Official Spec Thread: Regular Season

[SOUL]

I've been bullish about our teams the last few years because of injury and being young, but I think this current team is getting underrated. Obviously shooting needs to improve but with health, we are a .500 team.

[msmoore66]

On one hand, Hollinger's concerns aren't unfair. On the other hand, his take seems a bit lazy. I understand the concept of needing a longtime bad team to prove it to you before you start giving them credit, but the Magic made strides last season and there are legitimate reasons for optimism. He says he can't see why we're listed on level with the Raptors, but if he cared to, he could turn that same critical eye on the Raptors and come up with just as many ways to be pessimistic. So it comes off as lazy to me. Just keep predicting a bad team to be bad and if they prove you wrong, just say "hey, good for them, they overachieved."

I agree with this. I think this is part of the human psyche though, so much easier to under predict/hope/be a cynic as it is win win. If what you are predicting comes true you were right, if not well nobody cares as the focus will be on the success. It's lazy but it is what it is I guess.

As fans we do it a heap. Better to be pessimistic than get burnt getting our hopes up. I'm an Arsenal fan, and I hate it, but once the title race was over last season you could almost breathe a sigh of relief

[Skybox]

I've read a bunch of Hollinger over the years. And he consistently makes rudimentary points while still coming off as a complete dick. You rarely learn anything new that you didn't know from his insights in writing or pods. It's astounding to me how he has parlayed creating a fake, lazy stat into an entire career as a front office member and media member. Can't wait to return to that article in 9 months.

Lazy really is the word. This is fairly typical of the national media...there's only a handful that actually do the work, IMO. Hot takes are what get and keep jobs, not any kind of real insights these days. I love a guy like Barkley commentating...but he only gets a pass on his from the hip style because he's BARKLEY! I really don't see much difference between the knowledge level of many of these hacks (once they get past LAL, LBJ, Giannis, Harden, etc) vs quite a few on here who really care. We are kind of insane to do it to the (unpaid) degree we do

Basically, when Cole Anthony gets mentioned repeatedly, it's a signal that they really haven't done a lot of homework, IMO. It started a couple of years ago, when Cole led the team in scoring as a wild, inefficient PG who was dropped into the job due to injury, and basically chose shooting over passing. The laziest research possible is to check on the scoring leader and run with it...I remember seeing more than one article mentioning Cole as a foundational piece-which wasn't true, even at that time. I love Cole and I DO believe he's got a lot of potential - possibly even starter sometime (somewhere?) but that's a silly place to start with this team.

[VFX]

The analysis for Orlando this season really comes down to player development.

Yeah, the offense is extremely stagnant and an easy area to point at given the roster. You have to hope that everyone has progressed over the off-season offensively.

Hollinger does have a point about the pick and roll, which people have been talking about for a while now as a glaringly obvious deficiency for Orlando.

[drsd]

I mean if it were up to me I would trade at least one of them and/or Gary Harris before the season started if at all possible.

Agreed.

Frankly I expected G-Harris, Anthony and spare parts (e.g. Okeke and/or the Denver pick) to be flipped into a SG on a two-year deal. I REALLY felt that way after the Magic drafted Black. But when the summer league came and went it was clear that ....

Otherwise I think you play out the season as is, and look to move one of Fultz/Cole at deadline or I think they will look to resign one and S&T the other.

... the team would just "assess assets".

It's possible a team signs one or both of them outright, and we lose one or both which have value now for nothihng. The more i think about it the more I think Cole gets extended prior to opening night, and maybe i am underestimating the chance MF gets an early extension...

I think this is more probable than not. Maybe the most probable would be resigning Fultz and a SnT of Anthony. If Fultz continues as "the 19th best PG in the NBA", I would think that Orlando will sign him to a 4-year 100M deal. And then for Anthony, activate his qualifying offer forcing a SnT.

