Raptors’ Rajakovic prepared to keep pushing for more

A 16-win jump, the Toronto Raptors’ first playoff berth in four years, a first-round series that was more tightly contested than expected – even among the most detailed analysis in Raptors’ circles – and notable development from young players up and down the roster.

It’s safe to say that the past season was a smash hit for Darko Rajakovic, but the third-year head coach isn’t resting on his laurels.

“I have already 40 to 50 percent of my first team meeting ready for next year,” Rajakovic said at his season-end debrief with media on Tuesday. “Probably like two-three months ago I already started planning the summer, started planning the next season. Start making a bunch of notes.”

“That’s (an) ongoing process. That never stops,” he added.

Now that this Raptors team has grown together over the course of a couple seasons to ascend from the depths of the Eastern Conference and begin making a name for themselves, continued improvement both via development and in the standings gets more granular.

But while this was Rajakovic’s first time as a head coach in the playoffs, he doesn’t act like a rookie. Instead of acknowledging the precarious position Toronto sits in between the contenders and pretenders, Rajakovic instead pointed to their continuity as an advantage.

“The difference is continuity of the team, right,” he said. “Having players that are with the team for a stretch of time, so majority of the guys, they already know what the summer looks like for us, what that work looks like.

“We’re going to have a plan for each player, what they need to work on, what they need to improve over the next five-and-a-half months.”

For Scottie Barnes, the Raptors’ superhuman multi-tool that improvement could come in myriad ways. That’s a mind boggling prospect considering he’s fresh off averaging 24.1 points on 60.2 percent true shooting to go along with 6.1 boards 8.6 assists and 2.8 stocks all while taking on taxing defensive assignments in Toronto’s seven-game series against the Cavs.

“58 percent,” Rajakovic quipped at the mention of Barnes being only 60 percent of what he could become. “It’s going down. I just realized there is more room for growth.

“The way we use Scottie is so unique right. We use him in post ups, we use him in pick n’ roll as a handler, as a screener. He’s amazing in transition. There’s a lot of things that he’s doing; just polishing those things and getting better in those things. And getting in better condition, getting his body in even better shape, it’s just going to help with his overall game.”

It’s clear that the coach has unwavering faith in his superstar’s abilities. He already said he could be a future MVP at multiple points and that was before he was one of the best five players in the first round of the playoffs.

“The experience he’s gaining, the confidence that he’s gaining, it’s going to help him understand that there is more from him to give,” Rajakovic said of Barnes. “This summer specifically we’re going to focus more on his skill development. His ability to come up with a couple of moves off the dribble, to be an even better finisher at the rim.”

Of course the development doesn’t stop at Barnes. Rajakovic spent time discussing the trajectory of plenty of players on the roster on Tuesday, including leading scorer Brandon Ingram, rookie sensation Collin Murray-Boyles, standout sophomore Ja’Kobe Walter, and even depth pieces in Jamison Battle and AJ Lawson.

When it comes to identifying which skills should be focused on in offseason work, Rajakovic says he first considers the team’s style of play before taking into account where they believe the game is going league wide.

“When I talk to coaches, when I talk to players, I always like to say, what does it need to happen for a certain player to fail,” Rajakovic said. “You start right there. Like why is a certain player going to fail next season if he doesn’t do this, this or that. That gives you an answer of what you really need to focus on.”

But with all the talk about how everyone around Rajakovic is going to get better, it’s also worthwhile to consider how he’s going to continue pushing the envelope as the group’s leader.

“Well, I have a lot of plans for myself as well,” Rajakovic said. “I really want to continue my development on mental performance. I have a mental performance coach that I’m working with in Brian Cain who’s helping me a lot. And he’s helping myself, individually, but also in preparation of what kind of leader I need to be for the team.”

The post Raptors’ Rajakovic prepared to keep pushing for more first appeared on Raptors Republic.