As VanVleet walks away from Raptors, only time will tell how big a hole he leaves

First things first: Thank-you Fred VanVleet. Gone (from Toronto) but never to be forgotten. 

The now very handsomely paid Houston Rocket will forever be a Raptor. In seven seasons he became woven into the franchise’s lore as much as Vince Carter, Chris Bosh, or Kyle Lowry. Let’s start there. 

He’s top-10 in franchise history in assists, steals and three-pointers made, but is the Raptors No. 1 symbol that anything is attainable if the drive is there and self-belief never wavers.

Sure, it’s good business that the Raptors were able to emerge from Day 1 of free agency with centre Jakob Poeltl under contract for $80 million over four years and sure, Dennis Schroder (signed for two years and $26 million) is a reasonable replacement for VanVleet, given the circumstances. 

But when it comes to VanVleet, it’s not a player in, player out kind of moment. He’s bigger than that. 

The 29-year-old from Rockford, Illinois barely became a Raptor. He was signed as an undrafted free agent in the summer of 2016. The feeling was he would run their G-League team and see what would happen. He was Jeff Dowtin Jr., basically, with a beefier college resume and less hops. 

The Raptors had Kyle Lowry, Cory Joseph, and Delon Wright ahead of him on the depth chart at point guard. It wasn’t a position of need. 

But Wright injured his shoulder in Summer League that year and VanVleet got his foot in the door and instantly began building up credibility. He played well in the summer. On the first scrimmage of training camp, VanVleet made it his business to ruin Lowry’s day, showing the kind of fearlessness and competitiveness that separated him from the start. Lowry was sold early and took the rookie under his wing. 

Sure enough, Raptors 905 won the G-League title with VanVleet directing traffic. In 2017-18 second year VanVleet was orchestrating the ‘bench mob’ — the best second unit in the NBA and a big reason why the Raptors won a team record 59 games that year. In the 2018-19 championship season VanVleet was a constant in the rotation and — after the birth of Fred Jr. — a playoff hero. With Toronto trailing Milwaukee 2-1 in the Eastern Conference Finals, VanVleet made 14 of his next 17 threes as a second-time father and helped the Raptors storm back to down the Bucks and make the NBA Finals. 

Once there, he was the ‘1’ in Nick Nurse’s Box-and-1 defence he famously employed to stifle the Golden State Warriors’ Steph Curry. In the Raptors championship-deciding Game 6 win, VanVleet was ‘the one’ as he went off for 12 points in the fourth quarter as the Raptors made history. In the season after his friend and mentor Lowry left, VanVleet filled Lowry’s massive shoes and became an all-star. 

He holds the Raptors’ franchise record for points (54) and assists (20), joining Wilt Chamberlain as the only players to hold both single-game marks for one team. 

The photograph of VanVleet in full roar with a bandage covering his stitched-up cheekbone as the Raptors are poised to win the title is as iconic as any other image in franchise history. It would be his statue if that day were to ever come in Toronto. 

We’ll see on that one, but at the very least VanVleet could afford to split the cost, even if the whole damn thing was made of gold and encrusted with diamonds. 

Say this much: Getting VanVleet to change jerseys didn’t come cheap as the star of a very thin free agent market hit the motherlode on Friday night when he signed with the Rockets for three years and $130 million. 

It’s a massive pay day for a player who will earn almost as much on a per game basis ($525,000) than he did for his entire rookie season ($540,000). 

In a way, you could see it coming. Unfortunately, Raptors president Masai Ujiri and general manager Bobby Webster might have seen the full picture too late to do anything about it. 

From the moment VanVleet turned pro and adopted his famous ‘bet on yourself’ mantra, he was all passion on the floor and all business off of it. He hit free agency two other times in his career in Toronto and was eager to test the market each time, loyalty aside. 

In each case the Raptors made the best offer and were able to keep him. 

This time around things seemed more uncertain. The Raptors were hesitant to pay more than $90 million for three years for VanVleet — “they had a glass ceiling they didn’t want to go above,” said one source close to the situation. They wanted VanVleet back but were cognisant that he had played a massive minutes load the past two seasons and has had some injury challenges to show for it, missing 30 games over the past two years. 

