Where did Serge Ibaka’s shot-blocking go? It’s still there, a little bit, but he now hardly resembles the dude who, once upon a time, blocked almost 4 shots a game. Yes, I am aware of the conspiracy theory regarding Ibaka and his age. Yes, I realize that it does nicely explain his earlier-than-expected statistical decline. Yes, I have seen that picture of him in sweatpants.
A smarter man than me would analyze tons of gametape of Ibaka with the Raptors and determine something like “he’s being told not to chase help-side blocks” or “he’s defending more on the perimeter, reducing his chances for blocks”. I am not that smart, though, and even if I was, I don’t care about defense.
So why I am asking the question in the first place? Huh. Okay, so I’m done caring about that. The scoring part of this vid is what you really want to see, I only included the blocks for the handful of perverts who get their jollies watching filth like that. Ibaka had a Raptors-high 24 points, dominating the 76ers lackluster assortment of random bigmen. He could’ve scored a lot more if they let him play the fourth quarter, but they didn’t because the Raptors organization has so much class.