17-72 from three in 2 playoff games

[The-Stallion70]

We know the problem but I felt that this volume of attempts was staggering enough to start a thread.

The lack of shooting on the roster is something that us fans have been harping on all year and now only has it persisted in the playoffs but it has been magnified now when it matters most.

Most of us were shocked when we didn't make any changes at the trade deadline.

Changes need to be made.

[Jaxfann]

Too true!

[PrimeThyme]

It's the fear that I've always had and always will have with any Weltman-built roster.

Every year since Weltman took over as head of basketball operations, we've competed for the title of the worst-shooting team in the league, as well as the worst offensive one. We know what he values in a player and what he prioritizes in roster building.

He obviously has time to fix this, and our team is young, but don't be shocked if we're looking up three years from now and asking similar questions about our inability to shoot or play league average offensively. I won't be.

[Blue_and_Whte]

We know the problem but I felt that this volume of attempts was staggering enough to start a thread.

The lack of shooting on the roster is something that us fans have been harping on all year and now only has it persisted in the playoffs but it has been magnified now when it matters most.

Most of us were shocked when we didn't make any changes at the trade deadline.

Changes need to be made.

Well it’s not going to change this series. We’re easy to defend. Just load up on PB and Franz and watch the other guys chuck bricks.

[Message Boar]

Yeah, not great chief. Cavs are just scheming and daring us to shoot pretty good open threes, and we're hitting even a lot worse than our regular season %s. Not really much we can do except hope some guys start hitting some. I can't even name a Cavs backup big, one of Allen/Mobley always feel like they're out there.

We need to add at least 2 guards who can play in the playoffs this offseason, or at the very least 1 really good one and hope for internal development from our young guards. Along with other stuff; a big, a rotatable forward.

p.s. even Westbrook just knocked down an open three as I write this

[OrlDave]

The guys are clearly rattled a bit. Our guards shot it decently enough in the regular season (39.7, 37 and 34% for Suggs, Harris and Cole), they shouldn't be missing those wide-open looks so badly. Maybe some home cooking will calm the nerves a bit.

[pepe1991]

It's the fear that I've always had and always will have with any Weltman-built roster.

Every year since Weltman took over as head of basketball operations, we've competed for the title of the worst-shooting team in the league, as well as the worst offensive one. We know what he values in a player and what he prioritizes in roster building.

He obviously has time to fix this, and our team is young, but don't be shocked if we're looking up three years from now and asking similar questions about our inability to shoot or play league average offensively. I won't be.

Because he simply does not views shooting nor scoring as important.

You can see it with his drafting.

2017. Isaac, low usage, low scoring, mediocre 3 point shooter. 12 ppg , 35% for 3 on 2,8 attemps
2018. Bamba. Low usage, low scoring , crappy 3 point shooter. 12 ppg, 27% for 3 on 1,7 attemps
2019. Okeke. Low usage, low scoring, nice 3 point stroke. 12 ppg, 38,7% for 3 on 3,7 attemps
2020. Cole. High usage, terrible efficiency, streaky mediocre 3 point shooter, 18 ppg on 35% for 3 on 6,4 attemps.
2021. Suggs. Low usage, average scoring, mediocre shooter. 14 ppg, 33,7% for 3 on 3,5 attemps a game.
2021. Franz. Low usage, low scoring, below average shooting. 12 ppg on 34% for 3 on 3,6 attemps
2022. Banchero. High usage, high scoring, mediocre shooting. 17 ppg on 33,8% for 3 on 3,3 attemps

Anthony Black. Low usage, low scoring, way below avearge shooter from anywhere. 12,8 ppg on 30% for 3 on 2,6 attemps.

Jet Howard, average scoring, above average efficiency 14 ppg on 37% for 3 on 7,2 attemps



Red ones are high volumen players ( Banchero, Cole) blue ones are all similar type of low efficiency shooters, low usage scorers.
And i took better (second)years of both Okeke and Franz, their freshmen college years were worst.


Problem with all this is simply him overvaluing defense. If you make list of top 20 players overall, top 20 players on offense and top 20 players on defenes, you will have situation where way more players overlap in top 20 offense than in top 20 defense compared to top 20 overall.

