Knightro wrote:eyriq wrote:The 2024 Magic posted a stronger collective tNet, driven by Isaac’s elite impact, Moritz Wagner’s high oNet, and a tighter rotation. The 2025 squad has seen promising development from Banchero and Bitadze but lacks the same depth as last year.
Long story short...
The Magic's bench last year was extremely effective and this year it's been awful.
Cole/Ingles/Isaac/Moritz as a four-man combo had the most games played together last year of every four-man combo on the team and put up a +11.1 NET.
It didn't matter if the 5th man was Franz, Harris or Black - those four guys together were really good with whatever 5th man they had out there.
Isaac has regressed DRAMATICALLY from last year. His individual net rating in 2024 was +10.9 (113.0 ORTG, 102.1 DRTG). This year's it's -1.2 (105.2 ORTG, 106.4 DRTG). Statistically, even though he only played 16 MPG, he was the most impactful defensive player on a per minute basis in the entire NBA last year. The Magic were the best team in the NBA defensively by a mile when Isaac was on the floor and just absolutely killed people.
Cole is also much worse (+2.6 NET last year, -1.1 NET this year).
Ingles (+5.8 NET) wasn't retained and his primary replacement TDS (-3.5 NET) has been really bad.
And Moritz because of injury is going to play 851 minutes less than last year.
---------
Basically it's exactly what I laid out in the Clippers game thread.
1. They gambled that they could effectively replace Ingles' playmaking responsibilities internally and that did not happen
2. Isaac regressed SEVERELY year over year - went from unquestionably the most impactful low minute player in the NBA to an actively harmful player
3. KCP, because of poor shooting in comparison to the rest of his career, has not effectively replaced Suggs/Gary in the starting SG role
4. Franz and Paolo, while overall better players than last year, are both still such inconsistent and overall poor perimeter shooters that they negatively impact wins and losses more significantly on a game-to-game basis (Franz 34% 3PT in wins, 23% 3PT in losses - Paolo 38% 3PT in wins, 27% 3PT in losses)