Last season VanVleet shot 39 per cent from the floor and 34 per cent from three — both career lows since becoming a regular in the rotation — as a follow up to his all-star season a year ago. He slumped badly in the second half of 2021-22 and it carried forward through the first half of 2022-23, though his ability to cause turnovers and take care of the ball when he had it never wavered. His competitive spirit was equally resolute.

Still, going beyond three years seemed risky, especially considering the other contract commitments Toronto could be facing at that point while under a more restrictive collective bargaining agreement. Going beyond $30 million annually would have created problems when it came to allocating resources elsewhere, including signing Poeltl, who the Raptors had traded a lightly protected first-round pick for at the trade deadline in February. 

That became a problem when the Rockets emerged as a wild card in the process.  Even armed with $60 million in cap space, they didn’t seem a threat as long as it looked like they were going to reunite with James Harden. The Raptors — and the rest of the NBA — were sure that was a done deal until recent weeks. When that unravelled — Harden opted into the last year of his deal with Philadelphia and demanded a trade Thursday — Houston turned to the next best veteran point guard on the market and made clear they were going to make a run at VanVleet. 

Per sources, by the time the Raptors met with VanVleet in Los Angeles at the opening of the free agency period, Toronto had decided to add another year to their offer, bringing it to $120 million over four years to counter the reported two-year deal worth $83 million Houston was ready to make. 

There was a long pause at that point with no news coming out for nearly three hours — an eternity in the opening stages of free agency when deals get announced like popcorn on high heat. 

It eventually became apparent why: The Rockets added a third year, bringing their total to $130 million over three years and the Raptors chose not to match. 

Fred VanVleet went from icon to former Raptor that quickly. 

The Raptors wasted little time pivoting, using the full mid-level exception they could suddenly access — they would have been deep in the luxury tax if they signed VanVleet and wanted to use the MLE — to sign Schroder who had a strong season with the Los Angeles Lakers last year. 

The 29-year-old German is almost VanVleet’s opposite as a lanky athlete with a lightning first step and the ability to get his feet in the paint at will, while using his speed and quickness to be an annoyance at the point of attack defensively. 

But his shooting comes and goes and he’s not the classic floor general the way VanVleet was at times. How the spacing will work with Pascal Siakam, Scottie Barnes, Poeltl, and Schroder — none of whom are the kind of shooting threats that spread a defence — will be a challenge for incoming head coach Darko Rajakovic. 

We’ll see, is about all anyone can say for now. 

Fortunately the Raptors are trying to improve on a 41-win season that ended in the first play-in game last season. The bar isn’t particularly high at this stage. 

But should they fail to hurdle even that there will be cause for plenty of questions, mainly: how did it come to pass that an all-star point guard in his prime and one of the most beloved and respected players in franchise history left Toronto for no return? 

Why are the Raptors running this thing back at all?

It’s one thing for the Raptors to be relieved that they won’t be paying VanVleet $47 million when he’s turning 32 years old, but had they been alert to the possibility that someone else would be willing to cut that cheque, the wise move would have been to move VanVleet at the trade deadline. It’s hard to ignore that. 

The Los Angeles Clippers were one team eager to acquire VanVleet in February, but the Raptors drove a hard bargain, trying to pry Terrence Mann and Ivica Zubac away. The Clippers were willing to do a deal centred around Luke Kennard and Brandon Boston Jr. Not the sexiest names but combined they shot 45.1 per cent from three for the Clippers, and the Raptors were one of the worst shooting teams in the NBA last year. With perfect hindsight, knowing that VanVleet was going to leave, they would be nice to have. 

But it’s hard to see around every corner in the NBA, and the reality is the Raptors weren’t ready to break things up and sell them off for parts then — they saw VanVleet as part of their future — and they still aren’t. 

The quick turn to Schroder shows it. That they traded for, and signed Poeltl shows it. A report that they’re now considering extending Gary Trent Jr. on an expensive long-term deal shows it. 

There is parity in the NBA and the Raptors believe they are closer to the brass ring than everyone else might think. 

They might be right. But it’s hard to believe they’re closer now that VanVleet is in Houston, but that’s how things shook out. 

No matter what happens, VanVleet will be missed. Athletes as smart and solid and thoughtful don’t come along very often. He made an impact when he was here and will be remembered. 

How much he’ll be missed when the ball goes up will be the question and if it turns out his absence is a hole the Raptors can’t fill, someone should answer for it.

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