{"id":176862,"date":"2026-02-08T15:04:06","date_gmt":"2026-02-08T20:04:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=176862"},"modified":"2026-02-08T15:04:06","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T20:04:06","slug":"raptors-to-cut-veteran-point-guard-when-why-what-are-their-options-to-fill-spot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2026\/02\/08\/raptors-to-cut-veteran-point-guard-when-why-what-are-their-options-to-fill-spot\/","title":{"rendered":"Raptors To Cut Veteran Point Guard When and Why, What Are Their Options To Fill Spot & TJD’s Role"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Toronto Raptors<\/a> made one of the NBA’s<\/a> most surprising trades af the trade deadline by acquiring veteran point guard Chris Paul<\/a> from the Los Angeles Clippers.<\/a><\/p>\n

Raptors To Cut Veteran Point Guard When and Why, What Are Their Options To Fill the Spot & TJD’s Role<\/h2>\n

While there was always doubt that Paul would suit up for the Raptors, the Raptors did have a use for him. The Raptors point guards rank in the bottom half of the league, and Paul figures to give them at least a few quality minutes behind Immanuel Quickley<\/a>. Granted, Jamal Shead<\/a> has done an outstanding job, though he has struggled shooting the ball.<\/p>\n

However, it is now official that Paul indeed does not have a role with Toronto. According to Michael Grange of SportsNet<\/a>, the 4o-year-old will be waived in the near future.<\/p>\n

“Chris Paul is probably one of my favorite players ever,\u201d said Raptors general manager Bobby Webster after making the trade. \u201cSo, it\u2019s a weird thing to trade for him. So I said (to his agent), whatever you want to do. At this point in his career, we want to be the most professional (we can be), so we\u2019ll waive him at the appropriate time.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Paul, who has never won an NBA title, struggled in his limited role with the Clippers before being sent home at the beginning of December. While Paul struggled shooting the ball, he still did a good job running the offense. He averaged 3.3 assists and just one turnover in 14 minutes of action.<\/p>\n

When Will The Raptors Waive Chris Paul?<\/h3>\n

With Paul on the roster, Toronto has 15 players on standard contracts. The Raptors are $1.1 million below the luxury tax and are unlikely to make any move that would jeopardize that status.\u00a0 Therefore, it is likely that the Raptors will sign a free agent.<\/p>\n

Golden State, Phoenix, Denver, Orlando, Houston, and Miami are all theoretical options as they have open roster spots. But, not sure anyone wants Paul. Teams have until the end of the regular season to finalize their playoff roster.<\/p>\n

Since the Raptors don’t have any urgency to make a roster move, as none of their two-way players are any danger of reaching the NBA 50-game limit.<\/p>\n

“Basically, no urgency for Raps until March 4, or until someone they wanna sign becomes available, Blake Murphy of SportsNet<\/a> tweeted.<\/span><\/p>\n

March 4, 2026, is the last day that NBA teams can sign a player to a two-way deal. AJ Lawson<\/a> and Alijah Martin<\/a> appear to be in a neck battle to grab the 15th spot if they go the 2-way route to fill the open spot. Lawson is the more NBA-experienced player, a better shooter and rebounder. Martin has the advantage in facilitating\/ball-handling and defense.<\/p>\n

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<\/smartframe-embed><\/p><\/h2>\n

What Will Trayce Jackson-Davis Role Be?<\/h2>\n

Besides acquiring Paul, Toronto acquired Trayce Davis-Jackson<\/a> from Golden State to provide insurance while Jakob Poeltl<\/a> deals with a back issue. Poeltl has only played 21 games, though none since December 21. He will miss his 24th straight game, per Murphy, before today’s contest against Indiana.<\/p>\n

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“Poeltl is out. He\u2019s \u201cvery close,” Murphy tweeted<\/a>. “The last 5-7 days have been reconditioning, trying to get that aspect back before he plays. Quickley is expected to play, but it’s still technically a game-time call.”<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n<\/div>\n
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Jackson-Davis is available against the Pacers and will likely see some time as the Raptors’ second big man off the bench. Darko Rajakovic<\/a> has been using either Sandro Mamukelishvili,<\/a>\u00a0Scottie Barnes<\/a>, or Collin Murray-Boyles<\/a> at the five in his starting lineups lately. But the 25-year-old will likely see sparse action, as he did with the Warriors this year. Murray-Boyles got the start versus the Pacers today.<\/div>\n
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Jackson-Davis is highly efficient around the rim. TJD has a high motor and is a relentless rebounder, particularly on the offensive end. While he is limited offensively, the 6-10 big man is a capable low-post defender and rim-protector.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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“We\u2019ve always had our eye on him in the past, but timing matters too,\u201d Webster <\/em>said, per Grange.\u201cWe called on him before, but Golden State got another big (<\/em>Kristaps Porzingis<\/a>) and I think it was sort of time for him to be free. So, when we did the <\/em>Ochai (Agbaji) <\/a>deal (to get below the tax), we had the ability. We didn\u2019t have a lot of money to spend, but we looked at anyone under<\/em> $3MM that we could bring in, and he quickly rose to the top of the list.\u201d<\/em><\/div>\n
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Jackson-Davis made his practice debut with the Raptors on Saturday and made quite an impression on his coach.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\u201cReally good first impressions,\u201d said Rajakovic<\/a>. \u201cYou can see that he’s a very smart player. He’s picking up things very quickly. He’s also asking really good questions in the parts of practice today when we went [with] a little bit of live.”<\/span><\/div>\n
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The Toronto Raptors made one of the NBA’s most surprising trades af the trade deadline by acquiring veteran point guard Chris Paul from the Los Angeles Clippers. Raptors To Cut Veteran Point Guard When and Why, What Are Their Options To Fill the Spot & TJD’s Role While there was always doubt that Paul would […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3146,"featured_media":176978,"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":[1608,2,62,3,14],"tags":[229,968,3852,4808],"class_list":["post-176862","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","category-featured","category-nba","category-news","category-raptors","tag-chris-paul","tag-jakob-poeltl","tag-scottie-barnes","tag-trayce-jackson-davis"],"modified_by":"Daniel Benjamin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176862","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\/3146"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=176862"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176862\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":176980,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176862\/revisions\/176980"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/176978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=176862"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=176862"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=176862"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}