2024-2025 Regular Season Game 41: Philadelphia 76ers (15-21) at Orlando Magic (22-18) 6:00PM

[VFX]

Any win this short-handed is a good win, but it's still frustrating how many games in which we outplay the opponents in most aspects handily are close or lost due to poor shooting. The only reason this one was close was because we shot so much worse from 3 than the Sixers and the FT line despite almost all of our 3s being wide open and the Sixers taking a lot of tough ones. We were crushing them on the glass, we were getting good looks inside and from 3, but the poor shooting made everything harder than it had to be.

Think of it this way, if we had consistent good shooting and consistent top 3 defense while being insanely short-handed most games... we would be a contender this year and win 5 chips in a row lol.

I wanna see how our offense is when we have most of our guys back. Shooting wasn't great early season but when we had most of our guys healthy (outside of Paolo in game 5/Franz sickness), we scored 109 points or more in every game but the Bulls one. Feel like with some more good shooting games, it can get to around 110-115 even if our defense lets up a little bit some games. Don't think we will ever have elite offense while playing our defensive style, but just being more efficient some games will really help.

It good to see this team win shorthanded. THAT BEING SAID

The problem here is that there is nothing really to take away from games like this except:
"The bench guys didn't give up and got the W" ... yeah ok and?

It's annoying as hell regardless, of W or L, because nothing informs us of anything on a substantial level regarding the entirety on the roster. We still need to see a starting lineup play real minutes to gauge anything and it hasn't happened, and likely wont, this season.

The most that can possibly come from this season at this point is slight internal player development. Nothing has been learned about the effectiveness of the starting lineup together. No major takeaways have been surmised outside of Goga beating out Carter for his spot, which frankly happened last season and went unnoticed by Mosely somehow. Very curious considering the contract situation of both players at the time... I digress....

The takeaway here is "Man the Magic will be really good when guys come back from injury" yeah id hope so. There is still more work to be done though to the roster and all that gets pushed aside when your wins are highlighted because your deep bench appears better than they really are in these kind of victories. Might as well keep everyone right?

Magic lose the next 3 games on the road against superior competition with healthy rosters and people will say "Yeah well we are injured. Nothing gained, nothing lost. We weren't winning anyway." Equally redundant information moving forward. At least it makes Mosely look good I guess.

[jezzerinho]

Any win this short-handed is a good win, but it's still frustrating how many games in which we outplay the opponents in most aspects handily are close or lost due to poor shooting. The only reason this one was close was because we shot so much worse from 3 than the Sixers and the FT line despite almost all of our 3s being wide open and the Sixers taking a lot of tough ones. We were crushing them on the glass, we were getting good looks inside and from 3, but the poor shooting made everything harder than it had to be.

Think of it this way, if we had consistent good shooting and consistent top 3 defense while being insanely short-handed most games... we would be a contender this year and win 5 chips in a row lol.

I wanna see how our offense is when we have most of our guys back. Shooting wasn't great early season but when we had most of our guys healthy (outside of Paolo in game 5/Franz sickness), we scored 109 points or more in every game but the Bulls one. Feel like with some more good shooting games, it can get to around 110-115 even if our defense lets up a little bit some games. Don't think we will ever have elite offense while playing our defensive style, but just being more efficient some games will really help.

It good to see this team win shorthanded. THAT BEING SAID

The problem here is that there is nothing really to take away from games like this except:
"The bench guys didn't give up and got the W" ... yeah ok and?

It's annoying as hell regardless, of W or L, because nothing informs us of anything on a substantial level regarding the entirety on the roster. We still need to see a starting lineup play real minutes to gauge anything and it hasn't happened, and likely wont, this season.

The most that can possibly come from this season at this point is slight internal player development. Nothing has been learned about the effectiveness of the starting lineup together. No major takeaways have been surmised outside of Goga beating out Carter for his spot, which frankly happened last season and went unnoticed by Mosely somehow. Very curious considering the contract situation of both players at the time... I digress....

The takeaway here is "Man the Magic will be really good when guys come back from injury" yeah id hope so. There is still more work to be done though to the roster and all that gets pushed aside when your wins are highlighted because your deep bench appears better than they really are in these kind of victories. Might as well keep everyone right?

