Raptors must avoid overburdening Lowry after Valanciunas injury
It's not quite the same situation as last year. But as the Toronto Raptors shuffle their rotation to make up for the absence of center Jonas Valanciunas, who is expected to miss six weeks with a broken bone in his hand, there are lessons to be learned from 2014-15.
The Raptors offense had been humming along lately before the Valanciunas injury. Entering Monday night's games, Toronto was in the top five in offensive efficiency. Now, though, the Raptors will be without one of their top three offensive options. And when that happened last year, thanks to an injury to DeMar DeRozan, Toronto asked Kyle Lowry to pick up the offensive load. As Eric Koreen of the National Post points out, it was a disaster:
If the Raptors are to challenge the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference playoffs this season -- if they're to even have a shot at doing so, really -- then they might have to weather some rough offensive stretches during the regular season. It's simply not worth wearing out Lowry now at the expense of the postseason.
Last year, the Raptors lost another one of the offensive fulcrums, DeMar DeRozan, to a significant injury near the end of November, and he did not return until January. And while the Raptors survived, and even thrived, without DeRozan offensively, that period is now seen as crucial in establishing the Raptors’ identity as an isolation-driven, perimeter-oriented team. It also helped contribute to Kyle Lowry’s physical deterioration, as the Raptors placed a huge offensive load on the point guard. He never recovered in the second half.
