Orlando Magic Top 30: The Most Under-Appreciated Player in Orlando Magic History
21. Steve Francis (2005-06)
It is hard to be the player acquired in a rebuilding trade. Giving away one of the four best players in a franchise’s history leaves big shoes behind.
Perhaps having the top pick in the draft — and someone who would join that Mount Rushmore shortly — softened that blow. Perhaps having no expectations or even being nominally competitive made the player who came in OK. Maybe he is just a player lost to history.
Steve Francis’ two-season run with the Orlando Magic was rocky, to say the least. He battled with coach Brian Hill in his second year and openly pouted when the team traded his friend Cuttino Mobley only three months into his first season.
Steve Francis was not the team captain that general manager Jon Weisbrod envisioned. His whole notion of trying to build a tough-minded hockey-style team with Francis as its tough-minded score-first point guard was . . . not a good idea. Francis was not a great team leader.
Even in his first season, he was moody and got suspended for refusing to re-enter a game late. He even kicked a cameraman.
It is fair to want to forget Francis’ time with the Magic. It is largely forgotten.
But it is fair to recognize Francis was actually pretty good in Orlando. He ranks higher on a lot of all-time Magic lists than people probably want to admit.
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He averaged 19.4 points per game and 6.5 assists per game in his two seasons with the Magic. In 2005, his first year with the team, he joined an exclusive club of players to average at least 20 points per game with the team when he hit 21.3 points per game.
Francis made an incredible first impression too. In his first game with the team, he hit a buzzer-beating layup to defeat the Milwaukee Bucks. And followed that up with a game-winning jumper to defeat the New Orleans Hornets. He was defiant and seemed to show the Magic were not going to go away.
Indeed, if Francis was able to propel the Magic into the playoff conversation in 2005, he would have been an All-Star without a doubt. His first year with the Magic was an All-Star-caliber year. The Magic have had plenty of those, but his individual season in 2005 was one of the best years everyone forgets.
It was ultimately doomed to fail. Francis played on raw emotion and the Magic never accounted for that. It was clear they needed to move on from him quickly to create a better locker room environment for Dwight Howard to mature.
That has left Francis somewhat forgotten to history.