Magic lose the next 3 games on the road against superior competition with healthy rosters and people will say "Yeah well we are injured. Nothing gained, nothing lost. We weren't winning anyway." Equally redundant information moving forward. At least it makes Mosely look good I guess.

Weird post, imo.

You're complaining that something that can't happen isn't happening.

We don't have a full strength team so we can't evaluate how close to contending it is. Well, yeah. Obviously.

But why does that invalidate the incredible effort of those remaining guys who are going out and getting the fans the most unlikely of win ratios?

They shouldn't bother because you wanted to evaluate the starters??

I don't get it. Sure, I think Weltman should make moves , and should have done 2 offseasons ago. But his lack of activity in no way undermines the incredible effort of the team and it's coaches in keeping in the playoffs a team that would otherwise probably be in the tank zone.

[Magicman125]

Think of it this way, if we had consistent good shooting and consistent top 3 defense while being insanely short-handed most games... we would be a contender this year and win 5 chips in a row lol.

I wanna see how our offense is when we have most of our guys back. Shooting wasn't great early season but when we had most of our guys healthy (outside of Paolo in game 5/Franz sickness), we scored 109 points or more in every game but the Bulls one. Feel like with some more good shooting games, it can get to around 110-115 even if our defense lets up a little bit some games. Don't think we will ever have elite offense while playing our defensive style, but just being more efficient some games will really help.

It good to see this team win shorthanded. THAT BEING SAID

The problem here is that there is nothing really to take away from games like this except:
"The bench guys didn't give up and got the W" ... yeah ok and?

It's annoying as hell regardless, of W or L, because nothing informs us of anything on a substantial level regarding the entirety on the roster. We still need to see a starting lineup play real minutes to gauge anything and it hasn't happened, and likely wont, this season.

The most that can possibly come from this season at this point is slight internal player development. Nothing has been learned about the effectiveness of the starting lineup together. No major takeaways have been surmised outside of Goga beating out Carter for his spot, which frankly happened last season and went unnoticed by Mosely somehow. Very curious considering the contract situation of both players at the time... I digress....

The takeaway here is "Man the Magic will be really good when guys come back from injury" yeah id hope so. There is still more work to be done though to the roster and all that gets pushed aside when your wins are highlighted because your deep bench appears better than they really are in these kind of victories. Might as well keep everyone right?

Magic lose the next 3 games on the road against superior competition with healthy rosters and people will say "Yeah well we are injured. Nothing gained, nothing lost. We weren't winning anyway." Equally redundant information moving forward. At least it makes Mosely look good I guess.

Weird post, imo.

You're complaining that something that can't happen isn't happening.

We don't have a full strength team so we can't evaluate how close to contending it is. Well, yeah. Obviously.

But why does that invalidate the incredible effort of those remaining guys who are going out and getting the fans the most unlikely of win ratios?

They shouldn't bother because you wanted to evaluate the starters??

I don't get it. Sure, I think Weltman should make moves , and should have done 2 offseasons ago. But his lack of activity in no way undermines the incredible effort of the team and it's coaches in keeping in the playoffs a team that would otherwise probably be in the tank zone.

Came off to me as more just lamenting our bad injury luck, and that plus our historically conservative FO that likes to "evaluate the roster we have" rather than make moves, can lead to frustration that we don't have a good idea of exactly how good we are/can be and what our ceiling is as currently constructed. That prevents us from taking the next step as we lack the requisite data to make an informed decision WRT what that next step should be.

[eyriq]

It good to see this team win shorthanded. THAT BEING SAID

The problem here is that there is nothing really to take away from games like this except:
"The bench guys didn't give up and got the W" ... yeah ok and?

It's annoying as hell regardless, of W or L, because nothing informs us of anything on a substantial level regarding the entirety on the roster. We still need to see a starting lineup play real minutes to gauge anything and it hasn't happened, and likely wont, this season.

The most that can possibly come from this season at this point is slight internal player development. Nothing has been learned about the effectiveness of the starting lineup together. No major takeaways have been surmised outside of Goga beating out Carter for his spot, which frankly happened last season and went unnoticed by Mosely somehow. Very curious considering the contract situation of both players at the time... I digress....

