Raps vs Celtics: Preseason - Wed, Oct 15th, 2025 - 730PM EST

[Duffman100]

This team is really looking like exactly what I thought they'd be, too many bad defenders in the starting lineup, you can't have a good defence with IQ, Barrett, and Ingram at the 1, 2, and 3, Scottie and Jak can't play defence for the entire team.

They'll try to compensate with their offence but it will be tough to do with Scottie looking like he has regressed yet again in 3 point shooting, even in preseason it's clear other teams are going to make it hard for the Raptors to get quality shots close to the basket. If they can't even play well against a decimated Boston team missing Brown for all but 7 minutes it's going to be a long season.

It's so weird. Knicks fans were adamant that IQ was a good defender.

[dandaman]

I will trust the 4 year sample of Scottie over 2 preseason games but lack of him adding nothing in the offseason is a bummer, offense looks clunky as advertised, they are in each others way alot but you can see if they fix that part that our offense can be be pretty potent, i am gonna give it 15 games or so before i start making any harsh judgements

[Son Goku 25]

I find IQ really annoying as a player. I think we had too much high hopes for him, he's not even a poor man's Maxey. Id rather have RJ on the team than him but we need his one skill that he has over RJ which is shooting.

Hopefully we don't shy away if we need to blow it up this season and tank or look aggressively at trades.

[DreamTeam09]

-Quickly isn't gonna go 1-8 from 3 most nights
-Scottie 7 of his 13 shots were in the paint
-The starters looked better as the game went on
-the whole team missed bunnies
-this is a team where the whole will be greater than the sum of its parts,

[HumbleRen]

This team is really looking like exactly what I thought they'd be, too many bad defenders in the starting lineup, you can't have a good defence with IQ, Barrett, and Ingram at the 1, 2, and 3, Scottie and Jak can't play defence for the entire team.

They'll try to compensate with their offence but it will be tough to do with Scottie looking like he has regressed yet again in 3 point shooting, even in preseason it's clear other teams are going to make it hard for the Raptors to get quality shots close to the basket. If they can't even play well against a decimated Boston team missing Brown for all but 7 minutes it's going to be a long season.

It's so weird. Knicks fans were adamant that IQ was a good defender.

He is in a good context. Thibs was also just a much more superior defensive coach than Darko is.

[HumbleRen]

I will trust the 4 year sample of Scottie over 2 preseason games but lack of him adding nothing in the offseason is a bummer, offense looks clunky as advertised, they are in each others way alot but you can see if they fix that part that our offense can be be pretty potent, i am gonna give it 15 games or so before i start making any harsh judgements

I think people would be less doomer about it if Scottie was coming out an all nba caliber season but he isn’t.

He’s coming off where he was bottom 2 last season in volume shooting. Like that should have sent signals to everyone that maybe Scottie just doesn’t have the skillset right now to be a top 2 offensive creator on a very good team.

He clearly won’t be this bad over the course of the season or even near it but what is clear is that we can’t give him the benefit of the doubt anymore that he’s just simply “experimenting” in the pre season. He hasn’t proven to be an efficient creator once during his 4 seasons outside of an extremely hot shooting month in December of 2023.

[ATLTimekeeper]

Through 5 pre-season games we have a really high assist rate and a really low TOV rate. Fwiw, last pre-season we had a high assist rate with a high TO rate and that carried through to the regular season.

The offense is encouraging despite the poor results. Poeltl is just getting his legs under him and Scottie and IQ have been off.

yes, and I think that's a point in darko's favor that the process has mostly been good and he's generally getting guys into good spots to get positive looks but the execution has simply not been there. you'd hope that would swing back around because while we're seeing some guys like IQ/Scottie struggle a bit with their shots so far, I don't think it'll be nearly this bad from there forever. so things can/will swing upward but the fact they're winning the possession battles/getting way more shots off/shooting more 3s will pay off in the end. they're still keeping competitive now as is with awful shooting.

The biggest problem on offense is we have no middle range established yet. That's supposed to be at volume Ingram and Scottie, but they're not hitting well from there. The next arrangement of shots is probably that Poeltl push shot and then IQ's floaters. I think there's some timing issues right now, especially with IQ just working very fast.

[MEDIC]

This team is really looking like exactly what I thought they'd be, too many bad defenders in the starting lineup, you can't have a good defence with IQ, Barrett, and Ingram at the 1, 2, and 3, Scottie and Jak can't play defence for the entire team.

They'll try to compensate with their offence but it will be tough to do with Scottie looking like he has regressed yet again in 3 point shooting, even in preseason it's clear other teams are going to make it hard for the Raptors to get quality shots close to the basket. If they can't even play well against a decimated Boston team missing Brown for all but 7 minutes it's going to be a long season.

It's so weird. Knicks fans were adamant that IQ was a good defender.

