The Orlando Magic made some strong additions to the team and largely played the summer well. But did they do enough to take the leap? Not in free agency.
After winning 25 games last season, the Orlando Magic had a lot of needs to fill in the offseason. As much as everyone wanted a rim-protecting power forward to line up next to Nikola Vucevic and some star power, that was just not going to be in the cards.
The Magic’s new organization has to prove itself to free agents to attract them into the fold and make that major impact they want to make. The roster they have built through the Draft and the vision the team has tried to put into place has to prove itself on the court before anything can happen.
Each offseason has the certain tasks a team needs to complete just so it can field a competitive roster. The Magic certainly had some of those — needing a backup point guard and to find some type of answer at power forward.
What became increasingly clear though as the Magic went after Paul Millsap and told at least C.J. Watson they were planning on pursuing some “big fish,” the Magic are not going to go anywhere until the players on their roster get better.
So the focus in free agency had to change (or at least stay on track) to supplement the players on the roster ready to grow and bring in a coach who could foster that growth and demand accountability or something a bit more.
The Magic supplemented the roster in free agency the best they could while maintaining cap flexibility. They acquired C.J. Watson as a backup point guard on a reasonable deal and shoring up the frontcourt with Jason Smith on a one-year deal.
The big moves were shoring up the foundations though and continuing the process of developing their young players and building through the Draft.
Mario Hezonja will undoubtedly become a big piece for the Magic moving forward, as you would expect any top-five pick to become. And re-signing Tobias Harris at an average of $16 million per year puts a ton of responsibility on the now-23-year-old forward to become a much more important and consistent player for this young team.
Yes, the Magic did not make anything more than a cosmetic change to their 25-win roster. The only shock to the system was the team’s new coach. That means most of the improvement for the Magic will come internally.
Still these changes that came this year are pretty important. Every move is when you are trying to climb out of the basement and take some steps forward.
So how did the Magic do this summer?
Next: The Free Agents