The takeaway here is "Man the Magic will be really good when guys come back from injury" yeah id hope so. There is still more work to be done though to the roster and all that gets pushed aside when your wins are highlighted because your deep bench appears better than they really are in these kind of victories. Might as well keep everyone right?

Magic lose the next 3 games on the road against superior competition with healthy rosters and people will say "Yeah well we are injured. Nothing gained, nothing lost. We weren't winning anyway." Equally redundant information moving forward. At least it makes Mosely look good I guess.

You really shouldn't be drastically updating your prior evaluation based on single game outcomes anyway. That said, you definitely can compare where you thought we'd be halfway through the season to where we are currently and update your evaluation accordingly.

For example, ESPN BPI projected us for the play-in to start the season and now has us with home court advantage, advancing to the second round. Any given game barely influences their evaluation of our team but in aggregate it's bought into our defense and the ascendence of Paolo and Franz.

[VFX]

It good to see this team win shorthanded. THAT BEING SAID

The problem here is that there is nothing really to take away from games like this except:
"The bench guys didn't give up and got the W" ... yeah ok and?

It's annoying as hell regardless, of W or L, because nothing informs us of anything on a substantial level regarding the entirety on the roster. We still need to see a starting lineup play real minutes to gauge anything and it hasn't happened, and likely wont, this season.

The most that can possibly come from this season at this point is slight internal player development. Nothing has been learned about the effectiveness of the starting lineup together. No major takeaways have been surmised outside of Goga beating out Carter for his spot, which frankly happened last season and went unnoticed by Mosely somehow. Very curious considering the contract situation of both players at the time... I digress....

The takeaway here is "Man the Magic will be really good when guys come back from injury" yeah id hope so. There is still more work to be done though to the roster and all that gets pushed aside when your wins are highlighted because your deep bench appears better than they really are in these kind of victories. Might as well keep everyone right?

Magic lose the next 3 games on the road against superior competition with healthy rosters and people will say "Yeah well we are injured. Nothing gained, nothing lost. We weren't winning anyway." Equally redundant information moving forward. At least it makes Mosely look good I guess.

Weird post, imo.

You're complaining that something that can't happen isn't happening.

We don't have a full strength team so we can't evaluate how close to contending it is. Well, yeah. Obviously.

But why does that invalidate the incredible effort of those remaining guys who are going out and getting the fans the most unlikely of win ratios?

They shouldn't bother because you wanted to evaluate the starters??

I don't get it. Sure, I think Weltman should make moves , and should have done 2 offseasons ago. But his lack of activity in no way undermines the incredible effort of the team and it's coaches in keeping in the playoffs a team that would otherwise probably be in the tank zone.

Came off to me as more just lamenting our bad injury luck, and that plus our historically conservative FO that likes to "evaluate the roster we have" rather than make moves, can lead to frustration that we don't have a good idea of exactly how good we are/can be and what our ceiling is as currently constructed. That prevents us from taking the next step as we lack the requisite data to make an informed decision WRT what that next step should be.

Correct.

This was essentially a season of "evaluation" because they re-signed everyone and are attempting to develop a number of young players. We don't really have any information because of the sheer amount of injuries that have occured.

Not really sure what jezzerinho is talking about. This team isn't contending for a while because everyone is still developing and the roster is far from finished. Its not an invalidation of the remaining guys. Orlando still has to play basketball games and compete.

I'm not blaming Weltman here for lack of decisions actually. I'm saying that anytime there is a reason to not have sufficient data Weltman will use that opportunity to forgo decisions as he loves to do.

So yeah... while I like seeing this team pull wins out of their ass against legitimate competition, I would much rather they glean relevant information about what will be working in the future iterations of this roster. There are levels to this. Not sure much has been gained so far outside internal development.

[Magicman125]

I do think the Paolo injury forcing Franz to play as a #1 option helped him. I think Franz subsequently going down and now Suggs helped Suggs and Anthony take on heavier offensive burdens and see what does/doesn't work for them, but it's not necessarily going to make it easy to figure out our most effective lineups or how the offense should ideally run when we're eventually (hopefully) back at full strength (minus Moe)

[VFX]

It good to see this team win shorthanded. THAT BEING SAID

The problem here is that there is nothing really to take away from games like this except:
"The bench guys didn't give up and got the W" ... yeah ok and?