If you bild nba team you would rather have 9th best offensive player than best defender. Sure , in perfect world you want both ( that's why Victor is viewed as best prospect in a decade, that's why Anthony Davis is viewed as first unicorn ), but it's not like anybody with common sense will trade some Herb Jones / Alex Caruso / Jalen Suggs for Athony Edwards or Kevin Durant or Lebron or Jaylen Brown ( who isn't even top 20 nba player, at least according to Ringer ).

If you want to build a team of bunch of elite two way players, your salary cap will go to hell in few years, because even average two way -okey- players make crazy money (Jaden McDaniels, OG , Jarret Allen etc ). Yet neither of them, if he isn't ultra elite on defense ( Davis, potentially Vicor ) won't really make all that difference, especially not as best player, but will be payed as one.

I've said it 2 days ago on playoffs thread, that you look at nba playoff defense ,and you see guys like Lebron, Jokic, Davis, Luka still puting up 30 + ppg on uber efficiency and you figure how much better they actually are than rest of a league and why you need top 5 player to win a ring. Not to make chasedown block on poor guard in 3rd quater ( young Lebron), not to put people on poster ( Giannis), not to make silly 45 foot no look passes ( Jokic) but to execute right plays in close game situations where nobody else has creativity, guts nor talent to make anything.

[The-Stallion70]

We know the problem but I felt that this volume of attempts was staggering enough to start a thread.

The lack of shooting on the roster is something that us fans have been harping on all year and now only has it persisted in the playoffs but it has been magnified now when it matters most.

Most of us were shocked when we didn't make any changes at the trade deadline.

Changes need to be made.

Well it’s not going to change this series. We’re easy to defend. Just load up on PB and Franz and watch the other guys chuck bricks.

Way to miss the point,

It is basically a forgone conclusion that the Magic will not win the series.

We don't match up well with them and the fact Garland, Mitchell and Mobley each missed time and then came back indicates that they are fresh.

The Knicks, Pacers and Sixers don't have great defenders to put on Paolo like Cleveland does. We match up better with them.

[doct3r dr3]

Didn't see this thread when I posted in the General Series Thread; I'll just repost it here:

Some fun with numbers from Stats.NBA.com

It may come as no surprise that the Magic's 23.6% 3P% is good for worst among all playoff teams through the first 2 games. But how well-contested are these threes the Magic are missing?

Through the first 2 games of the playoffs, the Magic have attempted:

• 0 "Very tight" (0-2 ft) contested threes
• 1.5 "Tight" (2-4 ft) contested threes per game (3rd fewest)
• 12.5 "Open" (4-6 ft) threes per game (9th most)
• 22.0 "Wide open" (6+ ft) threes per game (4th most)

... put into context, that means that 61.1% of the Magic's 3PA were wide open, good for 3rd most in the playoffs, and 95.8% were either open or wide open, also good for 3rd most in the playoffs.


and the Magic have converted:

• 0% of "Very tight" (0-2 ft) threes
• 0% of "Tight" (2-4 ft) threes
• 24.0% of "Open" (4-6 ft) threes (3rd worst)
• 25.0% of "Wide open" (6+ ft) threes (worst)

As a result, the Magic have missed 16.5 wide open 3PA per game, good for 3rd most in the playoffs, behind New Orleans (17.0) and Indiana (20.0).


TL;DR: The Cavaliers are leaving the Magic wide open for three, and the Magic are shooting them, but missing them at an alarming rate.

[Def Swami]

Read on Twitter

[UCFJayBird]

Didn't see this thread when I posted in the General Series Thread; I'll just repost it here:

Some fun with numbers from Stats.NBA.com

It may come as no surprise that the Magic's 23.6% 3P% is good for worst among all playoff teams through the first 2 games. But how well-contested are these threes the Magic are missing?

