How worried should we be about the Raptors?

The Toronto Raptors have lost 5 of their last 6 games and are in danger of falling well below .500 if they can’t get a few wins on their road trip.

Video Transcript

BEN CARLOS: Imman, why don't you start us off on your panic button vibes?

IMMAN ADAN: I'm not that worried. I'm not that worried. The Raptors have the 30th ranked defense in the last six games, according to nba.com. I have it right here. It says 118.4, which is ridiculous.

In their first nine games of the season, they had the seventh ranked defense at 102 point something. That's a huge difference. And I think they're much closer to that top 10 than they are to the bottom 10 or bottom in the league.

If they were losing games 75 to 80, and they were stopping guys, and still just couldn't score enough, then I would probably be more worried than right now, which is just there's a lot of reasons for why the defense has slipped in the last six games. You're talking about Khem being out, who is their defensive anchor and the sturdiest guy on the team. Fred VanVleet missing games.

And than your biggest piece, Pascal Siakam, being worked back in. That's huge. And Pascal has not looked like an all NBA level defender, but he's coming back from shoulder surgery and not having played basketball for nearly 200 days.

So, there are lots of reasons for why the Raptors defense doesn't look up to par. But I'm willing to bet that they're going to be a top 10 defense when all is said and done. So, I'm not too worried with what we've seen so far.

ARAIS FARAH: Yeah, obviously, there's a little concern any time you're not winning games and in the fashion that they're losing. These are winnable games, or at certain points, second, third quarter versus the Nets, they got a lot of momentum. You're thinking maybe they get this one.

Philly, they almost choked that win away. And then you had Portland, which Pascal OG came out the gate hot. They were playing really well, and the team just kind of beats itself a little bit. Quite a bit of mental lapses. Guys not knowing where to be.

Like, yeah, the blame can be shared all around from front office. Yeah, you want the idea of, like, a functional center to go up against these guys. Like, Cody Zeller's having an impact on the game, Isaiah Stewart.

And then at the same time, like, players need to take ownership. Like, Scottie has been dominant all year. Probably not the best game of his season last night, which started off really well. And then just a few mental lapses, a few turnovers, taking a tech, unnecessary plays.

But the good news is it's a young team. They're going to get better as the season goes along. You want to see a little more consistency. Instead of winning five straight and then losing five of six, you want to see let's grab two on the road here, lose one, win three.

A little more steadiness. But the good news with younger guys, they're going to get better as the season gets along, especially Scottie, Gary. They've been good early. Hopefully, Precious kind of gets it-- gets it going too there.

ASAD ALVI: Yeah, I'm not worried at all. What? Scale of 1 to 5, I'll put them at, like, maybe, like, a 2. Six games, they got 60, 70 left. So, I personally don't care about any five, six game stretch, anywhere here or there, but you know, if you look at the last five, it's like, all right, you got Pascal coming back in.

And the first five, their defense is great, their offense sucked. Last five, their offense have been great and their defense sucked. So, you know, you're going to have your ups and downs.

If there's anything I would, like, want to look out for moving forward is, like, all right, teams are kind of starting to pick on Scottie off-ball defensively. People are starting to pick up on Dalano not being able to kind of dribble with pressure, face up. So, you know, those are things like where, OK, you got rookies playing big minutes.

So, how are they going to move forward? So, those are just things to look for. But otherwise, it's like, hey, Khem's been out for five games and your defense fell apart. Khem comes back, still looking a little rickety, you know, maybe [INAUDIBLE] things start picking up. But--

IMMAN ADAN: You are working Siakam in those games when Khem does come back. So, [INAUDIBLE].

ASAD ALVI: And I think overall, it's like, hey, at least team's getting healthier, right? I'd be more worried if they pick up an injury next couple of games. So, you know, fingers crossed that nothing happens there. But otherwise, not too worried about it.

IMMAN ADAN: Wrap Fred VanVleet in bubble wrap. Wrap him in bubble wrap. If he goes down, that's it. That's it. Let's try again next year.

BEN CARLOS: I'm glad I'm here with the logical side of the Raptors fan base, because if you look on Twitter some nights, I imagine Donald Glover in "Community" walking into the room of fire, because everyone's like, Oh my God, [INAUDIBLE]. Like, yeah, all of what you guys said is, like, spot on.