It's annoying as hell regardless, of W or L, because nothing informs us of anything on a substantial level regarding the entirety on the roster. We still need to see a starting lineup play real minutes to gauge anything and it hasn't happened, and likely wont, this season.

The most that can possibly come from this season at this point is slight internal player development. Nothing has been learned about the effectiveness of the starting lineup together. No major takeaways have been surmised outside of Goga beating out Carter for his spot, which frankly happened last season and went unnoticed by Mosely somehow. Very curious considering the contract situation of both players at the time... I digress....

The takeaway here is "Man the Magic will be really good when guys come back from injury" yeah id hope so. There is still more work to be done though to the roster and all that gets pushed aside when your wins are highlighted because your deep bench appears better than they really are in these kind of victories. Might as well keep everyone right?

Magic lose the next 3 games on the road against superior competition with healthy rosters and people will say "Yeah well we are injured. Nothing gained, nothing lost. We weren't winning anyway." Equally redundant information moving forward. At least it makes Mosely look good I guess.

You really shouldn't be drastically updating your prior evaluation based on single game outcomes anyway. That said, you definitely can compare where you thought we'd be halfway through the season to where we are currently and update your evaluation accordingly.

For example, ESPN BPI projected us for the play-in to start the season and now has us with home court advantage, advancing to the second round. Any given game barely influences their evaluation of our team but in aggregate it's bought into our defense and the ascendence of Paolo and Franz.

But I'm not talking about one game in particular or evaluating on a game to game basis...

I'm talking about an entire season worth of data that has been deemed basically irrelevant due to injuries. We have 5 games of starters playing together so far after signing KCP. That information is more important than what the W/L column looks like because it informs them of what decisions should be made.

Orlando's window is what it is. Injuries don't change the window when you are handing out max deals and waiting on 20 year olds to determine who is going to be part of the future and who isn't. If you sign a roster to be deep, and you have a ridiculous amount of injuries throughout the season, then it informs you to change nothing about your approach and validates making zero changes.

[Skybox]

It good to see this team win shorthanded. THAT BEING SAID

The problem here is that there is nothing really to take away from games like this except:
"The bench guys didn't give up and got the W" ... yeah ok and?

It's annoying as hell regardless, of W or L, because nothing informs us of anything on a substantial level regarding the entirety on the roster. We still need to see a starting lineup play real minutes to gauge anything and it hasn't happened, and likely wont, this season.

The most that can possibly come from this season at this point is slight internal player development. Nothing has been learned about the effectiveness of the starting lineup together. No major takeaways have been surmised outside of Goga beating out Carter for his spot, which frankly happened last season and went unnoticed by Mosely somehow. Very curious considering the contract situation of both players at the time... I digress....

The takeaway here is "Man the Magic will be really good when guys come back from injury" yeah id hope so. There is still more work to be done though to the roster and all that gets pushed aside when your wins are highlighted because your deep bench appears better than they really are in these kind of victories. Might as well keep everyone right?

Magic lose the next 3 games on the road against superior competition with healthy rosters and people will say "Yeah well we are injured. Nothing gained, nothing lost. We weren't winning anyway." Equally redundant information moving forward. At least it makes Mosely look good I guess.

You really shouldn't be drastically updating your prior evaluation based on single game outcomes anyway. That said, you definitely can compare where you thought we'd be halfway through the season to where we are currently and update your evaluation accordingly.

For example, ESPN BPI projected us for the play-in to start the season and now has us with home court advantage, advancing to the second round. Any given game barely influences their evaluation of our team but in aggregate it's bought into our defense and the ascendence of Paolo and Franz.

But I'm not talking about one game in particular or evaluating on a game to game basis...

I'm talking about an entire season worth of data that has been deemed basically irrelevant due to injuries. We have 5 games of starters playing together so far after signing KCP. That information is more important than what the W/L column looks like because it informs them of what decisions should be made.

