With the 45th pick, the Raptors select Jamal Shead

[OakleyDokely]

If he can hit open 3s consistently, there's a role for him in the NBA because he's a safe pair of hands who can make plays defensively.

[PhilBlackson]

My only question is why do we need both him and Davion Mitchell?

Maybe you don't need Mitchell (in particular) but maybe you do but they won't find out until they see what Shead is or isn't as well.

Right now, we can pretty confidently say that Davion can at least be a passable back up. We don't know what Shead is yet. Personally I like the look of Jamal's versatility as a player more than Davion but we gotta see how/if it even translates to a NBA court.

While I wasn't one that got caught up in his single amazing senior year like half this board did, he's just a clear example that you can't just assume because he was a high level player at college that he will be at this level too. BUT again at least you he can be an ok backup, Jamal may be a complete Nowell level bust lol and if he is big deal almost every pick in the 40s usually fails besides Jokic & Norm lol but we hit on him, ok cool move Davion out in a future trade package or at worst it gives Shead a chance to adjust to the league and let him walk. But at least we have an actual PG rotation.

Not to mention both guys bring a dog attitude to the lockerroom where I really just don't see the downside especially when it arguably didn't cost a damn thing, in fact we were damn near GIFTED these guys by the Kings for taking McDaniels corpse off of our bench and thankfully out of our rotation.

[mtcan]

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Good, he's worth an actual roster spot. Sucks to suck, teams that only offered 2ways!

Or maybe theres a reason they only offered him 2 ways.

What does that mean? Which undrafted player gets an offer that is NOT a 2 way?

These offers came to him so that he has the option to tell teams "don't draft me" if he doesn't like his destination. (Which has been happening more frequently late second round nowadays)

It goes to show he actually wants to play in toronto.

Fred VanVleet got an off that is not a 2-way. Most undrafted guys will get the exhibit 10 or 2-way contracts.

That year we took Dalano and David Johnson...I recall that Dalano got a standard guaranteed 2nd round pick contract and David Johnson got a 2-way despite the fact that they were both 2nd round picks and taken one after the other.

[Chuck Everett]

A big Shead guy for these last 4 years, this guy is in the mold of Lowry and FVV. His one weakness is that he needs to raise his shot profile. He took a lot of off-the dribble pullups for Houston this year without Jarace and Sasser to pass to. His jumper tends to front rim a lot, but he's a former football player, who has in game leaping ability, not combine leaping which is BS anyway.

As long as Raps' development coaches work with Jamal to put a lot of arc on the ball, he will turn into a very good shooter. Just the fact that he spoke about watching film with them on his pre-draft workout tells me everything.

And one word on Davion. The second half of last year, he shot much better from 3 than he did at any point in his NBA career. I am not sure why he started making more of the catch and shoot 3's, but perhaps that is something he finally was comfortable doing, as he has always been much more of a downhill driver.

I had the exchange with Duffman, but I hope the change of scenery works out for Davion as well. Having Shead and Davion rag Quickley in practice/training camp should make him even better for the Raptors since most PG's in this league don't want to defend like that.

Davion has become really adept at pulling the chair on bigger offensive players, even though he gets called for fouls because he's not a star.

[Reeko]

I just watched a defensive highlight reel and my God this kid is a menace, a straight up ball hawk.

[dTox]

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[REJECTEDBYCLARK]

I just watched a defensive highlight reel and my God this kid is a menace, a straight up ball hawk.

he is the best perimeter defender in the class. better than dunn but he's beat in the dimension department. the effort and defensive IQ are off the charts. had shead 22nd on my board and a lot of guys i know had him 12-15. he's still young enough. totally different situation and player than nowell.

[mtcan]

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I was instantly impressed when I saw that. He's a good kid.

[Reeko]

I just watched a defensive highlight reel and my God this kid is a menace, a straight up ball hawk.

he is the best perimeter defender in the class. better than dunn but he's beat in the dimension department. the effort and defensive IQ are off the charts. had shead 22nd on my board and a lot of guys i know had him 12-15. he's still young enough. totally different situation and player than nowell.

He's doing stuff that I've never seen before. He steals the ball close to his own basket, saves it from going out of bounds but ends up passing it to a player on the other team and then steals it from that player. It's the kind of defensive effort that can lead a team and turn a game around. Can't wait to see him play for us.

[REJECTEDBYCLARK]

I just watched a defensive highlight reel and my God this kid is a menace, a straight up ball hawk.

he is the best perimeter defender in the class. better than dunn but he's beat in the dimension department. the effort and defensive IQ are off the charts. had shead 22nd on my board and a lot of guys i know had him 12-15. he's still young enough. totally different situation and player than nowell.

