For much of the last decade and a half, the Orlando Magic have needed to find offense.
The team has not been outside the bottom 10 in offensive rating since Dwight Howard was on the team in 2012. A lot of that frustration is because of years of being one of the worst shooting teams in the league. An irony considering the 2009 team was one of the first to lean on 3-point shooting as a strategy to win at the highest levels.
As the 3-point shot has developed in the last decade, the Magic have been consistently left behind as they valued other skills and elements to build their rosters. But they always knew 3-point shooting would become important.
They spent their copious cap room last summer trying to solve their 3-point shooting in Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, only for that gambit to fall flat.
It is not clear what went wrong with Caldwell-Pope. But the results were the results. The career 36.7-percent 3-point shooter shot only 34.2 percent from three this season, boosted by a strong closing kick. In the Playoffs, the veteran two-time champion made only 6 of his 23 threes (26.1 percent).
It was not good enough and the Magic were left looking for another shooter this offseason.
They found that in Desmond Bane, a career 41.0 percent 3-point shooter and someone who shoots at much more volume. He is a much better player than Caldwell-Pope by everyone's top-100 lists. It is a clear upgrade.
Even if Caldwell-Pope had worked out, this would be a clear upgrade.
But excuse Magic fans for still having some whiplash. They have heard these arguments before about adding a shooter and how it could transform the team.
Indeed, if there is one thing that this team should have learned from last year is that adding one shooter is not enough. Orlando will need internal improvement, too -- Jalen Suggs, Paolo Banchero and Franz Wagner will all need to take leaps from deep. The addition of Tyus Jones added more shooting to the mix.
But it should be clear from even some basic numbers: Desmond Bane is not Kentavious Caldwell-Pope. He is something entirely different.
Desmond Bane will take a lot more threes
The easiest place to start with Desmond Bane is that there is just a difference in attempts between the two players.
Even when Kentavious Caldwell-Pope was hitting threes at his advertised rates, he still averaged a max of 5.8 per game (and that was in 2017). Caldwell-Pope averaged just 4.3 attempts per game last year.
One of the concerns with signing Caldwell-Pope was that he was not going to get up enough threes, especially for a team that took the second-fewest threes in the league in 2024. Orlando wanted to get more threes up last year. The team did despite the poor percentage.
The lack of attempts and the reliance on having others create his 3-point attempts was a big part of his struggles.
"I think Kenny's game is dependent upon others offensively," president of basketball operations Jeff Weltman said. "He's not a guy who creates his own shot. That's not who he is. The injuries to Franz an Paolo and Jalen, our three shot creators, really upended our whole offense. I've always said it's not just Kenny, our entire team struggled to shoot. We did not get the same quality of shots that we got the year before. None of this matters if the team isn't healthy. If we had health last year, I think Kenny would have been the guy he has been his whole career."
Bane is not that player, to say the least.
Bane averages 6.3 attempts per game for his career and settled in at 6.1 per game last year, the second-fewest in his career. He topped off at 8.6 per game in 2024.
Even if he is just taking 6.0 threes per game next year, that is still a big boost over the nearly 4.0 per game Caldwell-Pope took last year. To get threes, you need to take threes. And the Magic should be taking a lot more threes next year.
It helps that Bane makes those threes at a high level.
Desmond Bane won't wait for his shot
The biggest difference between Desmond Bane and Kentavious Caldwell-Pope then is what they can do with the ball.
Caldwell-Pope is almost exclusively a catch-and-shoot 3-point shooter. Last year, 3.4 of Caldwell-Pope's 4.3 3-point attempts per game were catch-and-shoot 3-pointers, according to data from Second Spectrum. He made 35.3 percent of those shots.
Caldwell-Pope said he struggled at times to understand he needed to have a more aggressive mindset when he had the ball. It was easy for Caldwell-Pope to fade into the background and lose his rhythm.
Bane is a much different kind of player and a much more active player with the ball.
Last year, Bane took just 2.6 catch-and-shoot 3-pointers per game. He made 42.3 percent of those shots.
Bane's real weapon is how he creates his own shot and how he hunts 3-pointers more off the dribble. Bane shot 37.8 percent on 3.3 pull-up 3-point shots per game last year. He was seventh in 3-point field goal percentage among players who took at least 3.0 pull-up attempts per game.
Bane is going to hunt threes in various scenarios. He can do a lot more with the ball. And that was a big factor in acquiring him.
"Adding a guy like Des will give us an elite-level shooter but also a guy who is a playmaker, a guy who, behind Ja Morant, ran more pick and rolls than any other guy on the Grizzlies," Jeff Weltman said. "To have that guy to put pressure off the dribble."
That Bane averaged more than 5.0 assists per game in each of the past two seasons and played some point guard was a major selling point of the deal from the Magic's front office. It hints at a more diverse game. That was important.
But the biggest thing Bane brings with him is his shooting. And how he gets his shot is completely different from Caldwell-Pope. It is more dynamic. And it fits more what the Magic are looking for from their players.
Orlando is desperate for shooting. Everyone understands and sees that.
If things have gone right this time, the Magic have added a far more dynamic shooter to their lineup.