2023-2024 General Game Thread

[Soul Bro 1,421]

“Orlando was without Franz Wagner(sprained ankle) and Wendell Carter Jr. (sore right knee). It was the fourth consecutive missed game for both; Carter has appeared in only 13 games so far this season. Jalen Suggsplayed only 14 minutes, largely because he was dealing with an illness that seems to be working its way through Orlando's locker room.”

https://www.espn.com/nba/recap/_/gameId/401585163

[Soul Bro 1,421]

3 minutes ago, CTMagicUK said:

I'm ready to see some changes to this team. 

The Heat are always a tough game, they always play defense and play hard and they have the best coach in basketball. But they beat us tonight without any *****ing ball handling guards at all. That's depressing. 

Our PG position is a mystery to me. 

Suggs starts there even though he's not really a PG, picks up 3 fouls and ends up playing less than 15 minutes. (I actually think when Franz gets back we should continue to look at Suggs at PG with maybe Caleb at SG, the added ball handling of Franz might help).

Markelle Fultz, if the game was played in transition he'd be one of the best in the world but as soon as you get into a half court he's basically worthless, brought some good defensive playmaking though. 

Cole Anthony doesn't actually do anything useful above average. Defense? He tries and he's a great rebounder but to be kind id say he's below average. Passing? No. Shooting? 34% from 3. And then he just has possessions where he thinks "I'm him" and does a ludicrous amount of dribbling to get into a contested 8 foot shot that makes me want to pull my hair out. 

This team had it's longest win streak with Anthony Black starting at PG and now he's the 4th choice. And I get it, he needs to be better to be a starter long term, needs to be much more aggressive and confident on offense but he's awesome defensively for the most part and he's smart and he plays hard and if we're going to lose anyway I'd rather see him play than Cole or Trevelin Queen (who I do like as an end of bench guy). 

The C position is almost as big a mystery. 

Will WCJ ever have a healthy season? 

Is Goga mobile enough on defense to be a playoff starter? Does he offer enough on offense? 

And conversely is Mo Wagner strong enough on defense to start? (Answer: no.) 

It's actually troubling how important Joe Ingles feels because he returned and was immediately the best perimeter player off of the bench. But he's got like 1 year of NBA basketball left in him and realistically he's already borderline unplayable in a playoff series because of his lack of defense. 

What’s hard for me is Miami is great at finding more established, young guys like Jaquez who can really play, whereas often we draft raw, young guys who aren’t ready to play. Honestly, given we have two stud wings now in Franz and Paulo, I believe our drafting strategy needs to change.

[All Eyes On Me 1,213]

On top of last nights frustration, we seem to just be waving the white flag tonight. Carter, Fultz, Harris, Ingles, Franz all ruled out. Isaac supposedly will be back but I’m not holding my breath. We have 4 players that are either hurt or working their way back from injury ALL THE TIME… and have been for YEARS… all 4 need to go. I’m tired of talking about make believe of what could be if this roster was healthy because it’s not possible for Fultz, Carter, Isaac or Harris. Make trades now before January lets the season get away from us. Don’t wait til the deadline

[Soul Bro 1,421]

On a positive note, kudos to Mose for starting Caleb, as I think it’s improved our shooting and spacing. We still need a point guard.

[ball junkie 277]

14 minutes ago, All Eyes On Me said:

On top of last nights frustration, we seem to just be waving the white flag tonight. Carter, Fultz, Harris, Ingles, Franz all ruled out. Isaac supposedly will be back but I’m not holding my breath. We have 4 players that are either hurt or working their way back from injury ALL THE TIME… and have been for YEARS… all 4 need to go. I’m tired of talking about make believe of what could be if this roster was healthy because it’s not possible for Fultz, Carter, Isaac or Harris. Make trades now before January lets the season get away from us. Don’t wait til the deadline

I thought everybody was like oh well when the schedule lightens up we’ll be fine …I posted a link a few days ago showing us in 8th place …we’re lucky the Bulls lost last night or we’d be even closer to 9th …but I’m with you …the schedule does lighten up but counting victories before they hatch is a dangerous business in this league 

[CTMagicUK 1,488]

9 minutes ago, Soul Bro said:

On a positive note, kudos to Mose for starting Caleb, as I think it’s improved our shooting and spacing. We still need a point guard.

Caleb is definitely someone worth keeping around and finding minutes for. The fact we've learned that is basically the lone bright spark of this injury riddled stretch.

I'm hoping the way he's developed and come into his own this season is a good omen for the development of Jett Howard next season (I say next season because at this point I'm pretty convinced this is basically a red-shirt season for Jett no matter what happens). 