Forbes has an article that Orlando should lock Anthony up now to a multi-year deal at 12.5M a year. The idea is that he is then tradeable for MLE-level players and is thus an asset. The problem there is that Anthony will want something more like the deal Fultz got - 17M per year.

I guess that't the thing you don't want to lose value in this league for nothing, have to get at least get a trade exception back. Surely a PG goes down early this season and a team is desperate.

It would be very odd to have a productive player come off of a rookie contract walk for nothing. Anthiny will be resigned or SnT'ed.

My gut tells me MF breaks out this year, and i am not sure if that is good or bad for this franchise...of course my gut is wrong a lot...about JI specifically.

What if Fultz is a decent PG and whatif Isaac is a top-10 defender statistically? Well: Orlando makes the play-ins if not the playoffs. I can;t look beyond that. Let's just enjoy what looks to be an uplifting (and fun) season. Next season is a long way off.

[drsd]

The analysis for Orlando this season really comes down to player development.

Yeah, the offense is extremely stagnant and an easy area to point at given the roster. You have to hope that everyone has progressed over the off-season offensively.

Hollinger does have a point about the pick and roll, which people have been talking about for a while now as a glaringly obvious deficiency for Orlando.

And-1

Fultz is supposed to be a PnR PG. And Orlando's two best players are forwards. So: the PnR needs to be the bread and butter play for this team. If it is, this will be a great year. If it isn't, then, well, this season will frustrate.

[drsd]

Black has shooting form of 7'4 player who thinks his shot is unblockable ( because , if you are 7'4, it is ).

Like... how da hell are you going to shoot in nba without jumping?


btw clip vise, if shooter was as accurate as Isaac, 2pac would still be alive

Well ......

[drsd]

Jalen Suggs had a better sophomore season than Marcus Smart as a relatively equal comparison in terms of skillset. You just have no idea how to gauge prospects accurately. Your opinion is invalid from making assessments on them from my perspective.

Suggs year2 vs. Smart year-2 comparison: LINK

It is interesting to see how HORRIBLE Smart was early in his career offensively. His sophomore year, Smart shot below 35% with a 25% three-ball. But he was already at a all NBA defense level of talent that year. Smart was not competent offensively until his 5th year in the NBA.

[pepe1991]

Jalen Suggs had a better sophomore season than Marcus Smart as a relatively equal comparison in terms of skillset. You just have no idea how to gauge prospects accurately. Your opinion is invalid from making assessments on them from my perspective.

Suggs year2 vs. Smart year-2 comparison: LINK

It is interesting to see how HORRIBLE Smart was early in his career offensively. His sophomore year, Smart shot below 35% with a 25% three-ball. But he was already at a all NBA defense level of talent that year. Smart was not competent offensively until his 5th year in the NBA.

Marcus Smart continues to be most overrated nba player out there, by far.

Let's play a little game, career numbers

Player A: 10,6 ppg, 4,6 apg, 3,5 rpg . 38,6% FG, 32,3% for 3, 51,8% TS
Player B: 14,5 ppg, 2,1apg, 3,2 rpg, 41,6% FG, 34% for 3 and 51,2% TS


One player was delited from Memphis roster for "sucking" , other is "key addition" for them in offseason.

Spoiler:

Player A is Marcus Smart, player B is Dillion Brooks

How hard it is to play with *at least two allstars* whole career and still you are black hole on offense? Last year guy averaged 11 ppg on 53,8% TS and negative BPM. His BPM actually was just 9th among Celtics players alone.
He wasn't even all that good by RPM.

I hate RAPTOR data but even they don't like him. He was 32th among PGs, his RAPTOR was worst than Cole's.

Hell, Jose Alvarado kills him in all advanced stats.

[pepe1991]

I see lot of negative reactions on Hollinger's predictions.

For start there are few things to consider, when you look at last year's record.

Last year was very, very unique one.

I went back all the way to 2006 and got tired of searching , but we didn't have season with not a single team won at least 60 games in very long time ( at least 18 years, probably way more).

