MagicMatic wrote:ezzzp wrote:MagicMatic wrote:
The FO boxed themselves into a corner by never addressing an offense predicated on anyone other than Vuc that they acquired. Point blank, that’s the situation. The Orlando Magic can run a different offense and won’t be “tanking” by giving AG, Isaac, and Fournier more responsibility offensively. Just because we haven’t seen a scheme without Vuc doesn’t mean it would be impossible without him.
NOW after having made that caveat (that for some reason always needs to be stated and prefaced).
The FO does NOT NEED to retain the players at all costs simply because they are currently shouldering the load offensively. That’s the incorrect way of solving the primary issue at hand that they have not addressed alternate ways of distributing the responsibility of an offense.
The only argument to be made would be asset retention with Vucevic. However, that becomes much more difficult to move a Center at a $20+m that thrives only in a system built specifically around him for his entire career. That cost becomes less valuable to teams after he signs his contract.
Ezzp will continue to say **** like “slow and steady growth in a winning context”, which is another way of saying “we won’t be attracting free agents, won’t be utilizing the draft, and we will be watching a decade of Vucevic inspired offense before we ship off some of the younger core in some miraculous franchise altering trade.”
Teams have turned around in a quicker amount of time by forgoing systems that are clearly flawed, one dimensional, and ultimately lead nowhere. We aren’t talking about a team with multiple allstars that are underachieving based on their talent level. We are talking about a team that was proud of their main scoring option for years finally making an allstar reserve appearance after taking 17-18 fga per game while people cry about how necessary he is to the team’s future success. Give me a break.
WRONG...we literally have seen it.
The DJ/Fournier/Gordon/Isaac/Bamba lineup had an ORtg of
92.3 and a DRtg of 140.7 for a whopping
-48.4 NETRtg. Clifford tried it in 4 different games and only kept it on floor for 13 minutes for obvious reasons: it was AWFUL.
When Vucevic was on the court, the Magic had a 109.7 Offensive Rating. When he was off the court, the Magic free fell to a 100.3 Offensive Rating. LMAO that's a 9.4 differential.
That's before even mixing in that Ross will more than likely walk if Vucevic leaves. Its mind boggling how distorted your anti-vucevic filter stops you from seeing the obvious.
Slow and steady growth in a winning context DOES NOT mean we won't be attracting free agents. A competitive context is literally the second most important factor (behind $) for the vast majority of free agents.
Slow and steady growth in a winning context DOES NOT mean we won't be utilizing the draft. The Magic have ALL their draft picks AND this FO has a proven track record of finding good players everywhere in the draft.
Slow and steady growth in a winning context DOES NOT mean we will be watching a decade of Vucevic inspired offense. It means that the offensive load will be sustained by Vucevic until the core develops their offensive skills enough to carry it. Not to mention, his contract is likely 4 years.
FYI this approach you laugh at is the philosophy of the best and smartest franchises that aren't major market /destination cities.
Teams that turn it around quickly do it because they draft an instant game changer, trade for an instant game changer or add an instant game changer. None of those are likely for the Magic's current draft context or cap context or roster context or market context. It doesn't matter how much anyone cries about it, its not changing the reality of it.
Then so be it. If the Magic are bad because they can’t be propped up on the crutch that is Vucevic, then they deserve to land in the lottery. That’s the initial point of a lottery in the first place - to give lacking teams the chance at landing starter to elite talent.
The point is that you
have to give AG, Isaac, Fultz, Bamba, etc. (all top 10 picks) the chance to prove themselves in a context without production from Vuc - a player that has already been on this roster
for almost a decade. Otherwise you are asking for more of the same with extremely minimal varying results and opportunity to improve a clearly lacking roster. Which has ultimately been the case for a variety of reasons.
You don’t believe in the abilities of the youth on this roster and you champion Vucevic because he takes 17-19 shots a game in an archaic, slow, half court offense that fails to close out games a majority of the time.
The point is that you have to give AG, Isaac, Fultz, Bamba, etc. (all top 10 picks) the chance to prove themselves in a context without production from Vuc
Why?
Did any of them showed any reasons to belive they can?
Isaac is nothing else but never guarded spot up shooter at wing at this moment. And pretty mediocre at that.
Bamba is year away from being even that.
Gordon , after 5 years finally become average scoring starter, on league's average efficiency, and now is
one of 76 nba players that are averaging over 14 ppg. How impressive is that ? Well, standing at 56th position in PPG, there are 7 players ahead of him who put up 16ppg or more while comming off bench. 17 of them did it while playing less MPG than Gordon , 10 of them did it while shooting less shots per game.
I won't even talk about Fultz.
Their limitations don't come from fact that they are being held down by somebody, but from fact that they are underdeveloped and simply poor offensive players in this moment. Philly giving up MCW and Jah Okafor ulimited usage during rookie year didn't turn them into great players, counting stats just masked what they are as players, but even that got exposed later. Magic youth , no matter with or without Vučević simply has to be better at playing basketball first, than they can, if they are good enough, take over games, more shots...
Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans. -John Lennon
