What The Hell Happened With Scottie Barnes

What The Hell Happened With Scottie Barnes

from being considered the next Magic Johnson to being seen as Walmart Draymond Green compared to uh Draymond
yeah he’s drawn that comparison a lot
i say his fair in some ways I can’t compare him to
from someone who was considered to be the face of a franchise to not even being able to shoot from becoming an all-star to nobody talking about him Scotty Barnes’s journey has been a story on its own [Music] in July of 2024 he signed a 5-year contract extension with the Raptors that made him the highest paid player in the franchise’s history toronto thought they had their own superstar but the 2025 season left more questions than answers around him what the hell happened to Scotty Barnes when you watch Scotty at his best you really do see the Magic Johnson similarities both tall point guards with amazing vision and passing both have the height the rebounding the ability to make everyone around them better on the court now of course following the footsteps of Magic Johnson is a difficult task i mean how can anybody get as many girls in bed as he did he also won three MVPs three finals MVPs and maybe the All-Star team 12 times but while Scotty has to do a lot to even come close to those accolades on the court we are already seeing flashes of magic we have seen him grab a rebound and go coast to coast either scoring it himself or creating for someone else on the team in fact the similarities are so visible that Magic himself said that he sees a lot of his own game in the Raptor star but we didn’t see this version of Scotty in the 2025 season or maybe we did but now the expectations are higher for him when he signed that extension it showed that the Raptors had incredible belief in him a belief that he wouldn’t just be a good player but that he could literally become a superstar because now he’s making superstar money messiah and the Raptors were not the only people that believed in him he had gotten a lot of praise from other people around the league in 2023 Draymond Green complimented him with the highest form of compliment he could give he said that Scotty Barnes reminded him of himself and I think Scotty will do way more than I ever did in my career
hopefully Scotty doesn’t end up punching his own teammates green had said that he saw a tweet that said that Scotty Barnes’s floor is Draymond Green and he felt that’s a high floor he even called Scotty a special talent
he’ll take that to a whole another level
at that time Scotty had just played his 12th NBA game since then he has played significantly more but the comparisons with Magic and Green haven’t aged the best sure he still has all the qualities that we talked about the passing the rebounding it’s all there in fact he’s even transformed into a fantastic defender puts it away
and he still does make others better but now he’s also shooting like Draymond Green and no not the best version of Green he’s shooting like a version of him that never played with Steph Curry and Klay Thompson you see you can afford to play like Green when you have other Hall of Famers around you other players that can shoot and create on their own barnes didn’t have that in the 2025 season since he didn’t have help he was asked to do a lot on offense which put a lot of pressure on his shoulders with the Raptors rebuilding and reshuffling Scotty was asked to be the main guy on offense and while he gave it everything defending rebounding making plays he struggled to carry the scoring load all by himself his efficiency dropped his shooting took a massive hit and at times it just looked like he was trying to do too much it was Scotty’s team but with him the offense ranked 26th in the league for efficiency and a big part of that was how bad his shooting was he shot a career worst 26.3% from three now we always knew he wasn’t a lights out shooter especially not off the dribble and when you add in the fact that he was playing on a tanking team it’s not all that surprising to see a low number here but the bigger problem isn’t just that he was shooting poorly from beyond the ark it’s the drop off in his shooting between the three-point line and 10 ft away from the basket in this area which is in the paint but outside of the restricted area he went from shooting 50% to 41.7% now this is a worrying sign because that area is kind of his specialty taking advantage of mismatches little hook shots floaters this is where he used to do the bulk of his damage now again the lack of spacing around him doesn’t help it’s tough to be dangerous in that area when teams don’t have to worry about your teammates shooting teams could literally double Scotty or pack the paint because they knew that if he kicks it out it’s very unlikely that the shooter is going to make a three on top of this a hand injury also sideline him for a few games but the drop off was still there even before the injury scotty got injured in March and before then he was shooting 52.3% from the field 26.9% from three and 77.3% from the free throw line since March 1st his numbers got worse he shot 46.7% from the field 23.4% from three and 74.4% from the free throw line now again as I stated this earlier the roster construction doesn’t help him he’s basically forced to take tough shots because he can’t go to the rim consistently i mean look at one of his teammates