For the Raptors, as the NBA trade deadline approaches, just about everything is on the table

Two days until the trade deadline and the Raptors are doing their best to make it look like it’s just another workday.

The first practice following a mammoth seven-game, two-week road trip commenced and outside of O.G. Anunoby being unable to take part, it was pretty much business as usual.

But when practice ended and a few players and head coach Nick Nurse faced the media, the topic could not be ignored, hard as they all did to pretend to the contrary, this trade deadline could very well mark new territory for a team that is accustomed to being more on the periphery at this time of year than actual participants.

An underachieving season following one which suggested a more upwards and onwards trend, has made the Raptors a destination site for rumors and speculation ahead of Thursday’s trade deadline.

Every regular player not named Scottie Barnes or Precious Achiuwa has had his name come up in one of those rumours just this past week.

Monday the rumour mill was in high gear with the Raptors believed to be in the hunt to become part of that Kyrie Irving trade the Brooklyn Nets had already worked out with Dallas.

Alas, either the rumours were complete bunk or Massai Ujiri, Bobby Webster and the rest of that front office could not be swayed to pull the plug on a major trade still three full days away from the actual deadline.

Ujiri has made no secret of the fact that he prefers to do his roster managing during the off-season.

His track record backs that up with only a handful of trade deadline deals and only a couple of those of significance if you accept the fact that the 2019 championship does not happen without the services of both Marc Gasol and Serge Ibaka.

Ujiri, though, is in a much different situation than he normally finds his team at this time of year.

The Raptors are looking at the possibility of missing the playoffs all together or possibly sneaking into the play-in tournament which can mean a playoff season could come down to just one game.

And Ujiri has made his position on the play-in tournament very clear in the recent past when he asked ‘Play-in for what?’ as the Raptors went into full tank mode in their season away from home in Tampa.

That piece of decisive strategizing, along with a little lottery luck, led directly to Scottie Barnes who would go on to win Rookie of the Year and after a bit of a rocky start in his sophomore season is playing up to that level again.

The question becomes is Ujiri ready to give up on his current core.

There’s no question this group has under-achieved. You don’t have to go past the 25-30 record which has them tied for 10th in the East at the moment, but there also evidence, as recently as this season, that this core is capable of playing with any team in the league.

Just on the past road trip they locked up a very confident Sacramento Kings team on their home court.

Defensively it was as good as the Raptors have looked all season long.

But in the very next game the Golden State Warriors, admittedly a very good team when in rhythm, which they weren’t when Toronto arrived, put up 129 on them.

Nurse talked about the team making strides defensively on the trip but those improvements continue to show up periodically rather than consistently and without consistency, the defence will remain this teams Achilles Heel.

In that regard it’s almost laughable that the Raptors would even consider trading O.G. Anunoby, if that is in fact in the plans. Anunoby is hands-down their best one-on-one defender not to mention the steals he piles up or that he’s more often than not taking the toughest defensive assignment.

The good news, and granted it’s dwarfed by the defensive malaise that has handcuffed this franchise all season, is the offence has come back around to winning levels.

Credit Fred VanVleet and Gary Trent Jr. primarily for this, VanVleet in particular finding his offensive mojo these past few weeks and more importantly his three-point range.

But there are also accolades due Achiuwa and Chris Boucher. Achiuwa has stepped up masterfully in the absence of OG Anunoby providing much needed help on the defensive end and a nice boost scoring the basketball.

Boucher has been a consistent contributor these past couple of weeks coming off the bench, another area that has underperformed this season.

Is that enough to earn this group a reprieve and the rest of the season together? Only Ujiri and the front office can answer that, and they’ve seemingly had phones surgically attached to their ears of late.

In the interim Nurse is left to paint as optimistic a picture as he possibly can.

“I think the level of confidence is improving every day, right?” Nurse said Tuesday. “I think there was a stretch there where we got in a little bit of a bad funk there for 10 or 15 games, right? Where we weren’t winning and we weren’t playing that great and the effort was a little bit spotty here and there for whatever multitude of reasons that is. I don’t sense that anymore. I do sense a lot more confidence.

“I do feel … we’ve gone toe to toe with the best teams in the league home or away. It was buzzer beater against Philly, buzzer beater versus Brooklyn, buzzer beater at Boston, like there’s some pretty good performances that didn’t go our way,” Nurse said. “And we’re hoping some of that stuff evens out. It feels like it’s going to, or has. So that gives us confidence.”

We’ll find out Thursday, or potentially sooner, whether this is a sentiment shared by the front office.

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