I think IQ is a good offball/ system type defender. Knows where to be, when to help, etc. Not a very good on ball defender......not at PG anyhow.

Maybe Thibs got the most out of him wifh his system.

The Knicks seemed to have a good grasp of who IQ was and who he wasn't. They got the most out of his ability. They did the same with Precious when he got there.

The problem with the Raptors franchise is they are hell bent on trying to force every young-ish player into an allstar. Sometimes these guys are almost maxed out & you need to simply put them into a position to succeed. That's the only way to make a playoff push.

How many of these guys have shown substantial growth in the Raptors system over the last 2-3 years? I can't think of one player. Maybe Ochai? Barrett has shown some improvement.

There have been no Derozans or Siakams or FVV'S or Norms.

Thank gawd for Ingram. Without him, this team would be lacking major scoring talent.

[MEDIC]

I find IQ really annoying as a player. I think we had too much high hopes for him, he's not even a poor man's Maxey. Id rather have RJ on the team than him but we need his one skill that he has over RJ which is shooting.

Hopefully we don't shy away if we need to blow it up this season and tank or look aggressively at trades.

I was never a big IQ believer. I would take Pritchard over him as a starting PG.

I have been saying it for over a year now. If this team wants to get serious about winning, they need a serioud 2 way upgrade at the PG position. A young Holiday type player would do wonders for this team.

[MEDIC]

Boston was playing really hard. The Raptors didn't play scared and would have won without the refs.

Boston was punking them in the 1st quarter. Boston looked like a team of professionals. Raps looked super soft. To the Raps creadit, they picked it up aftee that.

Refs treated White like he was the 2nd coming of MJ.

nah it was like a 12 point margin, which is nothing in this NBA. The Celtics are trying to establish a really physical style of play. The fact that the Raptors battled back and carried the play for most of the game was really encouraging.

Yeah, but the Raptors need to learn to be the team that comes out physical. Some teams have that culture. Some don't. Boston always has.

Having said all that, I am glad the Celts came out & played hard & White played like a star. There is nothing to be learned from playing a weak/ soft opponent.

This was a learning game for the players and the coaches no doubt. There will be some valuable film to review.

[Pointgod]

This team is really looking like exactly what I thought they'd be, too many bad defenders in the starting lineup, you can't have a good defence with IQ, Barrett, and Ingram at the 1, 2, and 3, Scottie and Jak can't play defence for the entire team.

They'll try to compensate with their offence but it will be tough to do with Scottie looking like he has regressed yet again in 3 point shooting, even in preseason it's clear other teams are going to make it hard for the Raptors to get quality shots close to the basket. If they can't even play well against a decimated Boston team missing Brown for all but 7 minutes it's going to be a long season.

It's so weird. Knicks fans were adamant that IQ was a good defender.

Probably because Thibs emphasizes defence and playing hard at all costs plus he was mostly defending second unit players. To be fair, if you look at the advanced metrics he’s only had a DBPM above 0 once (0.4). Every other season has been 0 or negative. I wonder if that season was just the exception.

[JB7]

This team is really looking like exactly what I thought they'd be, too many bad defenders in the starting lineup, you can't have a good defence with IQ, Barrett, and Ingram at the 1, 2, and 3, Scottie and Jak can't play defence for the entire team.

They'll try to compensate with their offence but it will be tough to do with Scottie looking like he has regressed yet again in 3 point shooting, even in preseason it's clear other teams are going to make it hard for the Raptors to get quality shots close to the basket. If they can't even play well against a decimated Boston team missing Brown for all but 7 minutes it's going to be a long season.

The more I see of that starting 5 together, the more I see two separate lineups, with that starting lineup split up between them:
- BI & RJ together, with Mamu, CMB & Shead
- Barnes with IQ & Yak, plus Gradey and Ochai

BI & Barnes both want to be the initiator of the offence, and look disinterested if they are not. If they can play a significant portion of their minutes separated, the team will probably function better.

[Madvillainy2004]

Shead starting and handling and letting Scottie be point forward would make the offence so much better.

I just don't know how anyone can watch the games and think the solution is MORE scottie barnes at PG

Say what you want about Nick Nurse but he knew Scotties limitations lol he should be trying to do the things he did successfully as a rookie because thats the only role I see him being successful in offensively.

[ATLTimekeeper]

Boston was punking them in the 1st quarter. Boston looked like a team of professionals. Raps looked super soft. To the Raps creadit, they picked it up aftee that.

Refs treated White like he was the 2nd coming of MJ.

nah it was like a 12 point margin, which is nothing in this NBA. The Celtics are trying to establish a really physical style of play. The fact that the Raptors battled back and carried the play for most of the game was really encouraging.

Yeah, but the Raptors need to learn to be the team that comes out physical. Some teams have that culture. Some don't. Boston always has.

Having said all that, I am glad the Celts came out & played hard & White played like a star. There is nothing to be learned from playing a weak/ soft opponent.

