Jamison Battle found consistency in instability

Two theories began to take shape on his lack of minutes. The first was that his defense was holding him back, though throughout the regular season he finished with opponents scoring less while he was on the court according to Cleaning the Glass. Is he a great defender? No, but he wasn’t bringing the team down. Given the fact that the offense was 6.8 points per 100 possesions better when he was on the court, I don’t think the defense argument holds enough weight. What he provided offensively was far more valuable than any perceived defensive drawbacks.

The other theory was the ‘politics’ of it all as Samson Folk succinctly described in a piece he wrote in November.

From the organization/coaching perspective? Dick is a lottery pick who is up for extension this year (and still has boatloads of potential at 21 years old). Walter had a promising defensive start to his career and is only 21. Agbaji is heading into free agency this upcoming season. There is a mix of basketball politics and development here. I’m not going to point fingers, but having talked to a lot of people around and in NBA organizations over the years, teams try to play nice with agents and in turn will offer guys runways to try and play themselves into money. I don’t even mind that. Guys deserve to have a look, especially when their next year isn’t guaranteed. It’s all part of the calculus.

Battle’s contract is friendly to the team, available next season, and he’s a pretty consistent and unflappable player. His route to the NBA has shown a repeated ability to out play guys who were considered better than he was. Players who had a larger organizational vote of confidence than he did. He just shows up, hits triples, does his job. Does his thing.

This theory seems more rational even if I go back and forth on how I feel about the general concept. The only piece that doesn’t add up is that even after Agbaji was traded, and Dick saw his minutes dwindle, none of those minutes trickled down to Battle.

Even though his minutes weren’t consistent, Battle was when he was on the court. Over the season he shot 41.2% from deep, he showed strong flashes as a cutter, he opened the floor for his teammates and he had a positive net rating with nearly every single teammate he played with (the only players he was neutral or negative with was Walter, Jonathan Mogbo, and Alijah Martin). He is a certified Cavalier killer, both for the aforementioned game, and for propelling the Raptors (alongside RJ Barrett) to a game three victory in their first round series behind a 14-point fourth quarter eruption.

Battle is entering the final season of his contract, and while we know exactly who he is and what he can do, he’s never been a priority in the organization despite fitting the exact archetype of player that fits alongside Scottie Barnes. We’ll see if that changes this offseason, the Raptors have lots of decisions to make and whether it’s here in Toronto or somewhere else, Battle deserves to be a full-time rotation player.