Orlando Magic Daily Big Board 3.0: Clarifying the Orlando Magic’s goals

OMD Big Board 3.0: Clarifying the Orlando Magic’s goals

The Other Options

The biggest riser in recent weeks among the draft prospects is Mets 92 forward Bilal Coulibaly.

Coulibaly entered the season as a raw wing prospect with all the physical attributes but little understanding of how to use them. He struggled to get off the bench for Mets 92.

Now with Mets 92 in the French league finals, Bilal Coulibaly is an indispensable piece of the puzzle for Victor Wembanyama’s championship hopes.

He gets after players defensively and suffocates them with his size. And his offensive game has come a long way this season. That growth is the biggest thing for him. Everyone knew he had Lottery talent. But everyone wanted to see whether he could put all those pieces together.

He has started to put a lot of the pieces together to put him in a position to go in the Lottery.

Jarace Walker will not go 13th in this Draft. He is too talented and too solid of a player. There are teams that need what Walker brings to the table.

He is an excellent screener and defender who has good versatility. He plays tough and should play up or down positions defensively. Walker is going to be a connector who makes a lot of teams work.

But his lack of offensive skill probably puts him off the Magic’s list as a serious draft prospect. They just do not need a player with his skills. And he would probably struggle to accentuate the key players on this Magic team. This is a player where the fit is going to matter most for his development.

We all know the Orlando Magic love their Michigan men. They drafted Franz Wagner and Caleb Houstan and signed Moe Wagner. They like the solid play that comes from that program. They defend well and just play smart in general.

Kobe Bufkin is the next in line for the Michigan pipeline to the NBA. He is a solid shooter (although not strictly a shooter) and a decent playmaker. Bufkin is solid and has generated a decent amount of buzz in the draft process.

He is not going to get all the way to the basket consistently. But he could be a solid backup guard option with the potential to do a bit more with a bigger burst.

Another big riser in the Draft process so far has been Duke center Dereck Lively. His stats at Duke were fairly meager as he struggled with some injuries and fit in Duke’s system with another big in Kyle Filipowski next to him.

But Lively is extremely athletic. He was a top-10 player in his high school class. And he is starting to show that in his workouts. There are rumors that he is showing off his range and outside shot. That could transform him back into that prospect from before college.

The Magic do need to shore up their center position. It is one of the big needs this offseason. And while it might be better to use a veteran to fill that spot, Lively is someone who would be able to man that backup spot effectively and occasionally play alongside Wendell Carter.

Keyonte George rates as a solid shooter. There are plenty of reasons still to draft him and look at him. His low shooting percentage was almost certainly a product of shot quality and having to set up all of his own shots.

His biggest detraction is his size. He is going to struggle to get into the paint. And the question is whether he is a pure shooter that can fill that role alone.