Predicting the future is a difficult task.
None of us truly know what is coming, at least when it pertains to basketball. The Dallas Mavericks were were nearly .500 at the trade deadline before reshaping their rotation, turning on the jets and making it to the NBA Finals. The Oklahoma City Thunder were projected outside of the playoffs by many and ended up as the No. 1 seed. The Orlando Magic won more games than the Philadelphia 76ers and Miami Heat.
Still, even with those surprises, you can at least get somewhat close by looking at the known information. How much talent does a team have? What additions and subtractions took place over the offseason? Is a team younger, and likely to improve, or older, and likely to decline? Was a team unusually healthy or injured last season?
With the Toronto Raptors, a number of those factors come to bear. They didn't make many notable additions this offseason that will drastically change their rotation, but they certainly did last season and those key players didn't have much time to play together. They have a young core likely to improve, and those players succeeded at a high level when they were on the court together last season.
The most important factor will be health, as the Raptors were positively ravaged by injuries a season ago. Scottie Barnes and Jakob Poeltl missed the last 20+ games of the season, and everyone around them was in-and-out of the lineup. If the team has even average health next season they should be significantly better.
Predicting the Raptors' season is therefore very difficult to do with any accuracy, but one thing is clear: all of the information suggests they will be better than last season, if not much better.
Clear to everyone, that is, but Bleacher Report's Andy Bailey.
Bleacher Report thinks the Raptors will be bad
There was a case to be made for the Toronto Raptors to move off of key veterans this offseason and enter a full rebuild, to go after a top prospect in the 2025 NBA Draft and further build out their core. They didn't take that path, however, and it's clear they are planning to be competitive next season.
Andy Bailey at Bleacher Report doesn't think so. He recently predicted the win-loss record for all 30 teams in the NBA, a significant undertaking. In doing so, he made a couple of very surprising predictions, and perhaps none more so than the Raptors, who Bailey pegged as going 26-56.
For context, last season, in the midst of a massive reshaping of the roster, and countless injuries to key players, and a truly shocking losing streak toward the end of the season, the Raptors went 25-57. Bailey thinks they will only improve by a single win this year.
Perhaps Bailey had a well-thought out reason for why the Raptors wouldn't improve at all now that they are healthy and have an offseason of preparation, why the young core wouldn't improve, why the Raptors would lose a whopping 56 games. Did he?
He did not.
His explanation is mostly positive, that the Raptors played well together when their core was on the court together, and that those three young stars fit together well. He gave a nod to Gradey Dick as an improving player. And then tossed out a "but they aren't a playoff team yet" and continued on his way.
There is a wealth of space between 26 wins and the playoffs, and the Raptors should reside squarely in it. It's not out of the question they are good enough to compete for a low-end playoff spot, and at the very least their win projection needs to start with a '3' and not a '2'. Bailey appears to have applied very little logic to his win prediction, which highlights the flaw in his subjective process.
When ranking teams, it's very easy to start with familiar teams or exciting franchises and apply a win total. Then as you go down the list, your last few teams have a limited number of wins remaining, and they get the short end of the stick. That almost has to be what happened with Toronto here; Bailey handed out wins and had precious few left for the Raptors.
Perhaps Bailey will be right, but he certainly didn't show his work, and it's much more likely the Raptors soar well above this prediction. Even the Vegas over/under was quoted in the article as 30.5, and Bailey did nothing to explain why they would go under. It's hard work writing an article like this, but it's clear he either didn't have or didn't take the time to balance it out for all 30 teams.
The Raptors aren't set up to return to dominance next season, but 26 wins? All of the available information screams that they'll easily clear that mark, and likely well before the season is over.