Through the first 2 games of the playoffs, the Magic have attempted:

• 0 "Very tight" (0-2 ft) contested threes
• 1.5 "Tight" (2-4 ft) contested threes per game (3rd fewest)
• 12.5 "Open" (4-6 ft) threes per game (9th most)
• 22.0 "Wide open" (6+ ft) threes per game (4th most)

... put into context, that means that 61.1% of the Magic's 3PA were wide open, good for 3rd most in the playoffs, and 95.8% were either open or wide open, also good for 3rd most in the playoffs.


and the Magic have converted:

• 0% of "Very tight" (0-2 ft) threes
• 0% of "Tight" (2-4 ft) threes
• 24.0% of "Open" (4-6 ft) threes (3rd worst)
• 25.0% of "Wide open" (6+ ft) threes (worst)

As a result, the Magic have missed 16.5 wide open 3PA per game, good for 3rd most in the playoffs, behind New Orleans (17.0) and Indiana (20.0).


TL;DR: The Cavaliers are leaving the Magic wide open for three, and the Magic are shooting them, but missing them at an alarming rate.

This is the kind of stuff that boggles my mind. I mean I get it, it's two games so it could be a bad trend at the wrong time in terms of missing wide open 3s. But I'm pretty sure we saw stats that said we were among the league's worst in missing wide open 3s for the entire season. To me that's a mental thing, and a uniquely shared mental thing within the team.

How do you fix that?

The only way I can see is you bring in guys who are more consistent and less streaky. All of our guys are OK shooters overall, but they're all streaky. And streaky players tend to feed off energy and other players' performance. If we start the game and hit our first few 3s, they'll probably have a really good night shooting. If they miss a ton, we're going to have a bad night (which is why I was on the verge of blacking out when they started Game 2 jacking up 3s left and right and missing - badly).

[GameOver25]

Didn't see this thread when I posted in the General Series Thread; I'll just repost it here:

Some fun with numbers from Stats.NBA.com

It may come as no surprise that the Magic's 23.6% 3P% is good for worst among all playoff teams through the first 2 games. But how well-contested are these threes the Magic are missing?

Through the first 2 games of the playoffs, the Magic have attempted:

• 0 "Very tight" (0-2 ft) contested threes
• 1.5 "Tight" (2-4 ft) contested threes per game (3rd fewest)
• 12.5 "Open" (4-6 ft) threes per game (9th most)
• 22.0 "Wide open" (6+ ft) threes per game (4th most)

... put into context, that means that 61.1% of the Magic's 3PA were wide open, good for 3rd most in the playoffs, and 95.8% were either open or wide open, also good for 3rd most in the playoffs.


and the Magic have converted:

• 0% of "Very tight" (0-2 ft) threes
• 0% of "Tight" (2-4 ft) threes
• 24.0% of "Open" (4-6 ft) threes (3rd worst)
• 25.0% of "Wide open" (6+ ft) threes (worst)

As a result, the Magic have missed 16.5 wide open 3PA per game, good for 3rd most in the playoffs, behind New Orleans (17.0) and Indiana (20.0).


TL;DR: The Cavaliers are leaving the Magic wide open for three, and the Magic are shooting them, but missing them at an alarming rate.

Abysmal.
One of the biggest frauds this series in my opinion is Cole Anthony. I really thought he was legit 6th man/microwave/scoring punch off the bench and would rise to the occasion. There's still time left, but he's disappointing.

[doct3r dr3]

Didn't see this thread when I posted in the General Series Thread; I'll just repost it here:

Some fun with numbers

This is the kind of stuff that boggles my mind. I mean I get it, it's two games so it could be a bad trend at the wrong time in terms of missing wide open 3s. But I'm pretty sure we saw stats that said we were among the league's worst in missing wide open 3s for the entire season. To me that's a mental thing, and a uniquely shared mental thing within the team.

How do you fix that?

The only way I can see is you bring in guys who are more consistent and less streaky. All of our guys are OK shooters overall, but they're all streaky. And streaky players tend to feed off energy and other players' performance. If we start the game and hit our first few 3s, they'll probably have a really good night shooting. If they miss a ton, we're going to have a bad night (which is why I was on the verge of blacking out when they started Game 2 jacking up 3s left and right and missing - badly).

