25-under-25: Scottie Barnes needs to figure out how he will dominate

Scottie Barnes ranked No. 15 on The Step Back's 2023-24 25-under-25, ranking the best young players in the NBA. Check out the rest of the list here.

Sift through some old pre-draft scouting reports of Scottie Barnes and it’s almost impossible to ignore the Ben Simmons mentions:

Similar to Ben Simmons. Ben Simmons if he gave a crap. Must become a threat to score outside the paint or could get the Ben Simmons treatment. The player who has a real chance to become Simmons with a shot is Barnes. Scottie Barnes showing flashes of Ben Simmons.

After his rookie season, the comps felt pejorative and pessimistic. 

Barnes didn’t have nearly as much rookie playmaking responsibility as Simmons but he still won Rookie of the Year, averaging 15.3 points, 7.5 rebounds, 3.5 assists and 1.1 steals per game. He posted a 55.2 true shooting percentage, shot 73.5 percent from the line and made 58 3-pointers. (Simmons has made five in his entire career). Most importantly, Barnes showed a complete lack of fear, playing through his limitations with joy and enthusiasm.

A year later, things feel a little bit differently.

Barnes took on slightly more playmaking primacy in his second season, averaging 4.8 assists per game. But his 2-point and 3-point percentages dropped. His jumper is looking like a massive problem for the Raptors and the enthusiasm feels a little misguided without a harder edge.

Across his first two seasons, Barnes has made 29.0 percent of 417 3-pointers. He regressed enormously on long 2-pointers last season, dropping from 38.7 percent to 32.9 percent. His 34.5 effective field goal percentage on all pull-up jumpers was dead last (by a huge margin) among the 75 players with at least 200 attempts last season.

It’s not just that he missed, it’s the way all those misses changed the way defenses played him.

As the season went along, opponents increasingly gave Barnes a huge amount of space with the ball at the top of the key. Cutting off passing lanes and basically daring him to either shoot or drive into a brick wall.

At this point, pretty much any jumper Barnes takes is a win for the defense. The only real wrinkle he’s tried in response has been moving to the wing and backing down his defender, ceding the space and turning the possession into a post-up. That would be fine if it was a strength but he ranked in the 33rd percentile in scoring efficiency on post-ups and looked about as confident there as he did shooting mid-range pull-ups.

I realize this sounds overly negative. But this is a huge and dramatic hole in Barnes’ game and it’s the difference between his current form and his hypothetical ceiling. With his current jumper, Barnes is Ben Simmons. There’s upside in his willingness to shoot from different locations and at least test the defense something that seemed to leak out of Simmons as time went on. But functionally, it’s limiting in much the same way.

But Barnes also presents all the same tantalizing potential. His size, agility, handle and vision are incredibly unique. He is a disruptive defender and still barely scratching the surface at that end of the floor. He doesn’t need to turn into Kevin Durant, even becoming a slightly below-average jump shooter could be enough to turn him into an All-Star and the kind of player the Raptors need to build back toward a title. 

And that’s not even the only path. Giannis Antetokounmpo overcame similar limitations by leaning into his physical advantages, adding strength and simply overwhelming opponents. That’s an approach that is, in theory, open to Barnes as well — becoming so elite as a finisher, and so unstoppable in getting to the basket that the defense can’t afford to give you any space, anywhere.

But the Raptors need to see some of that from Barnes this season. An improved jumper. More selectivity in how he uses it. More development of the other tools in his scoring arsenal. Enthusiasm directed less toward joy and more toward force of will, the desire to dominate. 

Barnes can still be one of the best players in the league. But he needs to reset his direction and start making forward progress this year or he risks stalling out.