Jordan Loyd finds balance between competing goals at Summer League
Loyd went from unknown to breakout guard in the G League last year. Now his journey continues as the offseason takes hold.
The reality for many players on the fringe of the NBA during the summer months is they’ll be tasked with answering a lot of questions in small opportunities. Within a handful of free agent camps and summer tournaments, there’s not a lot of room for error, nor is there any room for negotiating one’s place — trying to get a foot in the door means doing so the first time it cracks open, then trying to maneuver it further open later.
For Jordan Loyd, this meant trying to accomplish two somewhat conflicting tasks at Las Vegas Summer League: Play the role he was being assigned, and trying to show that he can do more than that while staying within its confines. It’s a standard conundrum in Utah, Orlando, and Las Vegas, one dozens of players deal with each summer, balancing the need to have strengths noticed or concerns assuaged with the need to fit in quickly to a sometimes narrow job description.
Suiting up for the Toronto Raptors, Loyd’s primary role was to help space the floor for their three established sophomores and newest signing Alfonzo McKinnie, a role he was promoted to after sitting out the team’s first outing (he’d been participating in Orlando Summer League up until the day prior) and then coming off the bench once. Given his 3-point range and willingness to accept a lower-usage role, Loyd was a seamless fit in this way. It also let him focus on a narrower list of tasks, which in theory can help at the defensive end, where there are questions about Loyd’s ability to hold up against stiffer competition (he made his conference All-Defensive Team in his final college season).
To that end, Loyd’s time with the Raptors was an unquestioned success. Over four games, he averaged 11.3 points, shot 48.1 percent from the floor, and was 16-of-17 at the free-throw line. He didn’t shoot the 3 as well as he would have liked at 3-of-13, but he left Vegas with a strong 65.3 true-shooting percentage, and the Raptors outscored opponents immensely (21.7 points per-100 possessions) with him on the floor. His subtle impact made quick fans of his teammates, with whom he’d had almost no time to gel prior to hitting the floor.
“Jordan Loyd came in and he was a surprisingly good addition,” Fred VanVleet said after Loyd’s eight-point, four-rebound performance against Minnesota. “He was great today. I don’t know what his stats ended up being, but he just made the game work easier.”
That’s almost always the type of endorsement teams want about the players they bring in to these situations. NBA teams aren’t scouring the G League and the international free agent bin for 30-point scorers, they’re looking for ninth and tenth men, a common refrain inside G League arenas. Fitting in and going mostly unnoticed in that sense was Loyd’s aim when moved into the starting lineup, as he looked to play a more traditional two-guard role alongside VanVleet.
“Just trying to do what I can to help. I know he has a big load on him, so if I can come in off the ball, relieve pressure off him,” Loyd said. “And also the other guys, Pascal, Jak, they all made me feel really good, and they’re easy to play with, so it’s my pleasure, man.”
But Loyd is also well aware in order to eventually make the jump to the NBA, he’ll need to show teams he can play at least a little bit of point guard, something he hadn’t done since high school until last season. It’s also something he wouldn’t get the chance to do much in the Raptors’ starting configuration. With VanVleet and undrafted Cincinnati free agent Troy Caupain around, Loyd was playing primarily off-ball. At 6-foot-4 and 210 pounds, Loyd has the size to stick at shooting guard, but he believes offensive versatility is a big part of what he can offer.
“Just trying to prove that I can play both ways, offense and defense. Also, that I can play the one and the two, be a good combo-guard,” he said. “I believe that in the NBA, I’ve gotta be able to play the one and the two. So if I can come out here and prove that, I think I have a pretty good shot.”
Loyd didn’t get to play much as a traditional ball-handler until the Raptors’ final game, when VanVleet sat. He dished three assists in that one, bringing him to seven for the tournament, a respectable if unspectacular number. There’s some reassurance in knowing that with Indiana in Orlando, he played with the ball in his hands a lot more, averaging 3.8 assists to only 1.3 turnovers, though he shot poorly in that event.
All told, Loyd showed well across the two tournaments, enough to affirm the growth he showed in his rookie G League season a year ago. A third-round pick by Fort Wayne, Loyd returned great value, averaging 15.1 points, 4.2 rebounds, and four assists while shooting 43.6/34.2/87.1. He didn’t get to display quite the shooting touch he would have liked, and the oscillation between roles in the two events (and even across games within them) meant there wasn’t a wealth of opportunity to solidify himself as a certain combo-guard or a two-way player just yet.
Even if the urge was there to step outside of his given role to prove those things, Loyd did his best to do what was asked of him.
“Naw, I wanna stay within the system,” Loyd said before the Raptors’ final game. “The coaches have done a great job of putting the plan in, so I’m just gonna try to stay with it, as hard as that’s gonna be. I’m gonna do my best.”
That he might need to show a little more despite a strong G League campaign and decent tournaments is not new to Loyd. He was only lightly recruited out of high school, then spent two years at Furman before transferring to Division-II Indianapolis to eventually grow into a starring role. He had but a single pre-draft workout, had little interest overseas, and slid to the third round in the G League draft. It seems he’s still in the process of shaking off any stigma from the path that got him to this point, but a week from his 24th birthday, he’s on his way.
Now it’s a matter of whether that forks toward a two-way or Exhibit 10 contract, an overseas deal or another year in the G League.
