Casey hopes to get DeRozan more minutes at point guard
DeMar DeRozan is slowly but surely demonstrating improvement as a facilitator for the Toronto Raptors, so to help accelerate his growth in that facet of his game, some minutes at point guard could be on the horizon.
"We got to have a better mentality of ball movement, man movement, and spacing," Raptors head coach Dwane Casey said during a Wednesday appearance on Sportsnet 590's "The Andrew Walker Show."
"DeMar DeRozan, have him handle the ball a bit more as a point guard, a facilitator, a passer. Kyle Lowry moving the ball a bit more, spacing up. We don't want to give our whole 'what we're going to try to do next year' away, but again, it comes down to passing the basketball and better spacing more so, than we know, one-on-one play."
The Raptors have been criticized in the past for utilizing an isolation-heavy offense, with DeMarre Carroll recently taking some parting shots at the team and its style of play.
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Toronto did rank dead last in the Association in 2016-17 in assists per game (18.5), 27th in passes made (274.7), and last in potential assists (37.6), while going iso 742 total times (seventh) at a frequency rate of 8.5 percent (sixth).
"Everyone and their brother knows we want better ball movement," Casey added.
Delon Wright is currently slotted as the backup to Lowry at the point after Cory Joseph was sent to the Indiana Pacers. While he did show a great deal of promise in his sophomore year, Wright is still an unproven commodity who could sink or swim in a more prominent role. If DeRozan can demonstrate a level of comfort for running the offense and evolve into an even more willing passer, it would alleviate some of the pressure on both Wright and third-stringer Fred Van Vleet, and add a new wrinkle to what's become a rather predictable attack.
According to Basketball-Reference.com, DeRozan hasn't played a single second at point guard since 2011-12, when three percent of his minutes across 63 outings were at the position.