But we also only had 3 trully tanking teams.

Contenders ,didn't go for winning EVERY game, and not all non- playoff teams tanked. By default, everybody in between got clustered with similar records.

We had Magic, OKC; Pacers, Jazz all blowing expected records wide away, but non of them made playoffs.

Even opposite, despite some teams being dissapointments, nobody really fell waaay off. Like, Raptors undeperformed, still had .500 record. Warriors underperformed, still won 54% games, Suns underperformed, yet had home court adventage in first round.


Whole season was bit crazy in terms of standings. West only had 2 teams winning 50 games. Once again, that didnt' happen in past +40 years ( not counting shorter seasons),


Magic, as 3rd worst record on East, had 34-48 record.
For example: 3rd worst records over years held

2018-19 : 22-60
2017-18: 27-55
2016-17: 29-53
2015-16: 32-50
2014-15: 25-57
2013-14: 23-59


So hypotetical clamis of:
"Magic blown out their expetations " and " Magic are still not good team and won't be good team" are in same time true and false.

34-48 isn't terrible team on it's own, but it was still only 12th record among 15 teams.

their expected 36/37 wins projection isn't terrible team, but probably won't be playoff team.


His point about bad offense and terrible spacing isn't really arguable.
Magic were 4th lowest 3 FGA taken team while being 7th worst in 3 point accuracy. That accuracy made Magic offense 4th worst in nba.
Basically whole last year's roster + Ingles are returning this year. it's not really objective to expect MASSIVE uptick on offense from same players. Internall growth will just take you that far and shooting as skill isn't something player out of thin air becomes good at in year 3,4,5,6. Most shooters shoot well early on, and become elite with experience. Don't go from 25% for 3 into Klay Thompson in between years 3 and 4.

[SOUL]

It's easy to predict an uptick just from younger players being older, team being relatively familiar with each other, and not being forced to play 3rd stringers (fingers crossed) large minutes in first 25% of the season.

We were actually pretty good against the elite teams (1-1 vs Denver (almost 2-0), 3-1 vs Boston, 2-0 vs Warriors, etc) so maybe we won't be as lucky there but we also lost a lot of easy games too + deliberately tanking the final week of games.

If we have relative good health and some of the worse teams naturally want to tank, and we at least play decently vs evenly matched + better teams, there's a real shot for 39-41 wins without much thought.

Honestly, only the elite teams like Milwaukee, Boston, Denver, PHX and maaaybe one or two more scare me that much, because we've shown we can compete with all of these teams.. it's just that all of the bad teams are equally as scary because we haven't shown a constant ability to beat up on the worse teams yet, which to be fair we were considered one of those teams for the last few seasons + half of last season.

[pepe1991]

It's easy to predict an uptick just from younger players being older, team being relatively familiar with each other, and not being forced to play 3rd stringers (fingers crossed) large minutes in first 25% of the season.

We were actually pretty good against the elite teams (1-1 vs Denver (almost 2-0), 3-1 vs Boston, 2-0 vs Warriors, etc) so maybe we won't be as lucky there but we also lost a lot of easy games too + deliberately tanking the final week of games.

If we have relative good health and some of the worse teams naturally want to tank, and we at least play decently vs evenly matched + better teams, there's a real shot for 39-41 wins without much thought.

Honestly, only the elite teams like Milwaukee, Boston, Denver, PHX and maaaybe one or two more scare me that much, because we've shown we can compete with all of these teams.. it's just that all of the bad teams are equally as scary because we haven't shown a constant ability to beat up on the worse teams yet, which to be fair we were considered one of those teams for the last few seasons + half of last season.

