JJZFL

This. How many offensive rebounds have they had?

Fournier also costs us close games by not passing to anyone but Vuch during crunch time and by forcing shots at the end of games. He did better with both last night. It’s the kind of thing that’s hard to tease out of statistics. Agree that Gordon seems to be growing into the point forward role and is getting better at moving the ball to both sides of the court.

I’m glad we stayed competitive and didn’t freeze up on offense in the 4th. In the close ones we lost recently, we stopped passing the ball and switched to one on one play, especially Fournier. They all did better with that last night.

No lead is big enough going into the fourth to make me feel comfortable. Maybe if we were up by 40 or something.....

Putting Fournier 1 on 1 vs Hayward was begging to lose.

Epic. Outscored 25-4

Exactly my point. We need to get rid if some of these guys in favor of some shooters. Nothing against Ennis, he just isn’t what we need right now.

Agree. Also agree that in the last few minutes of regulation we stopped moving the ball and went into hero ball mode, which cost us badly.

I don’t understand that either

I agree with everything you’ve said about Cole. Regarding Ennis, I think we’ve seen from our recent string of losses that you need 3-4 three point threats on the floor at all times and Ennis just isn’t giving us that at this point.

The problem with Ennis is his shooting is terrible and we have too many of these gritty guys who can’t shoot on the floor at the same time. With him, Birch, and Clark on the floor you’ve got 3 who can’t shoot. Add MCW and we just don’t have enough offense.

I think you keep Bacon and MCW. Don’t know that anyone would want the other two but I’d be looking to get rid of them for prospects if possible.

Good grief. What an ending!

Don’t know if I want to watch the second half of this thing. I guess I’ll see how the start of the third goes and then decide.

6 points so far with 1:41 left in the quarter. Wonder what our record low is.

We’ve been out scored 21-3 in the second quarter. We’ve scored three points and there’s less than 5 minutes left in the quarter.

You’re totally right. Minnesota really stunk in the first and I got excited. Was premature.

Gordon like a bull in a China shop trying to run the offense.

I can’t argue with that either

Well on the bright side we appear to have finally found a team that shoots worse than us :) 3-12 from three, 8-24 from two, for Minnesota.

We haven’t found those pieces because by tanking we had little to work with and no one wanted to come here. Admittedly our emphasis on everything but shooting also hurt us but that was also part of the tanking strategy. One big difference now compared to prior years is that the odds of getting a very high draft pick are much worse now no matter how bad your record is.

I usually agree with you but I come to the opposite conclusion. Where we are now is what I predicted on these forums 8 years ago when we broke with all previous Magic history and decided to go with a tanking strategy. High risk with the odds stacked against you, and if you don’t get that superstar, you condemn yourself to mediocrity or worse for a very long time. Better to do the hard work of trying to stay competitive and building a team piece by piece, like we did with Heart and Hustle. It also doesn’t wreck your team culture when you take that approach.

The concern from my standpoint is there’s some chance he isn’t going to be healthy. He was kept out for 18 months to recover from his knee injury and then quickly reinjures it after just a few games. I know the current injury was said to not be serious, just a bruise or something, but they sure have kept him out a long time and I haven’t heard anything about a timetable for his return. The risk you take in drafting an injured player, I guess.

There is no question that for some reason we’ve prioritized lanky athletic players who can’t shoot. People have been complaining about it for at least 4-5 years. Gordon shooting 33.3 percent from 3, for example. In 7 years he’s never shot better than 34.9% from three. That was in 18-19 by the way. Last year he shot about 31 percent. I doubt that he’s ever going to develop into a good 3-point shooter. Like Soul says, you can’t win very often if you don’t have multiple shooters on the floor.

Well said