Fred VanVleet Sets Franchise Record vs. Hornets While O.G. Anunoby's Success Complicates Future for Raptors

The Toronto Raptors saw Fred VanVleet set a new franchise record against the Charlotte Hornets while O.G. Anunoby continued to show offensive development

Jim Dedmon-USA TODAY Sports

O.G. Anunoby may be playing himself off the Toronto Raptors.

O.G. Anunoby may be playing himself off the Toronto Raptors.

It’s a complicated situation for Toronto: The better Anunoby plays, the less likely it is he signs an extension with the organization through his 2024 free agency.

At one point, it seemed impossible for the Raptors to extend Anunoby as current NBA rules prohibit players from signing extensions worth more than 120% of their current salary with eight percent raises after that. For Anunoby, that meant Toronto couldn’t come close to offering a reasonable deal. The new collective bargaining agreement, though, has raised that number to 140%, meaning Toronto can offer Anunoby a four-year, $117 million deal, an offer just low enough to make things difficult for the Raptors.

Had this been another injury-plagued season for the 25-year-old forward, Anunoby might have opted to play it safe. He may have signed an extension similar to the new maximum Toronto can offer. Instead, Anunoby has put together the best and most consistent season of his career.

The development has been impressive from Anunoby who dropped 23 points in Toronto’s 128-108 blowout victory over the Charlotte Hornets on Sunday night. While most of his buckets still come off easy catch-and-shoot looks, his pull-up game appears to be coming along. He worked the pick-and-roll with Christian Koloko in the first half before nailing a pull-up three, one of two threes he drilled off the bounce.

Statistically speaking, his pull-up game is becoming a bigger part of his offense. Nearly a quarter of his shots have been pull-ups over his past 10 games coming into Sunday and he’s hit them with a 54.8% effective field goal percentage, per NBA stats. Not coincidentally, Anunoby is averaging 20.1 points on nearly 60% shooting with a 50% three-point stroke over that same time span.

His playmaking has also looked better, as he worked the pick-and-roll with Jakob Poeltl, driving to the hoop before throwing a kick-out pass to Fred VanVleet for a clean look.

It did help to have VanVleet orchestrating the offense for most of the afternoon, whizzing the ball around, and finding Anunoby and Pascal Siakam for good looks. The 29-year-old guard set a franchise record with 20 assists to go with 20 points. He became just the third 20-20 player in franchise history, joining Popeye Jones and Chris Bosh, twice, both of whom grabbed 20-plus rebounds in their 20-20 games.

The Hornets hung around a little more than Toronto would have liked Sunday thanks largely to a 26-point afternoon from former Raptor Svi Mykhailiuk. It certainly helped that Charlotte was missing its top seven players and left Anunoby without any star player to build his All-Defense resume against.

Eventually, the Raptors put Charlotte away, as VanVleet found Siakam for an easy bucket midway through the fourth to set a new franchise record with 20 assists and becoming the first 20-20 player in franchise history.

Once the game was in hand, Anunoby subbed out, heading to the locker room with a twisted ankle after stepping awkwardly on the foot of a Charlotte defender. Expect more information on Anunoby’s ankle to be forthcoming but it didn’t look too serious considering he briefly stayed in the game following the injury.

Siakam led all scorers with 36 points on 16-for-24 shooting to go with seven rebounds and seven assists.

With the victory, Toronto pulls back to .500 and clinches a spot in the play-in tournament. The Raptors have now moved a half-game ahead of the Atlanta Hawks for the eighth seed in the East at the time of publication.

Up Next: Charlotte Hornets

The Raptors will do it all over again Tuesday night once again against the Hornets at 7 p.m. ET.