Yep, the Magic were 7th worst in the league (worst among playoffs teams) in wide open 3s for the season, at 37.8% 3P%. (Just ahead of the Bulls, Jazz, Spurs, Grizz, Blazers, and Pistons)

[Catledge]

This is what happens when a young team that is bad at shooting plays its first road playoff games.

I desperately hope we look different in our first home playoff games.

[Skybox]

Didn't see this thread when I posted in the General Series Thread; I'll just repost it here:

This is the kind of stuff that boggles my mind. I mean I get it, it's two games so it could be a bad trend at the wrong time in terms of missing wide open 3s. But I'm pretty sure we saw stats that said we were among the league's worst in missing wide open 3s for the entire season. To me that's a mental thing, and a uniquely shared mental thing within the team.

How do you fix that?

The only way I can see is you bring in guys who are more consistent and less streaky. All of our guys are OK shooters overall, but they're all streaky. And streaky players tend to feed off energy and other players' performance. If we start the game and hit our first few 3s, they'll probably have a really good night shooting. If they miss a ton, we're going to have a bad night (which is why I was on the verge of blacking out when they started Game 2 jacking up 3s left and right and missing - badly).

Yep, the Magic were 7th worst in the league (worst among playoffs teams) in wide open 3s for the season, at 37.8% 3P%. (Just ahead of the Bulls, Jazz, Spurs, Grizz, Blazers, and Pistons)

Generating so many open 3's is a very promising thing to see. I think Paolo & Franz could become a deadly duo when ORL adds guys that knock them down reliably. I'm not piling on Paolo for his recent difficulties...it's hard to succeed in your first playoff series with an entire offense on your shoulders. Get the man some help.

[JoshuaPotter]

This is the kind of stuff that boggles my mind. I mean I get it, it's two games so it could be a bad trend at the wrong time in terms of missing wide open 3s. But I'm pretty sure we saw stats that said we were among the league's worst in missing wide open 3s for the entire season. To me that's a mental thing, and a uniquely shared mental thing within the team.

How do you fix that?

The only way I can see is you bring in guys who are more consistent and less streaky. All of our guys are OK shooters overall, but they're all streaky. And streaky players tend to feed off energy and other players' performance. If we start the game and hit our first few 3s, they'll probably have a really good night shooting. If they miss a ton, we're going to have a bad night (which is why I was on the verge of blacking out when they started Game 2 jacking up 3s left and right and missing - badly).

Yep, the Magic were 7th worst in the league (worst among playoffs teams) in wide open 3s for the season, at 37.8% 3P%. (Just ahead of the Bulls, Jazz, Spurs, Grizz, Blazers, and Pistons)

Generating so many open 3's is a very promising thing to see. I think Paolo & Franz could become a deadly duo when ORL adds guys that knock them down reliably. I'm not piling on Paolo for his recent difficulties...it's hard to succeed in your first playoff series with an entire offense on your shoulders. Get the man some help.

Paolo's efficiency stats need to be taken with large large large scoops of salt. Is he efficient? No. Is he our "go to"? Yes.

I think Paolo has what it takes to become a no 1 option in the league. I do not think he is that person now. I only hope that his frustration helps give him the drive to continue to polish up his game. In the meantime I have said it for a while, we lack a 2nd or 3rd option on the offense. Two 20ppg guys just aren't going to cut it if your 3rd guy is 12.

[UCFJayBird]

Didn't see this thread when I posted in the General Series Thread; I'll just repost it here:

This is the kind of stuff that boggles my mind. I mean I get it, it's two games so it could be a bad trend at the wrong time in terms of missing wide open 3s. But I'm pretty sure we saw stats that said we were among the league's worst in missing wide open 3s for the entire season. To me that's a mental thing, and a uniquely shared mental thing within the team.

How do you fix that?

The only way I can see is you bring in guys who are more consistent and less streaky. All of our guys are OK shooters overall, but they're all streaky. And streaky players tend to feed off energy and other players' performance. If we start the game and hit our first few 3s, they'll probably have a really good night shooting. If they miss a ton, we're going to have a bad night (which is why I was on the verge of blacking out when they started Game 2 jacking up 3s left and right and missing - badly).

