There are officially 21 days until the start of a new NBA year and that is means for celebration. Preseason ball came back last night while you were probably asleep and James Harden recorded his first triple-double of 2019-20 for Houston Rockets as they played the Shanghai Sharks, in a game that didn’t count but still entertained.
The rest of the league is to start their preseasons on Friday and the days following the weekend. We will get the opportunity to witness the newer dynamic tandems share court time for the first time, big names in new threads and contenders practice obtaining their chemistry in short outings for four quarters. We are getting really, really close to NBA basketball, and it feels like I’m repeating myself when I say that the anticipation is killing us all.
But to get back on track, coming in at No. 21 is the 2018-19 first-round exit Orlando Magic.
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21. Orlando Magic (41-41) – With 42 Wins Last Year And A Stolen First-Overall Selection, Can The “Magic” For The Magic Continue?
Admit it. If you were asked last fall about Orlando’s ability to contend with the likes of the Heat and Wizards in the Southeast, you’d have never seen a postseason berth in the realm of possibility for these one-time underhanded Magic.
Don’t lie. You know you didn’t predict the Orlando Magic to be a topic of relevance in the yearly NBA Playoff Picture, and it’s okay, I didn’t either.
Steve Clifford should earn a presidential medal of freedom for the way he’s revived one of the more infamous and unlucky NBA franchises in recent memory. The Magic are developing fundamentally, and in the right way going from the top down. We all cannot wait for what is to come in Mo Bamba’s second year while Nikola Vucevic is coming off an All-Star season, the first of his career in fact. They’re maintaining stability by keeping their starting five from last year. They are adding wing depth by getting a proven and credible defender in Al-Farouq Aminu that has extensive postseason experience.
All of the things that the Magic are doing are just right. Problem is, there isn’t a lot to look forward too when it comes to their backcourt. D.J. Augustin is a veteran with some slightly impressive numbers and he only missed one game last season, but he was wildly inconsistent in his 81 starts, as he’s never averaged more than 15 points per game, or over 6 assists a game, over the entire course of his career. There’s no other reasoning that the Magic will need a reboot at the PG position, and it does not look likely that Augustin is the likeliest candidate to stick around for this rebuilding period that’s lasted for over eight seasons.
But, if all turns out well for their offseason pickup at the guard spot, that lengthy search that most teams that are looking for a franchise guard may not have to be undergone.
The disenfranchised Markelle Fultz is looking for a roster to fully call a professional roster home and hasn’t had the luxury of doing so, so at the tender age of 21, the 2019 season may be his last chance to maintain a spot in the NBA. His rookie season, being fair of course, was plagued with concurrent injury and mismanagement, causing him to miss over 68 games with that bizarre shoulder condition that altered his shooting form so many times you’d think he was a toddler learning the B.E.E.F method (Balance, Eye Contact, Elbow Follow Through).
Still, his ceiling for the type of guard he could be is too magnanimous to ignore. He averaged 18 points a game when he was a high schooler at DeMatha High, then went on to compete in the Pac 12 at Washington, putting up some scary good numbers by averaging 23.2 points per contest. He was equally able to get to the bucket by using an effective dribble, albeit with a 6’9 wingspan at a 6’4, 201-lb figure and shoot effectively from everywhere at a 47 percent FG percentage and a 41 percent rating from deep.
Now, his NBA numbers haven’t been great (averaged 7.6 points off a combined 41.2 shooting percentage in two seasons as a Sixer) but picture this: with a chance to develop in a low-pressure, media-dilute environment with a point guard’s coach in Steve Clifford, who is mainly responsible for the professional evolution of guards like Kemba Walker, Markelle Fultz is afforded the gift of getting healthy, boosting his confidence and growing into a franchise point guard for an evolving organization that could very well challenge for a consecutive playoff spot in a conference that doesn’t look that threatening.
Also with their backcourt situation: the Magic drafted Auburn Guard Chuma Okeke with the 16th overall pick. A volume scorer whose season ended abruptly with a torn ACL in a national tournament game, Okeke was the diamond in the ruff for the first-time Final Four visitors. He scored 12 points per contest and was a sniper from deep, nearly leading the team in 3pt percentage. The rookie will have to sit out the year and learn the system, but for a team that lacks guard depth, some may feel that the Magic made an unnecessary move of going back to the well in drafting a guard.
Touched on a little bit earlier, the Magic’s core maintained their stability in re-signing the likes of the cleared-for-takeoff Aaron Gordon and second-year man Jonathan Isaac out of Florida State. Gordon has improved his game every year since his rookie season in 2014 and looks to be living up to his four-year, $84 million contract signed just last year. Gordon’s numbers dipped slightly in 2018-19 from his 17.1 ppg standard, but that isn’t a reason to cast away the power forward whose game has expanded from just inside the restricted arc as a dunker to the three-point arc, shooting at a respectable 35 percent from deep with confidence.
If Gordon can take the leap to become an All-Star like his counterpart in Vucevic, the Magic could have one of the most arduous duos in the entire league to guard down low.
The Magic will also bring back the uber-athletic Terrence Ross, who saw a rise in his numbers in a career year as the leader of the second unit. He averaged 15.1 ppg off 42 percent shooting, while also posting the second-best efficiency rating of his tenure as a 2 guard in the NBA. The Magic are still looking to see if the improved games of a previously-conceived-to-be-average Evan Fournier and Jonathan Isaac make the leap to complement their teammates because if they do, the Magic will have more than enough firepower to compete and possibly win the Southeast Division and earn yet another postseason berth.
The Magic are literally the proverbial “what if” team in the Eastern Conference. They play in a division so impacted by free agency and injury and will have every opportunity to snatch the lead of the Southeast from the clutch of the Miami Heat (who, as you know, snagged Jimmy Butler in the offseason).
Some questions for next season: is Markelle Fultz the guy he was championed to be in the draft and can he earn a starting spot? Can Aaron Gordon take the next step to assert himself as an All-Star? Was Jonathan Issac worth a first-round draft pick? Can Mo Bamba flex his 7-foot frame and produce in some valuable minutes all season while staying healthy? Orlando only needs a couple of these things to happen for them to make the playoffs, luckily.
The only negative is that the Magic still don’t have the franchise guard they can trust to run the offense and produce consistently to make the Magic a practical threat in the East. So, worst-case-scenario, the Magic have a plan B in passing off some draft and free agent capital to make some trades.
The Magic will probably be a game better than what they were a season ago, and with the All-Star status of Nikola Vucevic and potential of Aaron Gordon being a multifaceted defender and scorer, the Magic will be able to further solidify their identity as an eventual contender in a weakened East sooner rather than later.
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