Jakob Poeltl Talks Losing Fred VanVleet, Returning to Raptors, & Offensive Role

Jakob Poeltl explains why he re-signed in Toronto, what losing Fred VanVleet will mean to the Raptors, and more

Dan Hamilton-USA TODAY Sports

It wasn’t always a forgone conclusion that Jakob Poeltl would be back with the Toronto Raptors this season.

Poeltl admitted as much Thursday afternoon during his re-introductory press conference in Toronto. The San Antonio Spurs, for example, were “definitely” a team that was on his radar, he said. He’d been happy playing for the Spurs prior to the deadline deal that returned him to Toronto and the feeling was mutual from San Antonio.

“But at the end of the day, I think just the way this team is set up right now and the outlook, especially right now for the next couple of years, I just felt like this would have been a better fit for me,” said the 27-year-old Austrian center who inked a four-year, $80 million deal to remain with the Raptors.

That outlook, though, is complicated and veered off course almost an hour after the Poeltl re-signed as news broke that Poeltl’s pick-and-roll mate Fred VanVleet had signed with the Houston Rockets. Poeltl said he’d been talking to VanVleet a lot throughout the process, and he would have liked for Toronto to retain the 28-year-old point guard.

“He’s definitely a big part of my success here,” Poeltl said of VanVleet. “We created some good chemistry here.”

How good?

Poeltl was about five points per 100 possessions better with VanVleet on the court compared to when he sat, the most for any Raptors player, per PBP Stats. The two also generated a staggering 1.32 points per possession in pick-and-roll actions together, per Sportsnet.

This season things are going to look very different in Toronto. Dennis Schroder, the point guard the Raptors signed to replace VanVleet, isn’t nearly as skilled in the pick-and-roll as VanVleet. He generated just 0.89 points per pick-and-roll possession last season, a significant step down from VanVleet’s 0.96 average, per NBA Stats. Schroder’s lack of pull-up shooting, just 8-for-33 last season from behind the arc, will make it easy for opposing defenses to play a dropping defense and defend the paint against the Poeltl-Schroder pick-and-roll.

The solution, Darko Rajaković said, is going to be to use Poeltl in different ways this year. Toronto wants to get the ball in Poeltl’s hands more often and force him to be a decision-maker, Rajaković told reporters in Las Vegas.

It makes sense, considering Poeltl is among the best passing big men in the NBA and ranked third, albeit a distant third, behind Nikola Jokic and Domantas Sabonis in assists from the elbow last season, per NBA Stats.

Poeltl came back to Toronto because he said he was comfortable with the team. He said he had unfinished business with the Raptors after the way last season finished.

But the situation has changed.

VanVleet’s exit is going to radically change Poeltl’s role on this team and whether he’s comfortable in that new spot remains to be seen.

Further Reading

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Dejounte Murray Extension Complicates Raptors Trade Rumors for Pascal Siakam