Boring days:
v Atlanta 1-3
v Boston 3-1
v Nets 1-2
vBulls 2-1
v Hornets 3-1
v Cavs 0-4
v Dallas 1-1
v Nuggets 1-1
v Pistons 2-2
vs Warriors 2-0
vs Houston 1-1
v Pacers 1-3
v Clippers 2-0
v Lakers 0-2
v Memphis 0-2
v Heat 1-3
v Bucks 0-3
v Wolves 1-1
v Knicks 1-3
v Okc 1-1
v Philly 1-3
v Suns 1-1
vs Blazers 1-1
v Kings 0-2
v Spurs 1-1
v Raptors 2-2
v Jazz 0-2
v Wizards 2-2


Wow this is cluster

Anyhow, after some word usage & several min lost forever, Orlando Magic were 15-30 against playoff teams and 19-18 against non playoff teams.

My win prediction is 38. Last year was 28-30 i belive, not 100% sure , so, if i missed margin by 4 last year, if same repeats itself, it would mean we win 42 games. Fingers crossed!

[drsd]

My win prediction is 38. Last year was 28-30 i belive, not 100% sure , so, if i missed margin by 4 last year, if same repeats itself, it would mean we win 42 games. Fingers crossed!

As of today I would say 38 +/- 5. And the homer in me says the Magic will be healthier than predicted and land on a 41-41 season.

I won't make a final prediction until after the pre-season games though. One prediction based on the clips of training camp: Black won't get very many minutes early in the season.

As to last season, I saw anywhere from 35-to-38 wins. So the 34 wins was almost on target. (( games 80-82 were embarrassing for the Magic though, after the heart breaking loss in game 79 ))

Game 80 starters: Suggs/Houstan/Bol/Okeke/M-Wagner
Game 81 starters: Fultz/Anthony/Suggs/F-Wagner/Bitadze
Game 82 starters: Fultz/Suggs/Houstan/F-Wagner/Carter

And all three were double-digit losses.

[eyriq]

I mean if it were up to me I would trade at least one of them and/or Gary Harris before the season started if at all possible.

Agreed.

Frankly I expected G-Harris, Anthony and spare parts (e.g. Okeke and/or the Denver pick) to be flipped into a SG on a two-year deal. I REALLY felt that way after the Magic drafted Black. But when the summer league came and went it was clear that ....

Otherwise I think you play out the season as is, and look to move one of Fultz/Cole at deadline or I think they will look to resign one and S&T the other.

... the team would just "assess assets".

It's possible a team signs one or both of them outright, and we lose one or both which have value now for nothihng. The more i think about it the more I think Cole gets extended prior to opening night, and maybe i am underestimating the chance MF gets an early extension...

I think this is more probable than not. Maybe the most probable would be resigning Fultz and a SnT of Anthony. If Fultz continues as "the 19th best PG in the NBA", I would think that Orlando will sign him to a 4-year 100M deal. And then for Anthony, activate his qualifying offer forcing a SnT.

Forbes has an article that Orlando should lock Anthony up now to a multi-year deal at 12.5M a year. The idea is that he is then tradeable for MLE-level players and is thus an asset. The problem there is that Anthony will want something more like the deal Fultz got - 17M per year.

I guess that't the thing you don't want to lose value in this league for nothing, have to get at least get a trade exception back. Surely a PG goes down early this season and a team is desperate.

It would be very odd to have a productive player come off of a rookie contract walk for nothing. Anthiny will be resigned or SnT'ed.

My gut tells me MF breaks out this year, and i am not sure if that is good or bad for this franchise...of course my gut is wrong a lot...about JI specifically.

What if Fultz is a decent PG and whatif Isaac is a top-10 defender statistically? Well: Orlando makes the play-ins if not the playoffs. I can;t look beyond that. Let's just enjoy what looks to be an uplifting (and fun) season. Next season is a long way off.

On the topic of PG and what will be done with Cole/Kelle, I fully expect both to move on and Black to earn the starting spot next season. If we exceed expectations I could see us keeping Fultz at a premium; the scenario where we're a playoff team and lock up Fultz is alive and well. I don't see a scenario where we keep Cole.

