Raptors bench mob takes major hit with Poeltl gone – let’s rebuild it

An important element of last season’s 59-win squad was the remarkable performance of the Raptors’ second unit. One of the biggest contributors (and not just in height) was center Jakob Poeltl, who’s gone to San Antonio as part of the price for extracting Kawhi Leonard. Now the Raptors must rebuild their second string and hope it can be as much of a game-changer as last year’s version so frequently was.

You will recall that I declared my starting five as:

1. PG – Kyle Lowry
2. SG – Kawhi Leonard
3. SF – OG Anunoby
4. PF – Pascal Siakam
5. C – Jonas Valanciunas

That leaves us with eight players currently under contract to move around the chessboard.