2023-2024 Preseason Season Game 3: New Orleans Pelicans (0-3) at Orlando Magic (2-0) - 7pm

[ibraheim718]

6'7 point guards with elite athleticism. Good playmakers and scorers. Good defenders. Sure, there are a few differences. Penny was a much better scorer than Black, but Black is a better defender. Penny was probably more polished at the same stage of their careers. But I'm hoping he has the potential to be a similar player to Penny. Same size, athleticism, and skill set. Penny was a generational talent, and one could say its unfair to expect Black to reach the same heights. I wouldn't say that though.

Edit: We've pretty got Billups (Suggs), Hedo Prime (Franz ), Melo (Paolo), and Penny (Black).

AB’s potential should be viewed as Josh Giddey with defense… which would be an all-star… but Giddey had the right mindset from the jump even though he couldn’t shoot to start his career either.

Agreed.

6'7ish playmaker with funky 3pt shooting? Model your game to Giddey.

He's not going to have the opportunity Giddey had though.

[RookieStar]

AB’s potential should be viewed as Josh Giddey with defense… which would be an all-star… but Giddey had the right mindset from the jump even though he couldn’t shoot to start his career either.

Agreed.

6'7ish playmaker with funky 3pt shooting? Model your game to Giddey.

He's not going to have the opportunity Giddey had though.

Yup... too bad for him we arent tanking and showcasing him.

[SOUL]

No goggles for Wendell tonight? That explains the off night.

[KillMonger]

Got to clean up some of the turnovers....dell and P5 play up to their normal standard we win this comfortably.... So considering they didn't play well and we pretty much played them even with their stars playing well says a lot..... Its preseason but I think Suggs is really starting to get it, it'll get better every game but so far he has taken a step forward....

Rookies look like rookies, don't get it twisted guys.... We were spoiled with paolo last season.... Most rookies don't come into the league playing that way... Most rooks take some time in the oven

Franz is the real deal, 19 points in 19 minutes? This is probably a 30+ ball maybe 40 if he played regular minutes.... He's playing like you expect a 3rd year Franz to look like

Sent from the phone in my hands

[tooler]

Franz with a nice 75/64/100 for preseason. Light work for him.

[tooler]

I don't think Paolo is going to score 25 PPG this season. Nothing has changed about his game and he won't get the FGA this year to boost the counting stats. I think we should reset expectations down to 20 if that. I'd love to be wrong!

Now imagine what happens if the team plays shockingly well and Franz is the top scorer mid-way through the season...

[The-Stallion70]

Jesus **** Christ we lost a preseason game? Trade everyone

[The-Stallion70]

Giddey was way better than Black as a rookie, more experienced having played in professional leagues and a better shooter.

[DiplomaticMagic]

Wasnt happy with our draft choices on draft day and dont see any reason to be happy with them now. Id be surprised if either play on opening night (unless its garbage time)

[eyriq]

One thing I'm feeling good about is that coach gave Black a shot at earning a rotation spot. If he's not in the rotation it's because he didn't earn it. Early losses for Black, Howard, and the front office.

[bigdogdylan5]

Man my hope of trying to stagger Franz and Paolo more so we only go 3-4 minutes without them seems to be dead…. That first half was a preview of rotation and that 2nd unit was out there for a significant amount of time.

[KillMonger]

Needs to be said..... Say what you will about JI but he is making an impact.... Now it's all about staying healthy

Sent from the phone in my hands

[SOUL]

Man my hope of trying to stagger Franz and Paolo more so we only go 3-4 minutes without them seems to be dead…. That first half was a preview of rotation and that 2nd unit was out there for a significant amount of time.

Don't think it's much of a preview at all, they had 20 minutes of total time so there will probably be one player staggered a bit, but in general people need to be comfortable with that 2nd unit playing together. It did well last year and held on decently tonight - in real games they aren't coming back with 4 minutes left.

