From the moment Paolo Banchero entered the NBA, he was a handful for the league to deal with.
The 6-foot-10, 250-pound forward entered the league with a body and skill set that made him unique -- he was the No. 1 pick after all -- and almost immediately, they did not know what to do with him. It is no coincidence that Banchero has averaged at least 20.0 points per game in all three of his seasons so far and has averaged at least 7.0 free throw attempts per game.
Banchero is quite simply a lot to deal with for any defense. Gameplans need to be made around him and his unique skills.
The problem for the Orlando Magic has been that they have not always been able to take advantage of it. Their spacing has been typically so poor with the suspect shooting on the team, that Banchero often found himself going up against double and triple teams any time he tried to get to the paint.
It is a credit to him that he still scores so much and forces so many problems, even with the attention he receives.
This year promises to be different.
The Magic added Desmond Bane to try to enhance their shooting. They hope the return of Jalen Suggs will give them another shooting boost. And Tyus Jones off the bench gives them another elite shooter.
On top of that, Banchero is simply getting better. And the Magic should have all the tools to make Banchero a true mismatch nightmare.
"The big thing for me in terms of why Paolo is going to make this leap is I have always seen him as one of the true great mismatch creators in the NBA," Sam Vecenie said on the Game Theory Podcast. "It's just hard to put anybody on him. There are just precious few players who can deal with his mix and blend of power, coordination, fluidity, balance and also have some explosiveness here and there."
If half the battle to building a championship team is finding a star that no defense can stop, the Magic have one. The question is whether the Magic can make his job easier and put him in situations that make the defense pay and compromise.
Banchero is a mismatch nightmare
Offenses in the NBA today are all about putting defenses in compromising positions. It is about making defenses decide what they can live with giving up.
In last year's playoffs, the Orlando Magic were so scared of the Boston Celtics' three-point shooting that they were willing to live with mismatches in the paint or switching Wendell Carter onto Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum. That strategy helped keep scores down, but the Celtics torched the Magic's vaunted defense in the areas they were happy to give up.
The Magic have a mismatch nightmare in Banchero. Put a bigger player on him, and he has the explosiveness and ball-handling to get by him or get to his spots. Put a smaller player on him, and he will bully his way through you to the basket and finish at the rim.
Banchero has the skills to draw fouls, set up his mid-range shot and finish at the basket. He has all the skills to eat up mismatches. On top of this, he has always been a willing passer, averaging 4.8 assists per game last year and 5.2 assists per game the year before. He averaged 9.4 potential assists per game, according to data from Second Spectrum.
The problem has always been: Does he have the supporting cast to take advantage of this extra attention and doubling or to limit how much teams can help on him?
The addition of one of the elite shooters in the league in Desmond Bane and the return of Jalen Suggs, along with the signing of Tyus Jones, will give Paolo Banchero three potentially elite jump shooters surrounding him.
The hope is that it gives him more space to target one-on-one matchups and take advantage of all of Banchero's mismatches, creating late double teams that allow him to kick out to these open shooters opponents are now more afraid to leave open. It could force teams to switch and give advantages on his drives instead of hedging and not worrying about the basket.
Defenses have a lot more to worry about, especially at the free throw line. And that forces them to make some compromising decisions.
Orlando can do a lot more creative things offensively to create mismatches with the bigger threats they have now on offense.
Banchero's efficiency is the missing piece
Essentially every argument about Paolo Banchero ultimately comes down to his efficiency and whether he can make enough shots to justify his shot volume.
Critics will knock his 32.0 percent career 3-point percentage, his below-average 55.1 percent true shooting percentage from last year (a career-high, by the way) and his poor on/off numbers to suggest his stats are somehow a bit empty.
While there are plenty of counters to that argument -- such as the attention he receives, his teammates' poor spacing and the fact he typically plays against opposing starting lineups while Franz Wagner anchors the bench groups -- there is no getting around that finding ways to get Banchero easier and simpler shots is the best way for him to improve.
He has already made a sizable leap. Most of the analysts do not account for his oblique injury in breaking down his 2025 season -- or the fact that it took more than a month for him to get back into playing shape with the intense responsibility on this team after he returned.
In the 24 games he played after the All-Star break, Banchero averaged 29.0 points per game and had shooting splits of 47.3/33.3/78.3. That equated to a 58.1 percent true shooting percentage, in the top 10 among players with a usage rate greater than 30 percent after the break last year.
Banchero is poised to make an All-NBA leap. Everyone can feel it. His efficiency should greatly improve.
Banchero has proven himself as a playoff performer too with 29.4 points per game in last year's playoff series.
What he needed was teammates who could force defenses to decide how to defend him and could make them pay for the wrong decisions. With Banchero, there will be a lot of bad decisions defending him. Orlando has the help to create this tension and concern for opposing defenses.
As last year's playoffs showed, Banchero cannot do it alone. And now he has the team around him to maximize his matchup advantages.