Garrett Temple gave the Raptors plenty of wisdom in his final years as a player, and Toronto is betting Kyle Anderson can bring that same steadying presence while offering a lot more on the floor.
Temple’s late-career run in Toronto effectively turned into a path to coaching. After spending the past three seasons mentoring younger Raptors players, he was hired by the Mavericks as an assistant coach under new head coach Dusty May.
Now the Raptors have lined up another veteran voice by signing 12-year pro Kyle Anderson in free agency. And unlike Temple, Anderson is not arriving as a pure bench mentor. He can still help them win minutes.
Anderson has bounced around quite a bit lately. He spent two seasons with the Minnesota Timberwolves, split the 2024-25 season between Golden State and Miami, and this past season played for the Jazz, Grizzlies, and Timberwolves. Even with all that movement, his regular-season minutes stayed fairly consistent.
For Toronto, he projects as a ninth-through-eleventh man in the rotation. If the Kawhi Leonard trade happens, the expected starting group would be Immanuel Quickley, RJ Barrett, Leonard, Scottie Barnes, and Jakob Poeltl. The main bench group would then center on Jamal Shead, Ja’Kobe Walter, and Collin Murray-Boyles, with Anderson in the next wave alongside Jamison Battle and rookie Allen Graves.
That’s where his value really shows up. The Raptors may not need him to log heavy minutes if the younger players are ready to carry the bench, but Anderson gives them the option of 20 solid minutes when needed. Temple, by contrast, was down to the very end of his career, averaging just 3.3 minutes per game and playing only two minutes in a 126-104 Game 3 win in the playoffs.
Anderson’s background should matter especially for Graves, since Anderson was one of the NBA comparisons in Graves’s draft profile. He also brings serious postseason mileage, with 76 playoff games on his résumé and a trip to the Western Conference Finals just two years ago.
That kind of experience stands out on a roster where playoff reps are still limited. Outside of Poeltl, Barrett, and Leonard if he’s on the team next season, there isn’t much of it.
Barnes has only been through two playoff series, and his first as one of the team’s top players. Murray-Boyles, Walter, and Shead are all just getting their first taste of the postseason.
In Other News...
Warriors Fans Suddenly Have A Stephen Curry Scenario To Fear
The idea of Stephen Curry in Toronto is the kind of offseason hypotheticals that usually gets filed away as internet noise, but this one has a little more texture because of the Raptors connection to him. Currys family history includes a Toronto chapter through his father, and he also spent part of his childhood in the city, which gives any theoretical fit a different feel than a random star swap.
Golden State fans are still left with the uneasy part of the conversation, though, because Curry has been open to the idea of creative thinking if it helps the Warriors get back on track after injuries altered the picture. Even in a speculative world, his future is not something that can be treated like a normal trade chip, and that is what makes the scenario worth watching rather than dismissing outright. [Read more 🡒]
Raptors Revenge Path Just Got A Lot More Real
Cleveland already made Toronto work for everything in their recent playoff series, pushing it to seven games even without some key pieces in the lineup. Since then, the Cavaliers have kept Donovan Mitchell in place and are lining up another addition in Mario Hezonja, but the roster around him has changed enough to make the East feel a little less fixed than it did in the spring.
For the Raptors, the bigger point is that their own ceiling could rise fast if Kawhi Leonard ends up in the mix and stays available. A healthier, more dangerous Toronto group would look like a far tougher matchup for Cleveland next time around, especially with the Cavs having already shown they can be stretched when the series gets physical and the margins get thin. [Read more 🡒]