How Ochai Agbaji remains quietly perfect for the Raptors
Ochai Agbaji first makes himself known in transition, running behind Scottie Barnes. He catches the ball deep in the lane — perhaps too deep, running too fast, to go up clean? But no, he’s such a quick jumper that it’s an easy dunk. Quick-twitch athleticism is an understatement.
Soon he gets some screening work done. A short roll into the middle, where he makes the play. For those who can recall a few years earlier, it is eerily reminiscent of another Toronto Raptor (back when he was with another team).
Then all is quiet. He stands in the corner. For possessions on end, minute after minute. It’s relaxing work, but someone has to do it. It’s calm and casual. Walks into an open triple in transition. Drills it. Then back to the corner, of course, only to take a handoff and cash another 3-pointer as Pascal Siakam struggles to fight through the screen. Back to the corner, of course, but this time his defender doesn’t leave him. So Scottie Barnes waltzes to the rim for a layup.
Then? More time in the corner, of course. Time to chill out. It was a cool 10 points in five shots in the first half. Easy work.
If Agbaji’s offensive experience is mostly hanging out, drilling jumpers, followed by occasional but incredible bursts of effort via cutting and driving, it’s almost the exact opposite on the other end. Agbaji runs. A lot. He’s run the fifth-furthest distance on defence so far this season, obviously the most on the helter-skelter Raptors.
The Raptors put him on TJ McConnell in the second quarter to turn off the water on the Indiana Pacers’ offence, and he does the trick. He switches onto Tyrese Haliburton. Picks up Benn Mathurin in transition. He helps and rotates and always finds himself under the rim when the team needs someone there. Sometimes his marks score, but mostly they don’t even get a chance. He rounds their drives, forcing them to pick up the ball and move it along. As with Agbaji’s offence, it’s mostly invisible work. He doesn’t usually collect highlight steals or blocks (though he does swat Mathurin from behind in the third for a real highlight, leading to a Barnes triple the other way). Mostly, he simply does the job, and he does it well. He keeps his feet in front.
Early in the third, Agbaji’s predilection to head to the corner hurts him; RJ Barrett is dribbling in transition, watching Agbaji ahead of him. Agbaji heads to the rim, but Barrett was expecting him to drift to the corner. The pass goes behind him, a turnover. It’s a quiet quarter in general. Those will happen. But beneath the surface of his placidity, duck-like, he’s always doing something.
Even when he’s lounging in the corner, he’s not, you know, lounging. He drifts up, or down, to maintain passing lanes to his waiting hands. He crashes the glass to snatch offensive rebounds after static possessions. When he’s not in the corner, he’s usually dashing to the rim as soon as his defender turns his head — meant to get the ball, but if he doesn’t, he’ll happily exit and relocate to his traditional spot in the corner. He starts, and often ends, possessions in the corner, but he’s still in the top 20 in the league for furthest distance traveled on offence so far this season.
So even though he’s chilling, he’s truly moving. Sometimes his teammates miss him on his cuts, and that’s part and parcel of having a low usage rate; you rely on your teammates to get you your looks. The quiet third quarter drifts into a quiet fourth. Until he catches in the corner, everyone lulled to sleep, as he drills yet another triple to quiet Indiana’s run to nearly tie the game. He forces a shot-clock violation with four minutes left as Toronto’s clinging to the lead he gave them. The Raptors win. Not behind Agbaji, or due to him, but certainly with him helping out the whole way there.
Agbaji is in an interesting place with these Raptors. He is (almost) certainly going to the bench when the team is healthy. Gradey Dick played too well to start the year, and Immanuel Quickley is too important to the future, for either to be at risk of moving to the bench. Agbaji is the only option. Yet he has certainly been within Toronto’s collection of ‘best five players’ to start the year, and it’s arguable whether his value is maximized off the bench or with the starters.
He is averaging career high everythings this season, shooting the Christmas spirit into the ball, and basically never turning it over. And he does all that with an exceptionally low usage rate, more or less not inserting himself into the game, just waiting for his teammates to call upon him. Compared to other players in similar roles, he has been exceptional.
Agbaji is ranked ninth in win shares among players with usage rates below 15 percent, and most of the players above him are bigs. Third in total win shares when you add in turnover rates below 10 percent. This isn’t just best-small-role-player-on-the-Raptors territory, it’s best-small-role-player-in-the-league stuff. Now I have a machine gun ho ho ho. He is second in the entire league in made corner 3s and is shooting 50 percent on drives. And after almost exclusively shooting from the corner to start the year, he is drifting further and further up the break, but he’s not cooling off. He’s up to 38.7 percent from above the break on the year, far from the profile of a corner merchant.
“A lot of the work that he’s putting in, there’s no magic to it,” said Darko Rajakovic of Agbaji’s start to the year to our own Samson Folk. “When you put the work in, when you believe in what you’re doing and your teammates believe in you, it’s amazing.”
He turned back as he walked out of the room, saying to Samson and laughing: “there is some magic.”
Will Agbaji’s magical-fueled, heavy-metal weaponry scale to a bench role? It’s hard to say. Bench players often need to fill bigger roles than fifth-option starters because they’re generally not alongside the stars — they’re replacing them. Will Agbaji remain practically perfect when his usage rate creeps up?
There are ways Darko Rajakovic and the Raptors can scheme to keep Agbaji in his ideal role, or close to it. He will likely be the first player off the bench, which means he’ll play his first shift alongside at least two of Barnes, RJ Barrett, and Immanuel Quickley. Even two of those three together will shoulder enough responsibility that Agbaji can hang out in the corner and only pop in when opportunity arises. Dick’s usage has skyrocketed this season. Toronto has players who want the ball, and as long as Agbaji is alongside enough of them, it will benefit both him and the team.
He won’t stay this hot, surely. He can’t continue hitting half of his triples. But every time he has a down game, has a quiet shift, misses a single shot — every time you think he’s cooling off — he just bounces right back to the standard of excellence he’s set so far this season. He’s always churning forward, doing something, finding ways to contribute. Running. No matter how quiet he may look on the court.
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