Yep, the Magic were 7th worst in the league (worst among playoffs teams) in wide open 3s for the season, at 37.8% 3P%. (Just ahead of the Bulls, Jazz, Spurs, Grizz, Blazers, and Pistons)

we'd be 2-0 if these boys could shoot 38% on open 3-pointers this series lol.

[Fortune Teller]

It's the fear that I've always had and always will have with any Weltman-built roster.

Every year since Weltman took over as head of basketball operations, we've competed for the title of the worst-shooting team in the league, as well as the worst offensive one. We know what he values in a player and what he prioritizes in roster building.

He obviously has time to fix this, and our team is young, but don't be shocked if we're looking up three years from now and asking similar questions about our inability to shoot or play league average offensively. I won't be.

Because he simply does not views shooting nor scoring as important.

You can see it with his drafting.

2017. Isaac, low usage, low scoring, mediocre 3 point shooter. 12 ppg , 35% for 3 on 2,8 attemps
2018. Bamba. Low usage, low scoring , crappy 3 point shooter. 12 ppg, 27% for 3 on 1,7 attemps
2019. Okeke. Low usage, low scoring, nice 3 point stroke. 12 ppg, 38,7% for 3 on 3,7 attemps
2020. Cole. High usage, terrible efficiency, streaky mediocre 3 point shooter, 18 ppg on 35% for 3 on 6,4 attemps.
2021. Suggs. Low usage, average scoring, mediocre shooter. 14 ppg, 33,7% for 3 on 3,5 attemps a game.
2021. Franz. Low usage, low scoring, below average shooting. 12 ppg on 34% for 3 on 3,6 attemps
2022. Banchero. High usage, high scoring, mediocre shooting. 17 ppg on 33,8% for 3 on 3,3 attemps

Anthony Black. Low usage, low scoring, way below avearge shooter from anywhere. 12,8 ppg on 30% for 3 on 2,6 attemps.

Jet Howard, average scoring, above average efficiency 14 ppg on 37% for 3 on 7,2 attemps



Red ones are high volumen players ( Banchero, Cole) blue ones are all similar type of low efficiency shooters, low usage scorers.
And i took better (second)years of both Okeke and Franz, their freshmen college years were worst.


Problem with all this is simply him overvaluing defense. If you make list of top 20 players overall, top 20 players on offense and top 20 players on defenes, you will have situation where way more players overlap in top 20 offense than in top 20 defense compared to top 20 overall.

If you bild nba team you would rather have 9th best offensive player than best defender. Sure , in perfect world you want both ( that's why Victor is viewed as best prospect in a decade, that's why Anthony Davis is viewed as first unicorn ), but it's not like anybody with common sense will trade some Herb Jones / Alex Caruso / Jalen Suggs for Athony Edwards or Kevin Durant or Lebron or Jaylen Brown ( who isn't even top 20 nba player, at least according to Ringer ).

If you want to build a team of bunch of elite two way players, your salary cap will go to hell in few years, because even average two way -okey- players make crazy money (Jaden McDaniels, OG , Jarret Allen etc ). Yet neither of them, if he isn't ultra elite on defense ( Davis, potentially Vicor ) won't really make all that difference, especially not as best player, but will be payed as one.

I've said it 2 days ago on playoffs thread, that you look at nba playoff defense ,and you see guys like Lebron, Jokic, Davis, Luka still puting up 30 + ppg on uber efficiency and you figure how much better they actually are than rest of a league and why you need top 5 player to win a ring. Not to make chasedown block on poor guard in 3rd quater ( young Lebron), not to put people on poster ( Giannis), not to make silly 45 foot no look passes ( Jokic) but to execute right plays in close game situations where nobody else has creativity, guts nor talent to make anything.

Agreed. Welt keeps drafting defense-first guys in the lottery even though the league's best defenders: a) are often not lottery picks; and, b) are often not on the league's best teams.

