to any hasty judgments. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Alright, this is a really sensitive topic in the Raptors sphere, so before I get into it, I\u2019ll…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":703265,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3770],"tags":[7,6,681,680,476,3820],"class_list":{"0":"post-703264","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-toronto-raptors","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-nba","10":"tag-raptors","11":"tag-toronto","12":"tag-toronto-raptors","13":"tag-torontoraptors"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116363479129251764","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703264","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=703264"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703264\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/703265"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=703264"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=703264"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=703264"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}