Orlando's window is what it is. Injuries don't change the window when you are handing out max deals and waiting on 20 year olds to determine who is going to be part of the future and who isn't. If you sign a roster to be deep and you have a ridiculous amount of injuries throughout the season, then it informs you to change nothing about your approach and validates making zero changes.

Weltman and his crew of world-class experts don't get to say "Gee we can't tell what we've got without perfect conditions and another year or so"...that's just not a reasonable degree of proficiency at player analysis and team-building. These guys have all of the experience, all of the resources and staff and make millions to be able to see and project beyond what actually happens on court under ideal circumstances...I call BS.

BTW-I know they haven't said that out loud, but I don't know why the paying customers should be expected to give them so much rope.

I don't doubt they have short and long term visions for the team, but patience with "assessment" has a logical endpoint in time

[Knightro]

It good to see this team win shorthanded. THAT BEING SAID

The problem here is that there is nothing really to take away from games like this except:
"The bench guys didn't give up and got the W" ... yeah ok and?

It's annoying as hell regardless, of W or L, because nothing informs us of anything on a substantial level regarding the entirety on the roster. We still need to see a starting lineup play real minutes to gauge anything and it hasn't happened, and likely wont, this season.

The most that can possibly come from this season at this point is slight internal player development. Nothing has been learned about the effectiveness of the starting lineup together. No major takeaways have been surmised outside of Goga beating out Carter for his spot, which frankly happened last season and went unnoticed by Mosely somehow. Very curious considering the contract situation of both players at the time... I digress....

The takeaway here is "Man the Magic will be really good when guys come back from injury" yeah id hope so. There is still more work to be done though to the roster and all that gets pushed aside when your wins are highlighted because your deep bench appears better than they really are in these kind of victories. Might as well keep everyone right?

Magic lose the next 3 games on the road against superior competition with healthy rosters and people will say "Yeah well we are injured. Nothing gained, nothing lost. We weren't winning anyway." Equally redundant information moving forward. At least it makes Mosely look good I guess.

You really shouldn't be drastically updating your prior evaluation based on single game outcomes anyway. That said, you definitely can compare where you thought we'd be halfway through the season to where we are currently and update your evaluation accordingly.

For example, ESPN BPI projected us for the play-in to start the season and now has us with home court advantage, advancing to the second round. Any given game barely influences their evaluation of our team but in aggregate it's bought into our defense and the ascendence of Paolo and Franz.

But I'm not talking about one game in particular or evaluating on a game to game basis...

I'm talking about an entire season worth of data that has been deemed basically irrelevant due to injuries. We have 5 games of starters playing together so far after signing KCP. That information is more important than what the W/L column looks like because it informs them of what decisions should be made.

Orlando's window is what it is. Injuries don't change the window when you are handing out max deals and waiting on 20 year olds to determine who is going to be part of the future and who isn't. If you sign a roster to be deep, and you have a ridiculous amount of injuries throughout the season, then it informs you to change nothing about your approach and validates making zero changes.

Well it’s a good thing the season doesn’t end on January 13th.

There’s still plenty of regular season and hopefully a couple of playoff rounds for us to evaluate how good this group is and can be, plus what ultimately they need to go out and get to take that next step.

[eyriq]

If you sign a roster to be deep, and you have a ridiculous amount of injuries throughout the season, then it informs you to change nothing about your approach and validates making zero changes.

I think you've nailed it.

[VFX]

If you sign a roster to be deep, and you have a ridiculous amount of injuries throughout the season, then it informs you to change nothing about your approach and validates making zero changes.

I think you've nailed it.

Yeah, except I disagree with the idea to focus entirely on having the deepest roster possible in the off chance 9 players get injured all at once. I'd much rather they determine the best players to surround their max level players with moving forward.

The former issue can limit the latter.

[VFX]

You really shouldn't be drastically updating your prior evaluation based on single game outcomes anyway. That said, you definitely can compare where you thought we'd be halfway through the season to where we are currently and update your evaluation accordingly.

For example, ESPN BPI projected us for the play-in to start the season and now has us with home court advantage, advancing to the second round. Any given game barely influences their evaluation of our team but in aggregate it's bought into our defense and the ascendence of Paolo and Franz.

