Evaluating Jacque Vaughn part of Magic’s turning point year

The hot topic among Magic fans each night is the latest seeming injustice perpetrated by head coach Jacque Vaughn. The Magic’s coach has become the lightning rod and scapegoat for everything wrong with the Magic.

His first two years saw him win only 43 games and have a win percentage well below 30 percent. But that was not his charge. The Magic were not trying to win but rather clear the decks and set themselves up for the future. That means his main charge was keeping positivity up to prevent a bad culture from seeping into the locker room and help players continue to improve.

At a certain point, you get judged by winning. That goes for whether you are the general manager, the head coach or the players. Wins are ultimately what keeps or loses your job.

“I think overall this group has to learn me,” Vaughn said at media day before the season began. “We have a bunch of new players. We’ll grow together. my preparation doesn’t change. I think it’s my job to get these guys to grow together and learn about each other. I’ll keep it that simple. I’ll let you guys complicate it.”

This season, at least in my eyes, is about evaluating who stays and who goes on the Magic roster. Orlando has to start piecing together its future and pouring concrete around the pillars of this franchise’s future. Nikola Vucevic is already in place. Victor Oladipo figures to play a big role. Where Maurice Harkless, Andrew Nicholson, Tobias Harris and others fit in is a bigger question.

This mantra goes too for Jacque Vaughn.

For the first time, the Magic want to see a bit more progress on the floor. They have made it known publicly they want to be in meaningful games later in the season this year. The Magic’s start, albeit a tough one with the injuries and road games, has been somewhat encouraging. Orlando continues to show signs of progress on both sides of the floor, albeit without consistency.

Jacque Vaughn’s use of Victor Oladipo has been one of many questions heaped on the young coach. Photo by Jeremy Brevard-USA TODAY Sports

Vaughn’s critics grow louder though every time Elfrid Payton is not bringing the ball up the floor while Victor Oladipo is playing alongside him or when Willie Green plays ahead of Maurice Harkless. That is noise from the outside for sure, but also fair criticism. So too are some of his late-game play designs and the way his offense tends to favor setting up isolations on favored matchups rather than the crisp ball movement the team usually shows when it is most successful.

There are a lot of contradictions in Jacque Vaughn.

He knows what he is doing better now in his third year than he did in his first. His staff is still a reflection of the energetic group developing young players and the process of winning than the results at this point. Vaughn has built a good staff that works hard with the players and has generally helped them improve, but there is not an Alvin Gentry or Kurt Rambis helping guide the rookie head coach through the trials of the NBA and helping with some of the finer points a young coach has to learn.

Well, there is Gordon Chiesa, the Magic’s consultant who was an assistant coach with the Jazz while Vaughn was playing there.

As Josh Robbins of the Orlando Sentinel writes, Chiesa acts as an outside sounding board for Vaughn providing thoughts and feedback on what he is doing.

"“Coach is a sounding board for me,” Vaughn says.“We have a great relationship where there might be some things that I share with him that I don’t share with the other assistant coaches because they’re kind of entrenched in what they’re doing on a daily basis. I get to talk to him about how we look from afar, what his observations are, and I just get to talk to him about basketball.“It’s great to see what it looks like from afar from a guy that knows a lot about basketball and also how we can improve. I listen to his suggestions. I’m a good listener."

Again, like young players, this young coach is still learning how to take material learned in the classroom and apply it to the court, getting the most out of his players in an efficient and fluid manner.

Vaughn, in all likelihood, will get the entire year barring a terrible collapse from this team. The Magic expected to be in meaningful games later into the season, but few were whispering Playoffs as nothing more than an ambitious team goal. Progress is more of the goal and continuing to move in the right track.

The Magic appear to be headed that way. It would be hard to argue otherwise with some of the performances this team has had and the identity they have taken on as a scrappy team that can beat you on any given night.

As the team further develops that identity and gets closer to those pressure games, how Vaughn is doing in a nuts-and-bolts sense may have to come under closer scrutiny.

For now, though, Vaughn remains on the line with his future evaluated in the same way his players are. The Magic need to know whether he is someone that will be part of the final puzzle or moved on when the timing is right.