Even if you don’t agree with what they did, you can see what the Toronto Raptors were thinking when they gave Jakob Poeltl a three-year contract extension in the offseason.
Over the last two years, Poeltl’s presence was essentially the difference between the Raptors being an average team and a horrible one. They need his presence defensively, especially on their own glass, to hold up against better teams. With no other young 7-footer in the system, the Raptors didn’t want to risk Poeltl hitting free agency this coming offseason and being left with no options in the middle. To get Poeltl to opt into his $19.5 million player option for 2026-27, they guaranteed him nearly $50 million over the two years after that, plus $5 million for 2029-30 if the Raptors decide they are done with the then-34-year-old big man.
It has worked out about as poorly as possible in the first season, with Poeltl battling back injuries, the second-to-last thing you want to hear about your 30-year-old centre. (The first: He’s battling foot injuries.) The Raptors will go to the postseason regardless, and can still avoid the Play-In Tournament, despite losing to the Boston Celtics 115-101 on Sunday. Regardless of how that ends, Poeltl’s future complicates the Raptors’.
It is easy to say now, but the deal’s downside always outweighed the upside. Making upgrades to the roster will be significantly harder because Poeltl’s contract is fully guaranteed through 2028-29.
Poeltl was not the main reason the Raptors lost to Boston. Scottie Barnes, Brandon Ingram and RJ Barrett shot 17 of 44 from the field and combined for only five free throws. Raptors youngsters Ja’Kobe Walter and Collin Murray-Boyles played well, but it’s hard to overcome that output from your best players against a team as good as Boston.
But the game, especially the beginning of it, illustrated how this group has yet to feel Poeltl’s positive impact like previous Raptors teams. They were minus-16 in Poeltl’s 20 minutes. The most concerning bit came at the beginning, with the Celtics scoring 10 of the first 12 points. The Raptors were repeatedly confused when Neemias Queta set a screen on the on-ball defender, with the team not looking comfortable trying to make up for Poeltl hedging toward the ballhandler.
That was with a veteran-heavy lineup playing. Imagine how difficult it must be for the Raptors’ younger or just less experienced players to try to handle it. How do you make sure you bump Queta to stop him from rolling hard to the basket long enough for Poeltl to recover while, at the same time, not leaving a shooter open for too long? Few teams put as much of that type of pressure on their opponents as the Celtics do, and it showed.
Thanks to Poeltl’s injury, the Raptors have spent most of the season switching on defence, and that has played into their aggressive mindset in disrupting the ball. With Barnes and/or Murray-Boyles as the centre, they don’t have enough rim protection to play a passive defence, so they play up on the ball and try to create turnovers. It is a high-risk, high-reward style, but the Raptors have the personnel to do it well. Before the Boston game, Toronto ranked No. 7 in defence.
It leaves the Raptors smaller than most teams, and that was a problem against the Celtics, who had 12 offensive rebounds to the Raptors’ six. It was a problem in the loss to Sacramento that might place the Raptors in the Play-In Tournament, when the Raptors allowed the Kings to grab 19 offensive rebounds, including 11 by Precious Achiuwa. In that game, the Raptors were actually worse on their own glass with Poeltl out there. It was the first time Poeltl played in back-to-back games since October, a precaution because of his injury. It didn’t go great, even if rebounding issues are never one player’s fault alone.
For the season, though, the Raptors have grabbed 71.8 percent of potential defensive rebounds when Poeltl is on the floor and 68.1 when he’s not. That chasm is the equivalent of being third and 25th in the league. His defensive impact beyond that has been negligible, as the Raptors have been 1.8 points per 100 possessions stingier with Poeltl on the bench compared with when he plays. Given he usually plays against starters — the opposition’s best lineups — his presence defensively has likely been a wash.
But this year isn’t the issue. If the Raptors knew then what they know now, they never would have given Poeltl the extension. After the season he has had, it is unlikely he would have opted out of his contract, unless it was to secure a longer deal at an even smaller number than $19.5 million. That is a dishonest argument to make, given this year has approached the worst-case scenario.
The problem is he’s an awkward fit around Barnes offensively, as he is not a scoring threat outside the paint. And he is not a good enough defensive player in the paint to make up for that, even at his best. This season has not been his best. It is nice that the Raptors were optimistic about Poeltl’s ability to contribute as he aged, and he still has time to do that, but that would buck the trend with non-shooting big men.
Providing some protection at the rim, taking care of the defensive glass, setting good screens — all of those things are important. Poeltl does all of them decently to well, at least when he’s healthy. If the Raptors are to avoid the Play-In, they’ll need to beat the Miami Heat and maybe the New York Knicks this week, two teams that have plenty of size. You need your own size, with a bit of skill, to combat that.
But Poeltl is on the wrong side of 30 and has never been so good that he deserved the contract of a sub-All-Star, plus-starter big. The Raptors felt the impact of cheaping out at centre before, when they lost Marc Gasol and Serge Ibaka in 2020 free agency and replaced them with — watch out! — Aron Baynes and Alex Len. Perhaps that was running through general manager Bobby Webster’s mind when he gave Poeltl the extension. That hole up front is what caused the Raptors to trade for Poeltl at the 2023 deadline in the first place.
This time around, Webster should have been able to see how punitive it is to pay a rotation player like he is a high-level starter with the new CBA. The Raptors have done that twice now (Immanuel Quickley is the other, and you can make a case for Ingram). At least Quickley’s shooting makes him a snug fit with Barnes.
The best version of Poeltl would help the Raptors. There have been nights when this version of Poeltl has helped the Raptors. Not enough of them, though, and you wonder how much an offseason dedicated to recovery can help that. His offensive game won’t be changing.
The Raptors have had a nice year. Still, it’s likely heading for a rough ending — maybe in the Play-In, more likely in the playoffs. The Raptors will want to improve the roster. Instead of having $49.1 million in expiring contracts in the form of Poeltl and Barrett to go about that, they will be much more limited: all because they identified a good player as an irreplaceable one.