[All Eyes On Me 1,213]

1 hour ago, ball junkie said:

I thought everybody was like oh well when the schedule lightens up we’ll be fine …I posted a link a few days ago showing us in 8th place …we’re lucky the Bulls lost last night or we’d be even closer to 9th …but I’m with you …the schedule does lighten up but counting victories before they hatch is a dangerous business in this league 

Yeah, my optimism waned when Franz got hurt tbh. And with how we handle injury reporting, Franz could be out anywhere from a couple more days to a couple more weeks.

[orlandoholic 135]

another bad game by us.. I’m not going into all the stuff that bothers me about our team right now. It’s been the same issue for a long time now and Mosley ain’t the guy who is going to fix that. He needs help. 

Pretty telling that last game we saw how easily Spoelstra picked apart our zone defense meanwhile we looked clueless against this zone defense by OKC. CLUELESS!

One last thing. Fck Tony Brothers. He is an a$$hole every time he meets us. I’m done with the superstar calls. Can’t fckn touch SGA. 
 

[CTMagicUK 1,488]

2nd night of a back to back, on the road, missing all those guys, some guys probably still feeling some affects of the illness that's been going around. SGA cooking (and getting some superstar calls). I'm not super mad.

Glad AB got some burn, he played well all things considered. Honestly think he's going to be an enormous player for us 1 or 2 years from now when he gets stronger and more experienced, right now he gets a rookie whistle on defense where if he does anything it's a foul, once he gets established more he'll be a really impactful defensive player and he should be able to use that size and length to punish smaller guys who guard him more when he gets stronger. And I'm thankful Cason Wallace did nothing so we didn't get several posts about how Wallace was clearly the guy we should have picked and Anthony Black is a bust etc etc. 

Honestly it's kind of hard to judge this team with all the injuries and I think that's kind of just the only important point to take away from games like this, we can't continue to invest in injury prone guys. That starts with Harris and Fultz, if they're here past the trade deadline, which I'd be fine with if a little underwhelmed, I'd hope they won't be here next season. And that's nothing against either as players or people. But this team needs guys on the floor. Paolo and the rookies and randoms is fun for one or two games but it gets old quick. 

[JJZFL 621]

3 hours ago, CTMagicUK said:

2nd night of a back to back, on the road, missing all those guys, some guys probably still feeling some affects of the illness that's been going around. SGA cooking (and getting some superstar calls). I'm not super mad.

Glad AB got some burn, he played well all things considered. Honestly think he's going to be an enormous player for us 1 or 2 years from now when he gets stronger and more experienced, right now he gets a rookie whistle on defense where if he does anything it's a foul, once he gets established more he'll be a really impactful defensive player and he should be able to use that size and length to punish smaller guys who guard him more when he gets stronger. And I'm thankful Cason Wallace did nothing so we didn't get several posts about how Wallace was clearly the guy we should have picked and Anthony Black is a bust etc etc. 

Honestly it's kind of hard to judge this team with all the injuries and I think that's kind of just the only important point to take away from games like this, we can't continue to invest in injury prone guys. That starts with Harris and Fultz, if they're here past the trade deadline, which I'd be fine with if a little underwhelmed, I'd hope they won't be here next season. And that's nothing against either as players or people. But this team needs guys on the floor. Paolo and the rookies and randoms is fun for one or two games but it gets old quick. 

What really gets old for me is multiple players dribbling in 2-3 opponents and losing the ball.  I realize Banchero is our star but when he’s double or triple teamed he needs to trust his teammates and pass to someone else for a better shot.  Doubly true for Anthony.  A good chunk of our turnovers were due to dribbling into traffic with a mindset of taking a shot no matter what.  That has to change, no matter who’s on the floor.  

[CTMagicUK 1,488]

44 minutes ago, JJZFL said:

What really gets old for me is multiple players dribbling in 2-3 opponents and losing the ball.  I realize Banchero is our star but when he’s double or triple teamed he needs to trust his teammates and pass to someone else for a better shot.  Doubly true for Anthony.  A good chunk of our turnovers were due to dribbling into traffic with a mindset of taking a shot no matter what.  That has to change, no matter who’s on the floor.  

I agree with this. 

It's actually a running joke I have with myself that every time one of our announcers says "the Magic really need a bucket" Cole Anthony comes down the court and turns it over. 

I think "decision making" isn't a huge strength of this team at the moment, maybe it's youth or unsettled rotations but there's at least a couple of really dumb turnovers every game. I think Paolo will figure it out as he gets used to the attention.

[All Eyes On Me 1,213]

Since Franz got hurt, Paolo is getting prime TMac usage as a 21 year old 2nd year player.

I admittedly didn’t watch last nights game, felt like it was a schedule loss even if we were healthy.