TORONTO – Scottie Barnes saw the result of the first round of All-Star fan voting, the ones that took place on Monday, where somehow he wasn’t voted into the top 20 players in the Eastern Conference.
Barnes not being among the top 20 (10? five?) players in the East is a laughable notion, never more so than in a week where Barnes has tallied two triple-doubles in his last three starts — his monster 23-point, 25-rebound, 10-assist win in a win over the Golden State Warriors last Sunday and the 20-14-11 win over the Denver Nuggets in a loss Wednesday.
The Raptors sit in fourth place in the Eastern Conference after finishing 11th last season. Barnes is averaging 19.1 points, 8.6 rebounds and 5.3 assists on a career-best 58.4 percent true shooting (which takes into account the value of two-pointers, three-pointers and free throws). He is one of five players averaging at least 19/9/5 at this efficiency level, joining a list that includes Nikola Jokic, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Luka Doncic and Jalen Johnson. The other four are locks for the All-Star Game, and likely All-NBA status as well, provided they play a minimum of 65 games.
Where Barnes fits into those conversations will likely depend on how the Raptors perform throughout the season, but at this point he’s one of 12 players in the East deserving of All-Star recognition and there’s not even much up for debate.
Barnes didn’t seem too upset about the matter in his initial comments as the Raptors practiced Friday ahead of a pair of home games against the Atlanta Hawks on Saturday and Monday.
He has bigger goals in mind.
“I don’t really think I was surprised (by the vote),” he said. “It is what it is. At the end of the day, I’m just trying to win basketball games. At the end of the year, when All-Defence comes out, I think I’ll be more worried about that.”
There’s no reason why Barnes can do both: make the All-Star Game for the second time in his career and make his first All-Defense team at the end of the season.
The fact that the Raptors are the fifth-ranked defense in the NBA, with a lineup in which the starting center — Jakob Poeltl — has been in and out of the lineup for much of the year and where the next tallest player is six-foot-nine and the remaining starters generally haven’t been as highly regarded as neutral individual defenders can only help Barnes’ case.
Then there’s his status as the NBA’s leader in “actions”: his combined total of 100 steals and blocks is the best in the NBA, while he ranks seventh in deflections.
That’s why Raptors head coach Darko Rajaković tried to mobilize fan support ahead of the next round of voting on January 6.
“I’m perplexed,” Rajaković said. “I’m very disappointed that Scottie didn’t make the top 20. We have to get it right. Canada has to do it right. It starts with us. It starts with our city. It starts with our country here. We have 40 million people living in this country and 40 million fans of the Toronto Raptors …I have no doubt that Scottie Barnes is a star. I have no doubt that he should be at the top of the list of players in the East. Canada, we need to fix this problem now.
Barnes could help his own cause if he continues to rack up triple-doubles. There’s nothing like round numbers to grab people’s attention.
It’s not in his nature to chase stats, but there’s no reason why Barnes shouldn’t have more triple-doubles given his ability to excel in all three major statistical columns. It’s almost surprising that he’s only had eight in five seasons and before his two this week, he hadn’t had one in almost a full calendar year.
Since Barnes is by nature an unselfish player, there’s little risk in encouraging him to put a little more effort into releasing the kind of data that gets voters’ attention and would likely go hand-in-hand with the team’s success.
“I think for Scottie, every night he’s definitely a double-double opportunity, I think the points and rebounds should always be there,” Rajaković said. “The assists are the hardest part because I look at our potential assists a lot. (Against Denver), I believe, we had 22 assists, but our potential (assists) says we had 67. So, we missed a lot of shots…so, Scottie, I think he should be, and he’s a double-double machine every night. And I think his triple-doubles can be more frequent, too.”
Barnes has 17 point/rebound double-doubles in 35 games this season, surpassing the 25 he had in 65 games last year, which was his career high at the time. If his teammates can make a few more shots…
“When things are good, things are good,” Barnes said of the possibility of more triple-doubles in his immediate future. “I’m trying to be more intentional on rebounds, pushing the ball on the fast break. It’s great to have RJ (Barrett) back; he’s giving me free passes with the way he runs around the court and (his) shooting. He’s giving me free passes all the time. It’s good that we’re running and getting into good habits. (I) just try to focus on the rebound and when I score, it just happens to be there.”
The reality is that Barnes probably can’t do anything individually to significantly improve his standing in the fan vote, but if he doesn’t appear at least in the top 20 in the East, it will probably take some sort of post-mortem to explain why. He is expected to perform better in the media vote (which accounts for 25 percent of the weighting) and the player vote (which accounts for 25 percent).
His Raptors teammate Brandon Ingram — himself a worthy All-Star candidate — finished 12th in voting, so at least there’s some evidence that at least some Raptors fans’ votes counted. And there’s a history of Raptors stars being voted as All-Star Game starters in the past, with each of Vince Carter, Chris Bosh, DeMar DeRozan, Kawhi Leonard and Pascal Siakam earning that honor.
Still, Barnes’ road to the All-Star Game in Los Angeles will likely depend on whether Eastern Conference coaches elect him as one of seven reserves.
The Raptors’ team success and individual defense should help in that regard, and a few more triple-doubles wouldn’t hurt either.
