Have the Toronto Raptors done enough to make the finals?

Conclusion

While the West has always garnered respect as the ‘tougher’ conference to be in, these deadline moves have definitely made East-coast basketball relevant and exciting once again.

As of right now, there are reasons to be excited about the Raptors’ playoff chances, but when looking at the bigger picture, there are similar reasons to believe that they won’t even make it out of the second round, due to the adjustments made by other contenders.

Aside from Milwaukee, who has stayed relatively quiet from a drama standpoint, both Boston and Philadelphia have been riddled with chemistry issues on and off the court. Squabbles on who gets more shots or touches have definitely affected the smoothness of some parts of their game.

The only possible knock on the  Raptors’ goals of making a deep playoff run would be age and the caliber of additions.

A lot of Raptors already have a ton of miles on their bodies and both Lin and Gasol seem to be on the tail end of their primes. This can be concerning when considering how Tobias Harris seems destined for all-stardom and how Mirotic’s 3-point, floor stretching ability is a perfect fit for a Giannis-led offense.

Which trades will ultimately help push teams over the edge? Which experiments will fail? The final stretch of the season after the all-star break will prove to be an interesting site of analysis for the East for sure.