He's doing stuff that I've never seen before. He steals the ball close to his own basket, saves it from going out of bounds but ends up passing it to a player on the other team and then steals it from that player. It's the kind of defensive effort that can lead a team and turn a game around. Can't wait to see him play for us.

i was excited when i heard the name. i told pensare who was worried the raps are drafting too many offensively inclined players that one option at 31 was to trade down and select shead and before you knew it the mcdaniels trade happened and they were able to get him at a spot they were more comfortable and that I imagine more teams would be comfortable at.

he has no business guarding bigger players the way he does. i was and still am worried that at 6'3 he lacks the wingspan to have a beverley kind of return on defense but hes so good that you have to gamble on him overcoming it.

[XTC]

I just watched a defensive highlight reel and my God this kid is a menace, a straight up ball hawk.

he is the best perimeter defender in the class. better than dunn but he's beat in the dimension department. the effort and defensive IQ are off the charts. had shead 22nd on my board and a lot of guys i know had him 12-15. he's still young enough. totally different situation and player than nowell.

He's doing stuff that I've never seen before. He steals the ball close to his own basket, saves it from going out of bounds but ends up passing it to a player on the other team and then steals it from that player. It's the kind of defensive effort that can lead a team and turn a game around. Can't wait to see him play for us.

I've always said if you can make playing defense seem fun, you're a special type of defender.

Shead is exactly just that. I could put on a highlight of him playing defense and be thoroughly entertained. Kid is an NBA player and someone I really expected to go in the first round. What really separates him from someone like PatBev is his vision, playmaking, and leaderahip. Kid gives me Lowry vibes.

[Chuck Everett]

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He's a high character kid from a great family as well. Kelvin Sampson calls him the best leader he's ever coached. High praise for sure.

[Harcore Fenton Mun]

He plays a lot like Kyle. A smart, veteran guard.

[PhilBlackson]

A big Shead guy for these last 4 years, this guy is in the mold of Lowry and FVV. His one weakness is that he needs to raise his shot profile. He took a lot of off-the dribble pullups for Houston this year without Jarace and Sasser to pass to. His jumper tends to front rim a lot, but he's a former football player, who has in game leaping ability, not combine leaping which is BS anyway.

As long as Raps' development coaches work with Jamal to put a lot of arc on the ball, he will turn into a very good shooter. Just the fact that he spoke about watching film with them on his pre-draft workout tells me everything.

And one word on Davion. The second half of last year, he shot much better from 3 than he did at any point in his NBA career. I am not sure why he started making more of the catch and shoot 3's, but perhaps that is something he finally was comfortable doing, as he has always been much more of a downhill driver.

I had the exchange with Duffman, but I hope the change of scenery works out for Davion as well. Having Shead and Davion rag Quickley in practice/training camp should make him even better for the Raptors since most PG's in this league don't want to defend like that.

Davion has become really adept at pulling the chair on bigger offensive players, even though he gets called for fouls because he's not a star.

Love this post lol great insight...

Touched on a lot of stuff I'm thinking as I watch more & more of Shead....it's funny that you mentioned Lowry because I just drew a minor comparison to him maybe a page or two ago so I totally get what you mean. Although I'll firstly say with all due respect to Fred, who was a big shot maker during our championship run & had a damn good season where he made ASG reserve spot. I don't actually think he's the same "type" of PG although of course the commonality amongst the 3 are the height, strength and underrated defensive ability despite being short players.

BUT the massive seperator imo between Lowry & Shead from FVV...is the INTANGIBLES. Fred wasn't an intangibles guy ie/ being a floor general & a leader of his team. Fred threw teammates under the bus, that wasn't Kyle & that doesn't look like Shead to me. Also Kyle was never trippin about how many points he scored, he just wanted to win...Fred did VERY much care how much he scored even if it was at the expense of our winning. I'm not hating but that's really where they differ. Kyle tried to do all the little things to help the team win whether it was taken his patent charges, actively looking to get his teammates going, just bringing the energy night in & night out, always encouraging his guys & getting after it defensively --- I see a lot of that Jamal. He's not the same player & as I said in the post I made earlier, Jamal isn't the same level shooter which is a big difference (at least for now). Obviously I doubt Jamal will turn out to be even remotely as good as Kyle was but he does seem to be cut from a similar cloth even if it looks a bit different, I don't think Fred was made quite from the same stuff even if there were some resemblances.

And the last part is yeah they'll both push IQ to get much better off the dribble which is his biggest area of improvement. Also the 2 of them should bring a DOG mentality that has been missing maybe since Charles Oakley days lol. BUT between the two of them, if Shead hits to me, he has the potential to be the better back up because he looks to get his teammates more involved than what I've seen of Davion. I don't mind Mitchell but I do think he needs to do a much better job actually being a PG because you're not gonna be a very good & your small but just look to get your shot off each time AND you weren't a natural shooter either. So I feel like Mitchell needs to show me something different while Jamal just needs to show us that what he did in college, he can do in the league too.