Yako Purle i love Purle but he’s no Miles Turner he’s not going to help you stretch the floor he can’t go too far away from the paint so that limits the space that Scotty can attack even more the Raptors scored 11.4 points per 100 possessions when these two shared the floor together which isn’t very good now the plus side is that the team is great defensively when the two are together but of course that’s the trade-off two very good defenders but both of them clog up the paint so unless Purle develops a consistent three-pointer overnight Barnes is forced to have to expand his game now this isn’t to say that Scotty isn’t a player that you can build around his game is just unique so it will require a very strategic roster construction and the Raptors front office have known this for a while ever since he was drafted from his college days it was obvious that Scotty was a pass first type player as a freshman he averaged 10.3 points 4.1 assists four rebounds and 1.5 steals per game earning the ACC Freshman of the Year award ACC 6man of the year and third team allacc honors he had great vision and was always able to find his teammates his height combined with his basketball IQ and versatility made him the perfect prototype for what the Toronto Raptors were looking for he was the exact kind of player that Messiah goes for a player who can switch on defense but also has the ability to do a little bit of everything on offense his unique play style was met with some doubt even before he was drafted remember everyone thought that Toronto were going to select Jaylen Suggs but from the beginning Scotty Barnes showed why the Raptors believed in him on October 22nd in just his second NBA game he dropped 25 points and grabbed 13 rebounds against the Boston Celtics it wasn’t just a good performance it was a statement under the bright lights against the best team in the East Scotty looked like a season pro [Music] not a rookie and he kept getting better against the Wizards he scored 27 points and got eight rebounds even when he didn’t get a lot of assists you could see his passing skill he would grab a rebound push the ball up the court and get the Raptors running in transition by March the entire league had taken notice he was named the Eastern Conference Rookie of the Month for February and a few days later he went off for 31 points and 17 rebounds in an overtime battle with the Lakers by the end of the season Scotty had averaged 15.3 points 7.2 rebounds and 3.5 assists he was the only rookie who ranked top five in total points rebounds assists steals and blocks and most importantly he had helped the Rappers to the fifth seed in the East a direct ticket to the playoffs scotty did it all he played point guard he played center just like Magic Johnson once did in 21 games he had at least five assists showing off his skills as a playmaker and here’s a fun fact scotty became just the 19th rookie in NBA history to average over 15 points seven rebounds and three and a half assists you know who else was on that list magic Johnson and the reason that Scotty was so good in that season is because he was on an actual winning team the Raptors were not tanking in that period they had OG they had Pascal Seakum Fred Van Vleet so in a better team with better players around him Scotty’s game goes to another level the season after his rookie winning year Scotty showed even more of what he could do on November 4th 2022 he recorded his first career triple double 11 points 11 rebounds and 10 assists in a tough loss to the Mavericks a few weeks later he dropped a then career-high 32 points against the Lakers davis getting back and Scotty not only were the numbers growing but so was his confidence by the 2024 season Scotty had risen to an all-star level yes he came in as an injury replacement but no one questioned if he deserved it he had been playing like an all-star he was averaging 19.9 points 8.2 rebounds and 6.1 assists and he was doing it on a Raptors team that had traded away OG and Pascal Seako they were in a rebuilding phase back in his rookie year Scotty had veterans around him and when the team is trying to win that makes things a lot easier for Scotty by the 2024 season though he was the leader and that came with added pressure as I told you guys earlier it’s very hard to be a great passer when your teammates aren’t ready to compete now Scotty of course he didn’t complain he just kept working on his game and to be honest in 2024 many aspects of his game improved his pick and role play improved his passing and transition nearly became perfect he started driving to the rim more often and with better control in 2024 his three-point shot was actually beginning to show progress and because defenders had to respect the shot his passing became even more dangerous he also got better as a ball handler and he had to because he was becoming the Raptor’s main playmaker and just like Magic Johnson you could see that Scotty had that flare in his game he would throw no look passes he found gaps on the defense that no one else saw and just like Magic Scotty was being a smart cutter sneaking behind defenses using his size and strength to get easy buckets at the rim finding mismatches for Scotty is one of the most efficient ways that the Raptors used to score and both did this because they weren’t known as great shooters but both had to figure out how