The Orlando Magic’s transformation this offseason has been stunning and complete. The team has forced an identity that gives it a shot at the Playoffs.
Ultimately when breaking down the Orlando Magic’s projected starting lineup, the question comes up time and time again. Who is going to score? Who among Elfrid Payton, Evan Fournier, Aaron Gordon, Bismack Biyombo, Serge Ibaka or Nikola Vucevic is going to take the step up and shoulder the scoring load.
Someone has to. Points have to be scored. Someone gets the shot at the end of the game. This is always the focus for casual fans.
This Orlando Magic team though is going to be more like the subtitle to Dr. Strangelove though. Call the 2017 season: The Orlando Magic, or how I learned to stop worrying about offense and embrace defense.
For the four years the Magic have gone through this rebuild, Rob Hennigan has always said he had a vision of turning this group into a defensive team. His draft picks were all defensively advanced and offensively challenged, but with room to grow. Victor Oladipo cut his teeth at Indiana as a defender. Aaron Gordon was a bundle of potential with athleticism to spend on the defensive end. Elfrid Payton was a playmaker with good size and length.
The mold and the identity was there. It just never formed fully. The vision was always still there.
Jacque Vaughn was supposed to instill principles brought over from the Gregg Popovich tree and the San Antonio Spurs, a team that won championships throughout the 2000s based on their stifling, historically great defense. Scott Skiles was hired largely for what he had done in the past in transforming defenses in young teams.
Defense was the key to Playoff success. The Magic still believe that.
And with money to spend in free agency, they have forced that identity onto this team. Acquiring Bismack Biyombo and Serge Ibaka this offseason give the Magic elite rim protection. Frank Vogel is one of the best defensive coaches in the league, wrangling the third best defense in the league by defensive rating in a team that completely changed its style after David West‘s departure.
Defense was the focus of all of this. Offense did not matter. Defense was the key to unlock that elusive Playoff berth and push this rebuild forward in a way the draft just was not getting done for this group — even after last year’s 10-win improvement.
True, the Magic added shooting but not to their starting lineup. Ibaka is a decent 3-point shooter and Vucevic can hit a jumper, but the guards largely are not shooters. Teams completely ignore Elfrid Payton on the perimeter and Aaron Gordon is not much of a threat on the perimeter yet.
None of that matters though. The Magic know there is a key formula to making the postseason that has been consistent through the years. It is defense.
Their surest bet to make the 2017 Playoffs was to transform the defense in a significant way and improve the 17th best defense in the league by defensive rating from last season.
Time and time again, the best defenses in the league consistently make up the Playoff field.
Last season, 12 of the top 13 teams in defensive rating made the playoffs. The one that did not — the Utah Jazz — finished a game out of the final spot. The year before (2015), 10 of the top 12 defenses by defensive rating made the playoffs (a notable absence being the Indiana Pacers without Paul George). The same trend held true in 2014, when the top 12 teams in defensive rating all made the Playoffs.
The pattern is clear, the majority of teams that make the Playoffs have the top defenses in the league. And with the Magic feeling the need to push the timeline up and make the Playoffs in 2017, they pushed their chips in on this side of the floor significantly. The offense can figure itself out as the team grows and takes the next step to contention.
The Magic have to do first things first: Make the Playoffs.
When put into this extremely narrow focus of the 2017 season as a seemingly Playoffs-or-bust year, the moves the Magic made this offseason make sense. The long-term vision for the team took something of a back seat. The pursuit of a Playoff berth for the sake of a Playoff berth took precedent and the Magic made moves to put them in position to do do so.
They brought in rim protection, giving them the ability to unleash Aaron Gordon and Elfrid Payton more aggressively on the perimeter. This was always the kind of team the Magic wanted. One built on defense. For whatever reason, the Magic could not build it that way with the picks they were afforded and the coaches they brought in.
That more than anything probably put the pressure on the Magic. After four years of a rebuild, the team was still a collection of assets lacking a clear identity. Nothing seemed to be crystallizing. And the Magic went to action to force the identity they wanted that still fit the pieces they had.
Orlando still has an eye to the future. It is betting on the players it drafted and acquired in Elfrid Payton, Aaron Gordon and Evan Fournier to take a step up in their career and supplement the new players the team has acquired. But that identity was the key to establish.
Defense is the ticket to the Playoffs. It is the way forward. And the Magic finally got tired of waiting for a coach to impose that identity and have taken the steps to add players that fit what the coach wants. The development phase is almost certainly over.
There is no guarantee Aaron Gordon or Elfrid Payton or Mario Hezonja will take that step up. There is no guarantee the pairing of Serge Ibaka and Bismack Biyombo will work as well on defense as their pedigrees might suggest. There is no guarantee the Magic can score enough or fit Nikola Vucevic into those plans effectively.
Offense will have to come from somewhere. Scoring will matter and likely hold the team back at some point and in some way.
There is no guarantee this risk will pay off in the end of 2017. The Magic are not a surefire Playoff team.
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But betting and banking on defense, even to an extreme, is the best shot at accomplishing this goal the Magic have. And so they pushed their chips in and will watch as the dice roll.