What does Collin Murray-Boyles lack of shooting mean for the Raptors’ offence?
It can be easy to over-index on the importance of shooting in the NBA.
Teams like the Boston Celtics and Golden State Warriors before them have taken the three ball to never-before-seen heights, sparking an ever-expanding league-wide 3-point revolution. On average, 30 more triples were attempted per game this past season than 10 years ago. As the number of shots has steadily increased, so has the bandwidth they take up in basketball conversations.
So, when the Raptors selected Collin Murray-Boyles, a defence-first prospect and intriguing driver, but limited shooter, consternation about what that means for Toronto’s offence was inevitable.
The Raptors have been both a below average halfcourt offence and below average shooting team for four consecutive seasons. While there are reasons to think that could change, adding a non-shooter isn’t one of them. Murray-Boyles shot 27% on just over one attempt per game in college and his jumper needs a ton of work mechanically.
Yet shooting alone won’t make a team successful.
The Chicago Bulls, Utah Jazz, Brooklyn Nets, Washington Wizards and San Antonio Spurs all finished top 10 in 3-point attempts last season. Chicago was third and converted at an above average rate. The Phoenix Suns on the other hand were third in 3-point percentage last season and 12th in attempts. The Bulls lost in the play-in and the Suns didn’t even make it there. Shooting doesn’t solve everything.
At the same time, it certainly helps. Of the eight teams to advance to the second round in the 2025 playoffs, five were among the top 10 in made 3s per game during the regular season (Celtics, Cavaliers, Timberwolves, Warriors, Thunder). The three that weren’t had lower volume, but were all top 10 in percentage (Knicks, Pacers, Nuggets). Shooting isn’t the only requirement for success, but it is one of them.
To sort out what the addition of a non-shooter in Murray-Boyles will mean for the Raptors’ offence, we’ll examine the rotations of these recently successful teams and contrast them with Toronto’s. Considering what aspects of the ninth-overall pick’s game could ameliorate his lack of a jumper and benefit scoring in the halfcourt is important too.
For the purposes of this exercise, we’ll go off 3-point percentage alone. This isn’t always the best measure of a player’s true shooting ability, as it doesn’t consider shot diet or volume, but it will suffice for our purposes here. The league average was 36% last season, but we’ll bump down the cutoff for an “above-average” shooter to 35% (For example, Alex Caruso shot 35% from 3 last season, the threat of him shooting still made defences react.)
| Team | Above avg. shooters in rotation | Below avg./non-shooters in rotation |
| CLE | 12 | 2 |
| OKC | 11 | 2 |
| NYK | 7 | 3 |
| DEN | 7 | 4 |
| GSW | 7 | 9 |
| BOS | 6 | 5 |
| IND | 6 | 5 |
| MIN | 6 | 4 |
The cutoff I used for a rotation player was having played 410 minutes – or having averaged double digit minutes in a half-season’s worth of games.
The Raptors weren’t far off from these juggernauts, with seven above-average and seven below-average shooters.
Of course, not all shooters and non-shooters are equal. The Cavs had six players shoot above 40%. The team with the most “below-average” shooters, Golden State, had some flamethrowers to pick them up in Buddy Hield, Moses Moody, Brandin Podziemski, rookie Quentin Post and Stephen Curry. Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown both shot below 35%, albeit on an absurd number of pull-up attempts.
It’s also significant that seven of those eight teams were top 10 regular-season offences (only Golden State wasn’t), and all shot well from deep. The Raptors ranked near the bottom of the league in both 3-point shooting and offensive rating.
Two of the Raptors’ seven shooters from last season – Chris Boucher and Davion Mitchell – will not be on the team this season. However, of their non-shooters, Ja’Kobe Walter (34.9%) and Jamal Shead (32.3%) showed improvement as the season progressed. Walter in particular projects as a plus-shooter.
They will also add Brandon Ingram and Sandro Mamukelashvili into the mix, the former a 39% catch-and-shoot player on mostly above the break attempts. Mamukelashvili is a career 34.8% 3-point shooter. Only Scottie Barnes, Jakob Poeltl, Jonathan Mogbo, Murray-Boyles and maybe Shead project as below-average shooters.
Adding another non-shooter in Murray-Boyles won’t be a death knell for the Raptors offence. The rookie’s high-event defence should add plenty of transition opportunities. He’s a strong and adroit driver and can help improve what is potentially an even bigger area of weakness for the Raptors than shooting – rim pressure. Murray-Boyles isn’t great at passing out of said drives but can make sound reads when catching middle and surveying from there.
And while it won’t happen overnight, the rookie eventually developing a jumper isn’t out of the question! Despite his clunky mechanics, he’s shown impressive touch on other shot types, offering a glimmer of hope. Murray-Boyles developing an outside shot would raise his ceiling dramatically.
But even if he doesn’t, he’s an enormously talented young player. Talented enough that he will only improve the Raptors offence, even if he doesn’t do it by hitting triples.
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