Official 2025-2026 Regular Season Thread

[three3d]

I’m curious to see some takes on rebuilding coaches vs winning coaches. Is it really a thing? If so, what do you think it is that makes a difference? Why can’t coaches go from rebuilding to winning? Or can they (examples?)

I wonder if early on in a rebuild you have young players who you can get to buy in to high effort/energy and as things progress, players age, become more selfish in their careers, and lose a bit of the team spirit so to speak. Maybe they tune out coaches, start to think they know better, maybe don’t give effort to things that don’t benefit themselves or that they don’t believe in as they’ve matured into a certain mindset of their game/the NBA as a whole.

I feel like as players age and mature in the NBA, they expect to do less work for more results, as in play smarter not harder, and that might require more high level thinking from the coaching staff to get buy in. Like we need to play intelligently not just hard every night. Seems like vet teams don’t play as hard but play smarter to make the game easier and maybe rebuilding coaches have a hard time making that transition for whatever reason.

Good established coaches rarely agree to lead a rebuild.
You also need to be lucky enough to coach great players . Than you can establish your position and choose better situations.
OKC Daigneault went from tank to champion. He had elite GM and luck to coach SGA at his first gig.

We never rewarded skill and smart play. Some players were rewarded for effort, some for being a high lottery pick and potential, some becouse we just couldnt find better alternative. You could argue only players who got rewarded for good/smart play are Franz and Mo Wagners. Now TDS could join this group

This sounds like somewhat of an accountability issue to me. I think going back to Paolo’s second season I started to notice the careless turnovers piling up and would get frustrated nothing was being done. I still see the same thing today happening BUT now Suggs is doing it and AB is doing it. Stupid careless turnovers breaking your teams back and not once have I seen someone YANKED out of the game because of that. That is a horrible message, it’s okay to not value each and every position like it’s the most important of the game. They have been allowed to turn the ball over, they have been allowing to b@@ch and moan to the referee’s way to much. How about pulling someone out of the game and benching them when they do that. Hell you do that to Paolo who’s SUPPOSED to be your star player maybe everyone else will get the message.

[Knightro]

That’s likely because we’re turning the ball over so much and not forcing turnovers on the other end?

Last year the Magic's turnover percentage was 14.7%. This year, so far, it's 16.2%.

Last year Orlando averaged 14.9 stocks (steals + blocks) per game. This year they're down to just 14.2 stocks per game. That doesn't seem like a dramatic drop, but they went from the 30th ranked pace (96.5) to currently tied for 5th in pace (103.29).

Last year they were also 6th in the NBA in defensive rebounding at 72%. This year they're down to 18th at 68.4%.

Playing faster has made the Magic noticeably worse on the margins so far.

We can’t blame pace the last four games. We’re not going that fast.

We just cannot stay in front of guys. That’s mostly just about discipline and player effort.
And we don’t have the rim protection to cover it up.

Last four games the pace was still 101.00, which is still considerably faster than last year's 96.5.

The difference between dead last 30th and 5th last season.

[SloNick Russia]

Paolo is one of those dudes who gets to FT line a lot. His game is build around it, his complains are annoing but its just part of Paolo experience. To his credit this season I think he rebounds better, a bit more focused on defense. Still he is not a guy to count for on that end.
Paolo and Franz are more or less solid every game. WCJ, Bane and bench are all over the place.

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[three3d]

Paolo is one of those dudes who gets to FT line a lot. His game is build around it, his complains are annoing but its just part of Paolo experience. To his credit this season I think he rebounds better, a bit more focused on defense. Still he is not a guy to count for on that end.
Paolo and Franz are more or less solid every game. WCJ, Bane and bench are all over the place.

Sent from my SM-S928B using RealGM mobile app

This is probably why Paolo performs better in the Playoffs when the game slows down and he can be that type of player. But we need a point guard or floor general who dictates when we go to “Playoff P” basketball and when we run a different offense and controls the flow of the game for us.

[Knightro]

Playing faster has basically paid no dividends whatsoever so thus far. It's done nothing other than absolutely kill the Magic on the margins.

Last year the Magic gave up 19.8 transition possessions per game defensively, 18.5% of the time.

This year those numbers are up to 23.6 transition opportunities per game for opponents at 20.5% of the time.

They are turning it over more than last year which is leading to more fastbreak points going the other way.

They are fouling a lot more than last year which is leading to more easy points for opponents.

They are giving up a lot more offensive rebounds which is leading to huge increase in 2nd chance points allowed.

Their offense actually has improved a bit (112.9 ORTG this year compared to 108.9 ORTG last year), but it's not nearly enough to make up for the fact they've seen heavy declines in areas of strength a season ago.

