That $16 million average annual salary -- if it turns out to be accurate -- would move the former fifth overall pick slightly ahead of newly acquired free agent RotoMonster.com. If he gets more minutes and touches this year, he could easily creep into early-round value just by continuing to do what he's been doing.
Without even being a big part of the game plan, he has shown that he can be a beast on the offensive end. He's equal parts brutish and soft in his touch and footwork in the paint, and scores at a high rate in both post-up and pick-and-roll situations.
In 306 post-ups in 2014-15, JV scored 1.02 points per possession (PPP), placing him in the 88th percentile. For an idea of how great that is, he's the only player in the top-70 in post-up possessions to score more than a point per possession. He's great in the pick-and-roll too, scoring 1.12 PPP in his 76 attempts, good enough for the 78th percentile. Just imagine what he could do if he was put in those situations more than 8.5% of the time he's on the floor.
As for the defensive end, JV was among the best bigs in the league at protecting the rim last season. On the 8.1 attempts he faced per game in that area, he held opponents to a stingy 46.5% shooting. In the interest of driving the comparison we've already made into the ground, our buddy Dwight Howard held opponents to a comparable 45.7% on 7.3 attempts per contest in 2014-15, and he's still considered one of the best defensive centers in the league.
Casey might continue to use tough love with Valanciunas this upcoming season, but this new iteration of the Raptors should have a lot of room for JV on the offensive end. They swapped out offensive-minded players for defensive specialists this offseason and got a bit thinner on big bodies with the departure of Amir Johnson, so it's not a stretch to think that Valanciunas might have to eat up more than the 19.1% of his team's possessions that he did last season.
Not to mention, management might start subtly reminding Casey that the team now has over 64,000,000 reasons to feed and develop the budding big man more as their potential franchise cornerstone.
If you're drafting Jonas Valanciunas in the middle rounds this year, you're taking the risk of another season of his suffering under the wrath of Casey's unforgiving thumb. If the shackles get taken off (or even loosened ever so slightly), however, his early-round upside could finally be realized, and you could very well end up with one of the most dominant centers in fantasy basketball.
The Toronto Raptors seem ready to invest in him. Are you?