Toronto Raptors: How Kyle Lowry fits into the culture change

By Nate Wolf | Aug 22, 2017

Photo by Andrew D. Bernstein/NBAE via Getty Images /

The Toronto Raptors seem committed to changing their style of play on offense. In this series of articles, I’ll examine how each projected starter can fit into that “culture change.” Here, let’s look at Kyle Lowry.

Over the last few weeks, I’ve explored some changes the Toronto Raptors can make to implement the team’s new offense. You can find the articles for Jonas Valanciunas, Serge Ibaka, C.J. Miles and DeMar DeRozan here, here, here and here.

This time, we’ll look at Kyle Lowry, Toronto’s leader and best player. Lowry’s brilliance is partially the reason why the Raptors’ old offense was a monotonous supply of pick-and-rolls and isolations. He finished in the league’s 96th and 84th percentiles, respectively, scoring on those two plays.

Lowry’s shooting ability has a lot to do with his staggering efficiency. He put up 7.8 threes per game last season, canning 41.2 percent of them. His 3.2 made threes per game ranked fourth in the entire NBA, ahead of noted gunners like Damian Lillard and Kyrie Irving.

The really absurd thing? He shot a higher percentage on pull-up threes than on catch-and-shoot tries, per NBA Stats. You simply cannot go under a screen if Lowry has the ball.

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Lowry’s shooting will make the transition away from a stagnant, one-on-one offense much easier than it otherwise would be. The Golden State Warriors, Portland Trail Blazers, Boston Celtics and others have used elite shooting in creative ways over the last few seasons, and Raptors coach Dwane Casey will likely follow suit as he tries to inject more movement and pace into the team’s attack.

The pick-and-roll won’t and shouldn’t disappear. Lowry is too efficient in those sets to even suggest axing them. But Casey can integrate more movement to get the defense off balance before the final action.

Here, the Raptors run the same weave play two times in a row. The first time, Lowry threads a pocket pass to Lucas Nogueira, who has an open runway to attack the rim. The threat of that happening a second time then gets Lowry an open three:

Stopping, pounding the ball and letting the clock drain were the real ills with Toronto’s old playbook. You can run isolations and pick-and-rolls the entire game, even in the playoffs. But unless you have LeBron James and Kyrie Irving, or some similar tandem, you need a bit more movement to make those plays work over and over again.

If the “culture change” is really serious, however, Casey may use Lowry away from the ball more often. The Warriors’ offense thrives in large part because of the attention Stephen Curry demands even when he’s not dribbling himself. When he sets screens for other players, the mere threat of his shot creates space for his teammates to cut to the hoop or get an open three.

Casey can use Lowry in a similar way, especially now that C.J. Miles is around. Lowry isn’t Curry, and Miles isn’t Klay Thompson, but when the two Raptors run split screens for one another, it should have the same effect as when Curry and Thompson do so: chaos.

Lowry also shares stylistic similarities with Isaiah Thomas, who the Celtics use off the ball frequently. The two are both short playmakers who, due to their height, require some extra space to work their magic.

The Celtics create that space by running Thomas through an absurd amount of dribble handoffs. Thomas is a wizard – he can score in any number of ways. This play is arguably his bread-and-butter, though.

Jonas Valanciunas and Serge Ibaka are both poor passers, but assuming they’re comfortable simply handing the ball to Lowry, it’s easy to imagine the Toronto guard flourishing in this kind of set.

He finished in the league’s 38th percentile last season on handoffs. The year before, however, he ranked in the 86th percentile. Regardless, Toronto runs this set too infrequently; handoffs accounted for just 5.5 percent of Lowry’s offense over the last two years.

Nearly every other player on the Raptors is severely limited in some way. Valanciunas and Ibaka can’t pass, DeRozan can’t shoot and Miles is merely a role player. The bench, meanwhile, is wildly inexperienced.

Aside from his height, which clearly doesn’t limit him too severely, Lowry is dangerous in almost every situation. As Toronto alters its offensive style, Lowry will be an asset, not an impediment. He’s a nice fit in nearly every situation: handoffs, spot-ups, pick-and-rolls, off-ball screens, everything.

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Casey will need to be careful not to adjust his playbook too much. Players like Ibaka and DeRozan are tailor-made for the old Raptors offense. If he gets creative with Lowry, however, Toronto will be a joy to watch in 2017-18.

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