Toronto Raptors Season Preview
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Good morning and welcome to the Athletic NBA Daily. Coming up, can Kawhi Leonard lead the Raptors to the promised land once again? What is the ceiling for Scottie Barnes? We'll talk about all that and more coming up.
Good morning, everybody. Good morning to Samson Folk and Travon Heath, who are hosts of the Pull Up Trade Podcast. Uh first time coming here on the Athletic NBA Daily. Although Samson, you were here for NBA finals reasons, if I'm not mistaken, right? Yeah.
I talked to Dave. It's like, you know, that they say there always has to be a stark in the north. There always has to be a bald on the podcast. So I'm I'm here for that reason. I'm here for that reason.
Thank you very much for fulfilling uh our bald prerequisite. Thank you to that. Uh if you guys don't know, Samson and Trey, they both host the Pull Up Trey podcast over at Raptors Republic. Very good friends of mine, but also for my money, uh, the best Raptors podcast out there in terms of funniness, in terms of analysis, all of the above. And uh hopefully you get a preview of that. Trey, how? How's it going?
It's good. It's like um seeing my friend in the the multiverse and seeing what you do on outside of
outside of our So it's cool to see you like this. I know, I know. It's a little weird, right? For me to be on this side of the thing. Uh, usually just listening to you guys vamp and joke. Anyways, the Toronto Raptors have had a very busy offseason. Um, busy in the sense that they have been waiting for the Kawhi Leonard shenanigans to subside, to just be clear that Kawhi is going to be a member of the Toronto Raptors, and at the point that we are recording this now. Now, Kawhi Leonard is going to be a member of the Toronto Raptors. Uh, there's still contract negotiations looming, which seems inevitably that he is going to sign an extension with the Toronto Raptors at some point. Maybe by the time that you're listening to this, he has already signed that contract extension.
But all in all, he is a member of the Toronto Raptors, and that completely changes the discussion for this Raptors. Team that last season took a step, made it to the playoffs, uh, took the Cleveland Cavaliers who made it to the Eastern Conference Finals to a frisky seven-game series. Um, but now it's it's a different conversation about this Raptors team, and especially in this new look Eastern Conference. So I ask you, knowing that Kawhi Leonard is the most look-forward to thing. What is the thing you guys are specifically most excited for? Samson, I'll go with you first.
I tore my hair out watching the Raptors operate in transition last year. And seeing a team that had very few shooters and a player like IQ making less than thirty percent of his transition triples, they had to run offense by having Scotty and RJ try and ram their way to the rim with a a paint that was had so many guys in it. Now, Kawhi does These great things where he just shoots the hell out of the basketball. He's in the bottom, or he's not even in the top 50 in drives, but he's in the top 20 in drive scoring. He's not even that high in the Clippers don't play in transition that often, but Kawhi is near the top in transition scoring. When he gets the ball, everything becomes simpler. And the thing I'm actually looking forward to most is that for the Raptors, that defined themselves as one of the fastest.
Fastest teams in basketball. They actually were pretty bad at it. And Kawhi almost singularly makes them potentially very good at it.
I I think for me the thing I'm looking most forward to is um can Scotty Barnes shot making from the playoffs transition translate into the regular season?
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Chapters
4 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–9:27
2
How will Kawhi Leonard’s return change the Raptors’ championship odds?
9:27–16:26
3
What makes Scottie Barnes’ playoff transition play so exciting for next season?
16:26–36:31
4
Which bench players could become key contributors in the Raptors’ rotation?
36:31–42:29