DeMarre Carroll smiles during an introductory press conference in Toronto on July 9. At 6-foot-8 and 215 pounds, he is big enough to defend the NBA’s big men and quick enough to do the same with the little guys.Darren Calabrese/The Canadian Press
The back-to-back news conferences Thursday in the public concourse at the Air Canada Centre were as much about heralding the new approach of the Toronto Raptors as they were about showing off new arrivals DeMarre Carroll and Cory Joseph, both signed as free agents.
Usually, such affairs are thrown for the game's stars – the previous news gathering down at the ACC's Gate 5 was to trumpet the signing of superstar NHL head coach Mike Babcock by the Raptors' corporate sibling, the Toronto Maple Leafs.
Carroll, 28, has some star power in that he played a prominent role over the past two NBA seasons with the Atlanta Hawks and was a force for them in the 2015 playoffs. Both he and Joseph, 23, have compelling back stories: Carroll turned himself from a marginal player into a two-way force thanks to a prodigious work ethic, and Joseph is the Toronto native joyously coming home to serve as backup to guards Kyle Lowry and DeMar DeRozan.
But even Carroll, who signed for star-like money at four years and $60-million (all currency U.S.), admitted his reaction to the splashy news conference was "finally, blue-collar guys are getting a little recognition."
The point of the exercise, driven home by Raptors president and general manager Masai Ujiri, was to emphasize his transformation of the Raptors from offence-first playoff pushovers to hard-nosed defensive demons who will go well into the postseason. And who better than Carroll, described by Ujiri as "one of the toughest players in the NBA," to showcase the change?
Carroll came into the NBA in 2009 as a late first-round draft pick who could not find his way as a power forward. Over the next four years he bounced around the league, getting traded once and waived twice, including once by Ujiri when he was running the Denver Nuggets, before landing in Atlanta.
There he formed a bond with now former Hawks assistant coach Quin Snyder. He helped turn Carroll from a mediocre power forward to a defensive force as a small forward who could shoot well enough to be a consistent threat at the corner three, that three-point shot from the corner, the shortest part of the three-point boundary.
Even better, after improving his shooting enough to become a starter over the past two seasons, averaging 12.6 points and 5.3 rebounds in 2014-15, Carroll elevated his game in the playoffs last spring. He remained the Hawks' most relentless defensive player but also became their leading scorer through the first two rounds with six games of more than 20 points before suffering a knee injury in the first game of the third round against the Cleveland Cavaliers.
Carroll arrives with the same nickname as the revered former Raptor Jerome Williams, Junkyard Dog, but in this case he is a JYD with a complete game. At 6-foot-8 and 215 pounds, he is big enough to defend the NBA's big men and quick enough to do the same with the little guys.
Learning how to make up for a lack of talent with hard work came at an early age, Carroll said, when he realized in public school in Birmingham, Ala., that he was "not the smartest student" in the class.
"I did all my homework," Carroll said. "And I reached the same goal as the smart person. And that's what I do in basketball. I'm not the most talented person but I will do all the little things to be a successful person."
There were also plenty of hard times along the way. When he was 5, Carroll's older brother DeLonte died at the age of 9 from a brain tumour. In 2007, Carroll was hit in the ankle by a stray bullet during a nightclub shooting that did not involve him. One year later, Carroll was diagnosed with a rare form of liver disease that finally responded to treatment but may have repercussions later in his life.
So fighting your way to a starting job in the NBA, surviving trades and firings, might seem relatively easy. In fact, Carroll said, when he was cut from the Nuggets three years ago by Ujiri it was a lesson, not another tribulation.
"That day helped me become the man I became," Carroll said. "It made me think every opportunity you get, you have to take advantage of. When I got my opportunity in Atlanta I took advantage."
Ujiri remembers the moment a little differently from his side of the desk. "Stupid," is what he called his decision, and no, he was not about to claim any insight back then into what kind of player Carroll would become.
"If I figured that out, do you think I would have cut him?"