This was a learning game for the players and the coaches no doubt. There will be some valuable film to review.

I don't think it matters at all. This is pre-season. There's nothing at stake. It might be good for the Raptors to get some experience playing through playoff physicality, but it says nothing about the character of the team.

Case in point Schiermann elbowing Gradey in the throat last game. Gradey got up and made a bunch of shots. The Raptors let Schiermann's skill play the Celtics to a disadvantage and they came back and won while he fouled out. This is their physicality. Garza 5 fouls in like 10 minutes. Gonzalez 5 fouls in like 15 minutes. That's not tough. That's just hack basketball.

[YogurtProducer]

Shead starting and handling and letting Scottie be point forward would make the offence so much better.

I just don't know how anyone can watch the games and think the solution is MORE scottie barnes at PG

Say what you want about Nick Nurse but he knew Scotties limitations lol he should be trying to do the things he did successfully as a rookie because thats the only role I see him being successful in offensively.

I agree. Maybe a bit more usage than year 1 and 2, but certainly lower than last year.

Not to say he couldn't grow back into it in a few years, but certainly for this year he should be greatly reduced.

[YogurtProducer]

This team is really looking like exactly what I thought they'd be, too many bad defenders in the starting lineup, you can't have a good defence with IQ, Barrett, and Ingram at the 1, 2, and 3, Scottie and Jak can't play defence for the entire team.

They'll try to compensate with their offence but it will be tough to do with Scottie looking like he has regressed yet again in 3 point shooting, even in preseason it's clear other teams are going to make it hard for the Raptors to get quality shots close to the basket. If they can't even play well against a decimated Boston team missing Brown for all but 7 minutes it's going to be a long season.

It's so weird. Knicks fans were adamant that IQ was a good defender.

IMO he still is. This is a board that called FVV a bad defender as well. People just really suck at evaluating defense from guards.

Hard to really judge based off tanking in 2023/24, constant injuries in 2024/25, and pre season this year. I would give him a bit of time to get up to speed and play some real NBA basketball before we freak out lol.

I don't think IQ is gonna be making any all-defence teams, but he is far from bad at the PG spot. Moves his feet, seems alright in a team concept, doesn't get bullied, etc. People just have way to high of expectations for what you can reasonably expect from a PG on that end

[MEDIC]

nah it was like a 12 point margin, which is nothing in this NBA. The Celtics are trying to establish a really physical style of play. The fact that the Raptors battled back and carried the play for most of the game was really encouraging.

Yeah, but the Raptors need to learn to be the team that comes out physical. Some teams have that culture. Some don't. Boston always has.

Having said all that, I am glad the Celts came out & played hard & White played like a star. There is nothing to be learned from playing a weak/ soft opponent.

This was a learning game for the players and the coaches no doubt. There will be some valuable film to review.

I don't think it matters at all. This is pre-season. There's nothing at stake. It might be good for the Raptors to get some experience playing through playoff physicality, but it says nothing about the character of the team.

Case in point Schiermann elbowing Gradey in the throat last game. Gradey got up and made a bunch of shots. The Raptors let Schiermann's skill play the Celtics to a disadvantage and they came back and won while he fouled out. This is their physicality. Garza 5 fouls in like 10 minutes. Gonzalez 5 fouls in like 15 minutes. That's not tough. That's just hack basketball.

Well, if that's the way the coach wants them to play.....

I am a big habits guy. These games are practices. Practice like you want to play. You get them to be overly physical until they learn how to be physical, without fouling too much. Its impossible to do it any other way.

It also tells the refs "this is our brand, so expect it". Boston has been doing that for decades & they always seem to be allowed to play more physical than most teams.

[Harcore Fenton Mun]

That's the thing, what player's actually been in Darko's "dog house". I can't think of any (Bouche maybe).

So, I'm not surprised to see people doing whatever they want.

[Boogie!]

I find IQ really annoying as a player. I think we had too much high hopes for him, he's not even a poor man's Maxey. Id rather have RJ on the team than him but we need his one skill that he has over RJ which is shooting.

Hopefully we don't shy away if we need to blow it up this season and tank or look aggressively at trades.

IQs shooting will be valuable on this team… it makes no sense to complain about the guy who’s been consistent in a skill that this team sorely lacks. The only player that annoys me in the starting lineup right now is Barnes.

[TakeYourHeart]

Shead starting and handling and letting Scottie be point forward would make the offence so much better.

I just don't know how anyone can watch the games and think the solution is MORE scottie barnes at PG

He just might be so detrimental off ball that it's better to put him on the ball. So it's not about more PG Scottie, but less off ball Scottie screwing up the spacing for everyone and having his defenders help off him. Of course on ball Scottie has its own limitations, his defender might sag off of him but the floor will be better spaced...it's a theory not without its merits.