The interesting thing is I heard somewhere that we tend to extend people in the first week of the season, so maybe we'll see something right away and get clarity on the future at point guard very soon.

It is interesting that our best case (short term) scenario, performance wise, results in Fultz as our point guard of the future.

[basketballRob]

We may end up trading our picks next season. I was just looking at a mock, and Michigan isn't projected to have any players drafted.

Sent from my SM-G781U using RealGM mobile app

[jonbob17]

On the topic of PG and what will be done with Cole/Kelle, I fully expect both to move on and Black to earn the starting spot next season. If we exceed expectations I could see us keeping Fultz at a premium; the scenario where we're a playoff team and lock up Fultz is alive and well. I don't see a scenario where we keep Cole.

The interesting thing is I heard somewhere that we tend to extend people in the first week of the season, so maybe we'll see something right away and get clarity on the future at point guard very soon.

It is interesting that our best case (short term) scenario, performance wise, results in Fultz as our point guard of the future.

The rookie extension deadline is the day before the season starts. So there should be a lot of announcements related to 2020 draft class...We have Cole and Okeke that are eligible. The big names have already signed their max deals

I think Fultz and Isaac are eligible for an extension anytime before next summers Free Agency. Of coure Isaac also has a deadline regarding guaranteed money...i think is early January.

[Optimus_Steel]

Jalen Suggs had a better sophomore season than Marcus Smart as a relatively equal comparison in terms of skillset. You just have no idea how to gauge prospects accurately. Your opinion is invalid from making assessments on them from my perspective.

Suggs year2 vs. Smart year-2 comparison: LINK

It is interesting to see how HORRIBLE Smart was early in his career offensively. His sophomore year, Smart shot below 35% with a 25% three-ball. But he was already at a all NBA defense level of talent that year. Smart was not competent offensively until his 5th year in the NBA.

Marcus Smart continues to be most overrated nba player out there, by far.

Let's play a little game, career numbers

Player A: 10,6 ppg, 4,6 apg, 3,5 rpg . 38,6% FG, 32,3% for 3, 51,8% TS
Player B: 14,5 ppg, 2,1apg, 3,2 rpg, 41,6% FG, 34% for 3 and 51,2% TS


One player was delited from Memphis roster for "sucking" , other is "key addition" for them in offseason.

Spoiler:

Player A is Marcus Smart, player B is Dillion Brooks

How hard it is to play with *at least two allstars* whole career and still you are black hole on offense? Last year guy averaged 11 ppg on 53,8% TS and negative BPM. His BPM actually was just 9th among Celtics players alone.
He wasn't even all that good by RPM.

I hate RAPTOR data but even they don't like him. He was 32th among PGs, his RAPTOR was worst than Cole's.

Hell, Jose Alvarado kills him in all advanced stats.

I have to agree that Smart is severely overated. They didn't lose much by trading him away. He was part of the problem with his horrific offense and decision making.

[basketballRob]

I think Smart was way underrated. It's harder to see value when players do the little things, but I think Boston will take a step back. He was probably the player I least wanted to face on the Boston team.

Sent from my SM-G781U using RealGM mobile app

[j_n]

My guess would be 44-48 wins, last year's team would be have a much better record than 34-48 if not for health issues.

This year's team should benefit a lot from improvement of young players, anything below 41 wins would be a disappointment.

[Bergmaniac]

We were very lucky with the health of most of our key players after the 5-20 start, Paolo, Franz and Fultz played all games (except one game Franz missed due to a suspension) until we started tanking in the last week of the season, Cole missed only 3 games in this period. we can't just assume this would be the case the whole year.

Also, a lot of teams underestimated us after the 5-20 start, which won't be the case if we have a good start and hover around .500 from early on.

My prediction is 42-44 wins and narrowly missing the playoffs. If we can get a healthy Isaak for a decent chunk of the season we may sneak into the playoffs. But if Franz misses significant time, we'd be screwed, the team is still very reliant on him.