{"id":111345,"date":"2024-12-09T17:39:51","date_gmt":"2024-12-09T22:39:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=111345"},"modified":"2024-12-09T17:39:51","modified_gmt":"2024-12-09T22:39:51","slug":"raptors-rj-barrett-relishing-opportunity-knicks-didnt-give","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2024\/12\/09\/raptors-rj-barrett-relishing-opportunity-knicks-didnt-give\/","title":{"rendered":"Raptors Rising Star Relishing Opportunity Knicks Didn\u2019t Give"},"content":{"rendered":"

Toronto Raptors swingman RJ Barrett<\/a>\u2019s career has been rejuvenated by the New York Knicks\u2019 decision to trade him last season.<\/p>\n

The third overall pick in the 2019 NBA Draft, Barrett now consistently looks the part. In fact, he may be on the verge of his first All-Star selection. With averages of 23.3 points, 6.6 rebounds, and 5.9 assists per game, Barrett is one just 17 players posting at least 20 points, five rebounds, and five assists per game this season. Only seven of those players are in the East.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s always been there. I\u2019m just getting to showcase it more<\/a>,\u201d Barrett tells Michael Grange of Sportsnet.<\/p>\n

Raptors Rising Star RJ Barrett Relishing Opportunity Knicks Didn\u2019t Give<\/h2>\n

As Grange notes, Barrett\u2019s admission that his opportunities have expanded north of the border isn\u2019t new. The Toronto native literally hit the ground running when he was traded to the Raptors and has been asked what\u2019s changed for him<\/a> in myriad ways.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo. 1, the brand of basketball is different. I think it fits my style a little more. The team that we have, we\u2019re young, we run\u2026 I\u2019ve always been a guy that\u2019s been good in transition, so that always helps.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

For those that watched him in New York, his answer isn\u2019t inaccurate either.<\/p>\n

There have been times when it seemed like the Knicks were prepared to give him the keys<\/a> to the franchise. However, after New York traded for Jalen Brunson<\/a>, he took a backseat in the Big Apple. At best, Barrett was going to be the third option behind him and Julius Randle<\/a>. In that role, he could lean into his strengths as a scorer and connector but it capped his ceiling.<\/p>\n

Barrett\u2019s latest comments are particularly enlightening though. Not because he concedes being able to step into larger shoes in Toronto. It\u2019s because he acknowledges feeling frozen out of the Knicks\u2019 offense.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that those guys were so good that we didn\u2019t need the cuts and stuff \u2026 they\u2019re gonna put the ball in the basket,\u201d he says. \u201cIn basketball sometimes, better offense wins, and it clearly worked, it\u2019s effective \u2026 I was able to do my thing [in New York]. It\u2019s just here, I\u2019m more efficient.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201c\u2026 I cut more [here] just because I know I have a chance to get [the ball] and even when I don\u2019t get it, I\u2019m not upset about it because I know I\u2019m getting it on the next one \u2026 If you cut all the time and you never get the ball, you\u2019re probably not gonna want to cut,\u201d he quips.<\/p>\n

Avoiding A Territorial Dispute<\/h3>\n

Feeling shut out of the offense \u2014in some sense \u2014 off-ball and on-ball, must have been some frustrating to Barrett. To his credit, he kept his head down and held himself accountable in New York. Nonetheless, it had to have been a hard pill to swallow for a young player and top-three draft pick.<\/p>\n

To that point, keep in mind that he\u2019s still just 24 years old.<\/p>\n

With that being said, though Barrett\u2019s been developing great chemistry with Scottie Barnes<\/a> and Immanuel Quickley<\/a>, the Raptors should be aware of where he wants to be in the pecking order. This could be particularly important come draft time. Currently projected to land the No. 4 pick, Toronto could be in position to select a prized perimeter prospect<\/a>, like Texas freshman Tre Johnson<\/a>. That\u2019s exactly the type of move that could lead to a decrease in Barrett\u2019s touches though, complicating matters.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Toronto Raptors swingman RJ Barrett\u2019s career has been rejuvenated by the New York Knicks\u2019 decision to trade him last season. The third overall pick in the 2019 NBA Draft, Barrett now consistently looks the part. In fact, he may be on the verge of his first All-Star selection. With averages of 23.3 points, 6.6 rebounds, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5008,"featured_media":111389,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14,1608,62,556,12,3],"tags":[2815,98,1382,1964],"class_list":["post-111345","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-raptors","category-basketball","category-nba","category-nba-draft","category-knicks","category-news","tag-nba-all-star-game","tag-nba-draft","tag-nba-trade","tag-rj-barrett"],"modified_by":"Quenton S Albertie","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111345","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5008"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111345"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111345\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":111391,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111345\/revisions\/111391"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/111389"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111345"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111345"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111345"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}