And many of those declines can seemingly be tied to simply have less energy overall on a possession to possession basis from playing at a significantly faster pace.

[Knightro]

The Magic last season has a style that was very unique to them, for better or worse.

They played extremely slow, ranking 30th in pace.

However, that slow pace worked for them as it allowed them to play defense with great energy possession to possession as they ranked 2nd in turnovers forced defensively.

That slow pace also allowed them to eliminate a lot of hidden points by being super active on the glass. They were 1st in the NBA in opponents 2nd chance points and 6th in opponents fastbreak points even though they were high turnover.

But now all of that is pretty much gone and they're not playing so much better offensively to make up for it either.

[GelbeWand09]

Playing faster has basically paid no dividends whatsoever so thus far. It's done nothing other than absolutely kill the Magic on the margins.

Last year the Magic gave up 19.8 transition possessions per game defensively, 18.5% of the time.

This year those numbers are up to 23.6 transition opportunities per game for opponents at 20.5% of the time.

They are turning it over more than last year which is leading to more fastbreak points going the other way.

They are fouling a lot more than last year which is leading to more easy points for opponents.

They are giving up a lot more offensive rebounds which is leading to huge increase in 2nd chance points allowed.

Their offense actually has improved a bit (112.9 ORTG this year compared to 108.9 ORTG last year), but it's not nearly enough to make up for the fact they've seen heavy declines in areas of strength a season ago.

And many of those declines can seemingly be tied to simply have less energy overall on a possession to possession basis from playing at a significantly faster pace.

I think its Mosleys only chance to keep his job til the end of the season to slow it down & grind games out. I dont think we gonna be as successful at it with our additions as we were the last 2 years, but probably still better than now because we can hide our weaknesses more again.
Next to all the known weaknesses this team got, we are a pretty unathletic team on top, compared to many other teams we pretty much have no high level athletes which highlights our weaknesses even more at that fast style.
Being the slowest team in the league and ineffective on offense at the same time is not a recipe for success either, but it's probably the best Mosley can do with his coaching repertoire and our weaknesses.

[rcklsscognition]

Maybe the FO forced Prunty and the offense on Mosely even though he knew it wouldn’t work.

[MartinsIzAfraud]

If Mose can't figure out a way to run an offense that isn't ISO centric with Tyus/AB, Suggs, Franz, Paolo, WCJ then what the **** are we even arguing about? You can't continue to pray an offense works itself out through 2 bigs and continuously praying a volume shooter is lights out every night. Plenty of us saw the issues last year that Mose doesn't have an offensive system, yet we were told we didn't know ball and 2 bigs is the way the NBA is going.

What needs to happen is FO decides Mose has taken us as far as we he can after 30-40 games. Go bring in an offensive minded HC and let him work with what we have.

[bigdogdylan5]

The offense problems are am have always been the biggest issue but there is a second issue with Mosley’s coaching and culture that is scaring me more and more everyday. I have never felt like in the last two years the Magic had an effort problem on defense or offense. They had issues mind you but I never felt till this year they weren’t playing hard. I would push back on anyone that was that was saying passivity or bad play was not the same as not giving effort. Now that for a whole summer everyone is saying Magic are contenders and the first time these young guys have a taste of people saying your awesome they might have let that get to their heads. They have lost that underdog scrappy chip on their shoulder. The reason the Atlanta game last night was such a let down was because it looked like we got over that and now it’s right back after two get right games. The young guys saw no Trae Young and they let down their guard to a hungry team and got destroyed. That is on the players but it’s mostly on the coach. His strength was his defense and culture of effort if he cant have these players keeping a chip on their shoulder Mosley is toast.

[AdamTheGreek]

If we refuse to start Goga, then I’d try starting Paolo at center and have Tristan enter the lineup.
You can have Goga and Wendell play together against second units.

[MartinsIzAfraud]

If we refuse to start Goga, then I’d try starting Paolo at center and have Tristan enter the lineup.
You can have Goga and Wendell play together against second units.

i mean we have to try something but Goga isn't really going to change much.. dude is a fouling machine at times who occupies the same space as Paolo.

[eyriq]

If we refuse to start Goga, then I’d try starting Paolo at center and have Tristan enter the lineup.
You can have Goga and Wendell play together against second units.

Co-signed. Benching WCJ is solution number one and TDS has been a revelation on offense.

[RookieStar]

I know its a broken record and most of you think im just coping...

But im really waiting for 15 games in. That's where all teams ( unless they are leveled with injuries ) settle down and their expected standings assert itself.