[Parataxis]

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Good, he's worth an actual roster spot. Sucks to suck, teams that only offered 2ways!

I don't understand this? He doesn't get to pre-reject contracts, does he? He goes where he's drafted.

No, his draft rights go to where he's drafted. He doesn't have to sign a 2 way.

That's correct. But he can't turn down something that's never been offered to him.

Only one team gets to offer him a contract, and until 6 hours ago, no teams could.

Unless they just mean that he told teams that he didn't WANT a 2-way contract? But that could just be posturing until it actually comes time to put pen to paper. (plus, hey, draft rights don't expire, and a team could do worse than letting a kid get experience in Europe for a few years)

[Chuck Everett]

Love this post lol great insight...

Touched on a lot of stuff I'm thinking as I watch more & more of Shead....it's funny that you mentioned Lowry because I just drew a minor comparison to him maybe a page or two ago so I totally get what you mean. Although I'll firstly say with all due respect to Fred, who was a big shot maker during our championship run & had a damn good season where he made ASG reserve spot. I don't actually think he's the same "type" of PG although of course the commonality amongst the 3 are the height, strength and underrated defensive ability despite being short players.

BUT the massive seperator imo between Lowry & Shead from FVV...is the INTANGIBLES. Fred wasn't an intangibles guy ie/ being a floor general & a leader of his team. Fred threw teammates under the bus, that wasn't Kyle & that doesn't look like Shead to me. Also Kyle was never trippin about how many points he scored, he just wanted to win...Fred did VERY much care how much he scored even if it was at the expense of our winning. I'm not hating but that's really where they differ. Kyle tried to do all the little things to help the team win whether it was taken his patent charges, actively looking to get his teammates going, just bringing the energy night in & night out, always encouraging his guys & getting after it defensively --- I see a lot of that Jamal. He's not the same player & as I said in the post I made earlier, Jamal isn't the same level shooter which is a big difference (at least for now). Obviously I doubt Jamal will turn out to be even remotely as good as Kyle was but he does seem to be cut from a similar cloth even if it looks a bit different, I don't think Fred was made quite from the same stuff even if there were some resemblances.

And the last part is yeah they'll both push IQ to get much better off the dribble which is his biggest area of improvement. Also the 2 of them should bring a DOG mentality that has been missing maybe since Charles Oakley days lol. BUT between the two of them, if Shead hits to me, he has the potential to be the better back up because he looks to get his teammates more involved than what I've seen of Davion. I don't mind Mitchell but I do think he needs to do a much better job actually being a PG because you're not gonna be a very good & your small but just look to get your shot off each team AND you weren't a natural shooter either. So I feel like Mitchell needs to show me something different & Jamal needs to show us that what he does can work in the NBA too.

I am old sadly, but when Lowry was coming out of Villanova, I got into an argument with a Villanova fan who was pissed he was leaving after two years. I told him that Lowry would have a 10 year career in the NBA bare minimum and he bet me I was wrong. Well, Lowry is still somehow playing. That guy was/is a winner. And tough as nails.

As for FVV, I understand it didn't end well for Raps fans with him, but I am going to look at the totality there. When Fred was at Wichita State playing with Ron Baker and Cleanthony Early, you knew right away that he was a pro caliber point guard. He went undrafted and became a fringe all-star. That's incredible at his size. On the aggregate, Toronto got that man's best years. However, one of the things that is underrated about FVV is his ability to control the pace of a game. If you watched Houston at all this past season, he had a bounce back season in terms of reputation and really helped Sengun come into his own. The intangibles that Fred showed before he got blinded by wanting to "bet on himself" had returned.

My reason for lumping them together is because neither guy should have been successful as NBA pros if you just look at them. One has a big butt and the other is methodical. Both are short. Yet, because of their brains, they are better than guys who were quicker, faster, taller and bigger. Jamal is in that mold. Tamin Lipsey at Iowa State is another guy coming soon who is like that.

Davion was never going to get to showcase better passing ability in Sacramento sadly. Think about it. Their offense runs through Sabonis as a hub. Then Fox when Sabonis sits or is tired. Then Malik Monk whenever he comes into the game. That team was unique in the sense that I can't justify giving Davion the ball more over any of those guys. Davion should be playing with Booker/Durant or in New Orleans.

[OAKLEY_2]

Im gonna go out on a limb and say he outplays Davion in camp and takes his role.

I highly doubt that.

[deeps6x]

We are only taking guys with names starting with J. Ja’kobe, Johnathon and Jamal.

Ja’kobe, Joh'nathon and Ja'mal.

[deeps6x]

I really like Shead. I had him mocked higher and think it was a great pick. Sure, I wish he was a few inches taller, but if he was, we wouldn't have been able to get him here.

[dTox]

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