But I'm not talking about one game in particular or evaluating on a game to game basis...

I'm talking about an entire season worth of data that has been deemed basically irrelevant due to injuries. We have 5 games of starters playing together so far after signing KCP. That information is more important than what the W/L column looks like because it informs them of what decisions should be made.

Orlando's window is what it is. Injuries don't change the window when you are handing out max deals and waiting on 20 year olds to determine who is going to be part of the future and who isn't. If you sign a roster to be deep, and you have a ridiculous amount of injuries throughout the season, then it informs you to change nothing about your approach and validates making zero changes.

Well it’s a good thing the season doesn’t end on January 13th.

There’s still plenty of regular season and hopefully a couple of playoff rounds for us to evaluate how good this group is and can be, plus what ultimately they need to go out and get to take that next step.

We'll see.

[Knightro]

If you sign a roster to be deep, and you have a ridiculous amount of injuries throughout the season, then it informs you to change nothing about your approach and validates making zero changes.

I think you've nailed it.

LOL no he hasn’t.

A deep roster is a very good thing for the regular season. Any suggestion otherwise is silly.

The Magic, unfortunately, have just had extreme bad luck that their most critical pieces have all missed extended time. To the point where they haven’t been able to properly evaluate their primary rotation for enough games.

But the alternative to not have a deep roster and just lose a lot when guys get hurt which is not viable.

The Magic will inevitably get 20-25 games with their main core group of guys and they’ll get the data points they’re looking for to make informed decisions for next season.

[VFX]

If you sign a roster to be deep, and you have a ridiculous amount of injuries throughout the season, then it informs you to change nothing about your approach and validates making zero changes.

I think you've nailed it.

LOL no he hasn’t.

A deep roster is a very good thing for the regular season. Any suggestion otherwise is silly.

The Magic, unfortunately, have just had extreme bad luck that their most critical pieces have all missed extended time. To the point where they haven’t been able to properly evaluate their primary rotation for enough games.

But the alternative to not have a deep roster and just lose a lot when guys get hurt which is not viable.

The Magic will inevitably get 20-25 games with their main core group of guys and they’ll get the data points they’re looking for to make informed decisions for next season.

I haven't figured it out, but you are literally just reiterating my point in the same post. lol
You don't actually know whether the blue is true. You just hope it will be the case. I hope so too.

Orlando winning games off the backs of Cole Anthony, Caleb Houstan, Cory Jospeh, and Trevelin Queen is good for this seasons W-L column. Nothing else.

[eyriq]

If you sign a roster to be deep, and you have a ridiculous amount of injuries throughout the season, then it informs you to change nothing about your approach and validates making zero changes.

I think you've nailed it.

Yeah, except I disagree with the idea to focus entirely on having the deepest roster possible in the off chance 9 players get injured all at once. I'd much rather they determine the best players to surround their max level players with moving forward.

The former issue can limit the latter.

We have a deep roster because we spend so little on our top 3. It's expected of a rebuilding team whose best players are on their rookie scale contracts. Detroit is the only team with a cheaper top 3. We spend ~43% of the cap on our top 3 while the average team spends ~69% of the cap on their top 3. When your top 3 are JI, KCP, and Cole you'd better be deep.

[VFX]

I think you've nailed it.

Yeah, except I disagree with the idea to focus entirely on having the deepest roster possible in the off chance 9 players get injured all at once. I'd much rather they determine the best players to surround their max level players with moving forward.

The former issue can limit the latter.

We have a deep roster because we spend so little on our top 3. It's expected of a rebuilding team whose best players are on their rookie scale contracts. Detroit is the only team with a cheaper top 3. We spend ~43% of the cap on our top 3 while the average team spends ~69% of the cap on their top 3. When your top 3 are JI, KCP, and Cole you'd better be deep.

Orlando isn't rebuilding.

They have their 2.5 max players moving forward and are just biding time until all are paid.

