Ja’Kobe Walter came into his third season with a bold target in mind: he wants to lead the NBA in steals. It’s a lofty aim, but the Toronto Raptors guard has reasons to believe he can chase it down. He’s expected to play a meaningful role, and when Kawhi Leonard is out, the chances to gamble, jump passing lanes and make plays pile up fast.
Walter already showed the kind of disruption he can bring last season. In the playoffs, once he settled in, he piled up 13 steals across four games. During the regular season, he averaged one steal per game.
He opened this year with a strong defensive outing in Toronto’s blowout win over the Chicago Bulls, swiping three steals in 23 minutes. But he wasn’t the only Raptor making life miserable for Chicago ball-handlers. Leonard finished with four steals, while Immanuel Quickley added two.
Walter said the internal competition is part of the appeal.
“Actually I did think that,” Walter said when asked about whether he had expected his own teammates to compete with him for his steals goal. “You know, dudes like [Scottie Barnes], Kawhi, [Jamal Shead], we all get steals. So, knowing that I’m competing with them is definitely going to push all of us to become better defensively.”
That race is real. Leonard finished sixth in the league last season with 122 steals, and Barnes was right behind him in ninth with 114.
Cason Wallace led the NBA with 150. Walter has plenty of company in Toronto, and plenty of competition across the league too.
The bigger takeaway from the opener, though, was what Toronto’s defense looked like as a whole. The Raptors rolled past the Bulls by 43 points without leaning on outrageous shotmaking.
They hit just 45% from the field and connected on only ten 3-pointers. Leonard was inefficient.
Still, four of the five starters reached 20 points, which speaks to how balanced the offense was.
What really buried Chicago was the other end. Toronto stacked up 15 steals and six blocks, held the Bulls to 32% shooting and just 4-for-36 from beyond the arc, and turned 27 turnovers into 35 points.
It was only one game, and the Bulls are rebuilding, with rookie Caleb Wilson and 22-year-old Matas Buzelis as their top scorers. Still, it was a sharp first glimpse of what could be one of the three best defenses in the NBA. The Raptors will have to bring that same edge against better teams, but the opening night evidence was hard to ignore.
In Other News...
Allen Graves Had A Very Toronto Moment Before His NBA Debut
Allen Graves first night in the NBA came with all the Toronto trimmings. In his debut against the Chicago Bulls on Oct. 21, the Raptors rookie chipped in five points, five rebounds and three blocks in 19 minutes, but what stood out just as much was the setting around him. Graves called the experience of playing in front of a sold-out crowd and hearing the national anthem a significant moment, the kind of arrival that makes a debut feel bigger than a box score.
And for a player taking his first professional steps, Toronto supplied a scene he wont forget soon. Drake was courtside, adding another unmistakably local layer to the night, and Graves said he felt the support of family and friends after the game. For a rookie trying to settle into the league, it was a reminder that his first NBA memory in this city came with plenty of noise, attention and the sort of atmosphere that makes Toronto feel different from anywhere else. [Read more 🡒]
Raptors Face An Early Road Test Their Defense Can't Fake
The Raptors are about to get their first road test of the season in Washington, and it arrives with a chance to find out a lot about how real their early defensive promise is. The Wizards have reshaped their roster with the kind of veteran help that can steady a young group, bringing in Anthony Davis and Trae Young to support their younger players, which makes this more than a simple early-season stop. Torontos defense has looked sharp enough to invite optimism, but road games tend to expose whether that edge travels or gets softened by unfamiliar surroundings.
Washington will also be short-handed, with AJ ruled out, which removes another layer from a matchup already built around questions about depth and consistency. For Toronto, the interest is less about the prediction and more about how the team handles a setting where effort and discipline matter just as much as talent. If the Raptors can carry their defensive identity into this one, it would say something meaningful about where this group stands before the schedule gets any less forgiving. [Read more 🡒]
Raptors Draft Miss Just Raised A Bigger Question For Toronto
Torontos 2023 lottery swing on Gradey Dick was always going to be judged by more than just what happened on draft night. The appeal was obvious at the time: a polished shooter coming out of college, the kind of skill set that can look like a clean fit for almost any roster. But once that shooting proved harder to carry over to the NBA, and Dick was eventually moved to the LA Clippers, it left the Raptors with a familiar front-office question to wrestle with about how much weight to put on one elite trait.
Allen Graves has added another layer to that discussion ahead of the 2026 draft. He is viewed as a more versatile prospect, which makes him look like the sort of player Toronto may value more highly now than it did when it bet on shooting first. For a team still sorting out how to build its next core, the real issue is not just whether Graves can help, but whether the Raptors have already learned enough from the Dick pick to change how they evaluate the next one. [Read more 🡒]