[Black and Blue]

Needs to be said..... Say what you will about JI but he is making an impact.... Now it's all about staying healthy

Sent from the phone in my hands

I think he has looked great out there. If he and Suggs stay healthy (and Suggs takes the offensive leap we are starting to see) they’ll get us a substantial amount of wins.

I try to not worry about rookies, but AB is legitimately concerning. Fultz and Cole may get extensions simply based off of how lost AB looks out there. The team will need to find ways to keep his confidence up because it is looking like a (predictably, by me and others) long, long road for him.

[Black and Blue]

Man my hope of trying to stagger Franz and Paolo more so we only go 3-4 minutes without them seems to be dead…. That first half was a preview of rotation and that 2nd unit was out there for a significant amount of time.

Thankfully the second unit has looked pretty good. I think the Magic will adjust if they aren’t getting enough scoring, but will give every opportunity to build a deeper team with more options than last year.

Also remember the Magic usually try out some various lineups the first month of the season, so I’m sure we will see some staggering going on.

I’d love to see Jett get some run with the 1st or 2nd units to see what he could do with some open shots, but I’m guessing that’ll be in practice behind closed doors for now.

[tooler]

I'm willing to be patient with AB and I try not to complain, but I do have to wonder what high IQ does for us sitting on the bench as the 11th man. Long road ahead.

Ultimately it's in the noise compared to, say, Paolo's development this season.

[Knightro]

Man my hope of trying to stagger Franz and Paolo more so we only go 3-4 minutes without them seems to be dead…. That first half was a preview of rotation and that 2nd unit was out there for a significant amount of time.

Don't think it's much of a preview at all, they had 20 minutes of total time so there will probably be one player staggered a bit, but in general people need to be comfortable with that 2nd unit playing together. It did well last year and held on decently tonight - in real games they aren't coming back with 4 minutes left.

The 2nd unit was very good last year from December on, and please correct me if I am misremembering here, but I don’t recall many stretches last year where the Magic were consistently playing five reserves at once?

Like generally speaking it was Franz with four backups last year, right?

[Knightro]

Needs to be said..... Say what you will about JI but he is making an impact.... Now it's all about staying healthy

Sent from the phone in my hands

I think he has looked great out there. If he and Suggs stay healthy (and Suggs takes the offensive leap we are starting to see) they’ll get us a substantial amount of wins.

I try to not worry about rookies, but AB is legitimately concerning. Fultz and Cole may get extensions simply based off of how lost AB looks out there. The team will need to find ways to keep his confidence up because it is looking like a (predictably, by me and others) long, long road for him.

I’ve been saying this for months, but there’s basically a 0% chance the Magic let their starting PG Fultz walk after this season so they can hand the reins over to Black, especially when it looks like Black isn’t really going to be in this year’s rotation anyway.

[SOUL]

Man my hope of trying to stagger Franz and Paolo more so we only go 3-4 minutes without them seems to be dead…. That first half was a preview of rotation and that 2nd unit was out there for a significant amount of time.

Don't think it's much of a preview at all, they had 20 minutes of total time so there will probably be one player staggered a bit, but in general people need to be comfortable with that 2nd unit playing together. It did well last year and held on decently tonight - in real games they aren't coming back with 4 minutes left.

The 2nd unit was very good last year from December on, and please correct me if I am misremembering here, but I don’t recall many stretches last year where the Magic were consistently playing five reserves at once?

Like generally speaking it was Franz with four backups last year, right?

Kind of. They did have a decent number of stretches with reserves though, mostly in first halves.

Wagner comes out earlier and plays with them for a bit, but then they would go back to the reserves, then starters re-enter as 5 again.

I think what people didn't/don't realize is that always staggering means less on court time together with Franz and Paolo so if one is ALWAYS out there they are either playing insane minutes or not playing together as much as Mose wants.

Second half usually bench was more mixed or didn't play as much, unless they were clicking in which coach had no problem letting the lineups stay if starters weren't getting it done.

[SOUL]

Before we went to a 9 man rotation*