TRANSCRIPT: Jeff Weltman on "The Ryen Russillo Podcast" - 6/24/22 (transcript on page 3)

[swarlesbarkley]

Russillo: How do you evaluate your group of young guards - Anthony, Fultz and Suggs - particularly with Paolo?

Weltman: Well the first thing is, you think about the front line with Wendell 6’10” 260 who was one of the best rim and paint protectors in the NBA at age 22. You think about Franz at 6’10”, what’s he gonna be? 240? And now Paolo 6’10” 250 at age 19. You think about that front line with size, IQ, all of them have really good feet. They’re really aware. Then you think about those guys you mentioned. One thing I’ll say about Jalen. He only had about half his rookie season, but he already has become a top 90th percentile defender. That’s very, very uncommon for rookies. It’s common for rookies to be plus defenders, let alone numbers like that. Markelle as you said played the last 18 games and played well. Our team played significantly better when he got back. I think it all bodes well. We’re talking about ages 24, 20, 20, 19, 24, 21. All those guys you mentioned, we have other young guys we’re excited about as well. That’s what we’re doing now. I think that the positional versatility on both ends of the floor, the IQ, the size, that’s the way we see our team growing. That’s why we think Paolo is one of those guys, I was asked the question before “how does Paolo fit in?” and Paolo’s one of those guys who can fit in anywhere with anyone. And that’s what we want. We want a bunch of those guys and I think we’re developing that profile.

This answer seemed quite telling on how the FO views JI's spot on the team. He was asked about guards but first gushed about both WCJ and Franz as our "front line".

Whether it's injury and they don't project JI in the line-up (again) for the start of the year or they've already moved on from him being an important piece of this team, that was a rough answer for JI's future with the Magic.

Also - when asked directly about JI, Weltman talked about JI much like he talked about Bamba, a guy who is most likely not going to be on this roster in the fall - mostly in generalities about their personalities, very little talk about basketball skills.

[VFX]

I am glad that Jeff brought up Suggs' defense. Dude was top 3 at PG in all the metrics as a rookie. That is incredible. I believe the only PG that beat him everywhere was Marcus Smart (you know, the DPOTY).

A fully healthy season will look good for him.

Imagine what happens when his shot starts landing. If that happens he can be a top tier player.

[Andrew McCeltic]

I am glad that Jeff brought up Suggs' defense. Dude was top 3 at PG in all the metrics as a rookie. That is incredible. I believe the only PG that beat him everywhere was Marcus Smart (you know, the DPOTY).

A fully healthy season will look good for him.

Imagine what happens when his shot starts landing. If that happens he can be a top tier player.

I’m not sleeping on Suggs at all.. league chatter’s forgotten about him - he just had a rough year.

Glad you all finally picked a timeline - from the outside it was maddening to watch Fournier, Gordon, Vuc block the next wave..

Does Isaac have, like, career-ending injuries? Or is he taking so long to heal and missing so much early 20s development time that even fully healthy he’s going to have a lower ceiling?

[VFX]

I am glad that Jeff brought up Suggs' defense. Dude was top 3 at PG in all the metrics as a rookie. That is incredible. I believe the only PG that beat him everywhere was Marcus Smart (you know, the DPOTY).

A fully healthy season will look good for him.

Imagine what happens when his shot starts landing. If that happens he can be a top tier player.

I’m not sleeping on Suggs at all.. league chatter’s forgotten about him - he just had a rough year.

Glad you all finally picked a timeline - from the outside it was maddening to watch Fournier, Gordon, Vuc block the next wave..

Does Isaac have, like, career-ending injuries? Or is he taking so long to heal and missing so much early 20s development time that even fully healthy he’s going to have a lower ceiling?

People are sleeping on Suggs right now because he put up historically bad shooting numbers in his rookie season, which he played through injured. He wasn’t mediocre on that side like most rookies - he was BAD. However, his defense is otherworldly for a rookie and he wont be terrible forever on offense.

Yeah it took forever for the FO to pull the trigger on anything but mediocre basketball seeing as the league’s system punishes those teams the most.

People are down on Isaac because he’s almost never been healthy his time in Orlando. I don’t think the Front Office has given up on him yet, but the fans have stopped factoring him into lineups.

We simply don’t know what he will look like when he returns (and for how long) from being injured. Sure, he was a great defensive player when he was playing basketball. He just doesn’t play basketball very often.