to bend defenses anyways when Scotty cuts defenders panic and that opened space for his teammates to score in 2024 he’s finishing through traffic was also getting better and he was beginning to find his mismatches even more cuz remember this is a 6’9 guy that at times is playing at point guard so the likelihood of him matching up against a smaller player is very high and when he gets that mismatch he can post them up he can pass over them or go right through them and of course his defense had always been strong his length size and athleticism allows him to guard multiple positions he can guard one through five easy he can go out onto the perimeter but also protect the rim having a point guard who can do all of that it’s very rare so yes Scotty Barnes isn’t Magic Johnson not yet maybe not ever but his potential it’s massive and even in a bleak 2025 season there were a lot of positives to take away from Scotty’s game for example while his three-point shooting was down his mid-range was still at a solid 47.5% if he can keep the same percentage while increasing his volume he can become even more impactful in scoring and if he can score more his playmaking will only get better as he will attract more attention from the defense it’s a lot easier to make a team collapse defensively when they see you as an actual threat offensively and that’s why it’s so important for him to really develop his perimeter game more yes going forward you don’t want him hanging around the perimeter all the time but he needs to be able to do damage there even Draymond Green at his best could shoot just go look at his game seven performance in the 2016 final or basically any match where he’s being guarded by Rudy Goar if Scotty can figure out his offensive game it’s over for the rest of the league because on the other side of the court he already looks like a future defensive player of the year in 2025 his defensive leap was fantastic the Raptors outscored their opponents whenever Scotty was on the floor and it shouldn’t come as a surprise considering he’s a smart big guy that can guard anybody night after night he took on tough matchups and didn’t back down guards wings bigs it didn’t matter he could guard them all and what made him special wasn’t just his physical gifts it was how smart he played he read plays before they happened he jumped passing lanes he blocked shots he made it very hard for anybody to get comfortable according to the advanced stats he had one of the best defensive impacts in the entire league but anyone who watched the games didn’t need the numbers they saw it with their own eyes now going into the new season there’s a real chance that things could open up for Scotty with Ingram joining IQ staying healthy and RJ Barrett taking another lead the court will hopefully feel a little less crowded that should give Scotty more space to do what he does best get deep in the paint and create problems for defenders add in the growth of young players like Grady Dick and Jacobe Walter and suddenly the Raptors look a lot more dangerous cuz if Scotty is like Draymond Green he’s going to need movement and better players around him you can’t shine as a passer if you’re passing to G-League guys every night as his big rookie extension kicks in it will be time for the Raptors to take a new look at who he is cuz Scotty isn’t just potential anymore he’s also not a finished product either he’s chilling somewhere in between kind of in limbo this is a player who a few years ago was considered untouchable in trades for a big superstar someone whose ceiling was unlimited now nobody is denying that he’s a good player the question becomes how good at one point Messiah didn’t want to trade him for KD but now there are rumors about trading Scotty for Giannis that’s how big the spectrum is when you were discussing this guy some think that he’s baby Giannis in the making others see him as a guy who at best can only be Draymond Green his coach Darko still believes in him becoming a three-level scorer eventually not just layups not just threes not just mid-ranges but all of them together in one package someone that can take over games like when he put up 35 points nine rebounds and six assists against the Pacers or when he put up 35 points 11 rebounds and eight assists against the Spurs it’s a nice idea it’s what everyone around the organization hopes for nothing would make rappers fans more happy than developing one of their own into a mega superstar but there’s also a growing pile of evidence that the jump that everyone is hoping for might not happen scotty Barnes might be one of those players where the idea of him is better than the reality in my opinion I still think it’s way too early to say that and you can’t count anything out because every season no matter what the numbers say Scotty has found ways to keep growing and now with a teammate like Brandon Ingram his game can even get better to see why Brandon Ingram is actually a terrific acquisition by the Raptors you have to check out this video right

Scottie Barnes had it all—Rookie of the Year, an All-Star leap, and the promise of being Toronto’s next franchise player. But somewhere along the way, the doubts started creeping in. This video looks at Barnes’ journey, his rise, and the growing questions about whether he can truly lead a team.

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