Here are Yahoo's predictions for first-team all-defense:

Alex Caruso (Bulls) -- Undrafted, Bulls missed playoffs

Herbert Jones (Pelicans) -- 35th pick, Pelicans are 8 seed

Bam Adebayo (Heat) -- 14th pick, Heat are 8 seed

Anthony Davis (Lakers) -- 1st pick, Lakers are 7 seed

Rudy Gobert (Timberwolves) -- 27th pick, Timberwolves are 3 seed

You can get good defenders anywhere in the draft, and they have a lower correlation to winning. So why use lottery picks on them. Isaac, Bamba, Suggs, Black -- all top-6 picks by Weltman, all low-production, low usage guys.

[MagicMatic]

Does Orlando need more shooting? Yes.
Does Orlando need better shooting? Yes.

The bigger issue with Orlando's shooting, and offense, is how it is being run in the half court. There is little to no shot creation with our playmakers. Paolo and Franz look to score primarily in isolation at the rim. They drafted Houstan and Howard with recent picks searching for shooters.

The solution is to find a playmaking point guard that can ALSO stretch the floor. Those options weren't widely available in the 2021 or 2023 draft. They need to sign or trade for one to make sense of this offense.

[SOUL]

The bigger issue with Orlando's shooting, and offense, is how it is being run in the half court. There is little to no shot creation with our playmakers. Paolo and Franz look to score primarily in isolation at the rim. They drafted Houstan and Howard with recent picks searching for shooters.

Dirty secret is that until Franz and Paolo diversify their offense, it will continue to be like this. You're right in that individual sets and plays can be tweaked to have more looks and wrinkles to throw at teams, but it's not addressing how these guys default to score because it feels the best to them. Franz loves the mismatch drives from switches in iso and his other skill is backdoor cutting. Paolo loves the mid-range and working from the elbow. Paolo isn't an instinctual cutter when someone else has the ball and he finishes weak. Franz has no desire to implement a mid-range game, and both of them do not feel comfortable stepping into open threes and pump-fake themselves all the time.

Their shot preferences are an issue.

Compound that with the fact that when they get to their spots, and we work the offense through them, the other team (who I think you need to give more credit to when discussing our offense) are wisely not going to play anybody else on our team super tight, because we can't even hit open shots at league average, so they'll just send doubles or stymie Franz drives at the right time and nobody can punish them for it.

You dislike when Paolo/Franz initiate the offense, but it's one of the few ways anybody else can get involved when Paolo/Franz are getting ignored off-ball outside of Franz cutting. It's a double-edged sword because on some plays it can get other people involved more easily, but when the other team doesn't bite, it ends in just an iso play. Nobody on our team has enough wiggle to create their own shots consistently outside of Cole (who is hot and cold), sometimes Suggs, and maybe Jett next year.

We're not going to run our shooters off of screens like JJ Redick or Ray Allen or Klay Thompson. Those are elite movement shooters and they've been doing it since college. That isn't something Gary Harris has ever shown to be good at, Houstan tries it but doesn't hit many of those, Ingles can't do that. Terrence Ross was great at it because he was a contested shot maker with a high release. Also hearing JJ Redick talk about it in his podcast with LeBron, teams just aren't really running these plays much at all anymore since defensive coverages have changed.

There's just tons of issues when you don't have proper offensive guards on the team and bigs that have selective strengths like ours do.

Phoenix has the best three point shooter in the league in Grayson Allen, as well as Beal, Durant and Booker, who are all better three level scorers than both Franz and Paolo, and even their offense gets bogged down from way too many iso plays because they're all still most comfortable playing that way. It's just who they are.

There's just an extremely limited ceiling of what we're able to do when you consider player tendencies and personnel. I think you can attribute a percentage to lack of creativity on the coaching staff, but I would assume that every team communicates to their staff where they feel most comfortable on the floor and what plays the team feels comfortable running.

The focus this offseason needs to be pushing up that ceiling. Eking out a flawed roster isn't good enough because it's not sustainable. There will never be enough "easy" offense unless it's a dunk, because setting up guys for open shots on more "creative" and them missing is just as bad as it coming off of broken plays/sloppy actions that still end up in open misses.