[Skybox]

Deep is certainly better than "not deep" and if you can play most of them during the season and keep them ready-all the better. The idea that that insulates you from injuries isn't true...it's fun to steal games this year but in a "real" contending season, if you lose your top guys, you're out - period. The real test of a FO is building depth without spending so much. If Moe is our 3rd string C at $11m, and WCJ is our 2nd string now at $18m+ (when his extension hits) and Cole is basically an injury insurance policy at $13m and Gary Harris is a fashion model towel waver at $7.5m...you're really not doing any tremendously insightful or creative investing. Ideally, you've got one or two bargains in your starting lineup - we've got Goga and rookie scale guys (for now) and just a couple of strong, fairly compensated first guys off the bench.

Queen at <$2m and TdS at <$4m is more in line with what a really good deep bench should be costing. Guys on lottery scale salaries - even rookie deals - should be bench, but not deep bench if you're not hiding them offshore to bake.

I'm just afraid it's going to be a whole different ballgame when those big 3 extensions kick in. Maybe we'll see a wholesale re-working of the bench over the next couple of summers - but I'm not holding my breath. The easiest/laziest thing to do is just keep it together and hope things fit better through some kind of osmosis.

[eyriq]

If you sign a roster to be deep, and you have a ridiculous amount of injuries throughout the season, then it informs you to change nothing about your approach and validates making zero changes.

I think you've nailed it.

LOL no he hasn’t.

A deep roster is a very good thing for the regular season. Any suggestion otherwise is silly.

The Magic, unfortunately, have just had extreme bad luck that their most critical pieces have all missed extended time. To the point where they haven’t been able to properly evaluate their primary rotation for enough games.

But the alternative to not have a deep roster and just lose a lot when guys get hurt which is not viable.

The Magic will inevitably get 20-25 games with their main core group of guys and they’ll get the data points they’re looking for to make informed decisions for next season.

Let me reframe his point so that it echoes a point I've been making for a while now. There won't be a mandate for a re-tool after this season because the build isn't in a state for re-tooling. We have the cap sheet of a typical rebuilding team; salaries are more evenly distributed throughout a young and deep roster while the top is very lightweight. You don't re-tool a rebuilding team, you develop talent and identify a core.

[Knightro]

I think you've nailed it.

LOL no he hasn’t.

A deep roster is a very good thing for the regular season. Any suggestion otherwise is silly.

The Magic, unfortunately, have just had extreme bad luck that their most critical pieces have all missed extended time. To the point where they haven’t been able to properly evaluate their primary rotation for enough games.

But the alternative to not have a deep roster and just lose a lot when guys get hurt which is not viable.

The Magic will inevitably get 20-25 games with their main core group of guys and they’ll get the data points they’re looking for to make informed decisions for next season.

I haven't figured it out, but you are literally just reiterating my point in the same post. lol
You don't actually know whether the blue is true. You just hope it will be the case. I hope so too.

Orlando winning games off the backs of Cole Anthony, Caleb Houstan, Cory Jospeh, and Trevelin Queen is good for this seasons W-L column. Nothing else.

So would you prefer them to lose the games when they are missing players?

[VFX]

LOL no he hasn’t.

A deep roster is a very good thing for the regular season. Any suggestion otherwise is silly.

The Magic, unfortunately, have just had extreme bad luck that their most critical pieces have all missed extended time. To the point where they haven’t been able to properly evaluate their primary rotation for enough games.

But the alternative to not have a deep roster and just lose a lot when guys get hurt which is not viable.

The Magic will inevitably get 20-25 games with their main core group of guys and they’ll get the data points they’re looking for to make informed decisions for next season.

I haven't figured it out, but you are literally just reiterating my point in the same post. lol
You don't actually know whether the blue is true. You just hope it will be the case. I hope so too.

Orlando winning games off the backs of Cole Anthony, Caleb Houstan, Cory Jospeh, and Trevelin Queen is good for this seasons W-L column. Nothing else.

So would you prefer them to lose the games when they are missing players?

Thats your takeaway from the post?

No. I'm merely saying that wins or losses at this juncture are equally of importance IN TERMS of identifying what path they should be taking. I'm happy with the wins all things considered. It means the guys on the team prioritize winning and Mosely has them buying in.

I'm looking at the season from a macro viewpoint and not "WIN GUD LOSE BAD". I know thats difficult for some here to understand.