The Orlando Magic are always one of the more conservative teams in Las Vegas. They often do not play their roster players longer than they have to. They are not a team that sells out on winning the Summer League title. They are there to do their work and their evaluations as they aim to complete their roster.
For fans, that is not exciting. The Magic are not a team that uses the public-facing part of Summer League as the main goal.
The main goal of Summer League is not always to win the games (although that is not a bad thing if it happens) The Magic had a lot of young players that are going to be fighting for a spot in the rotation on a playoff team. That is a bit of a new feeling.
Orlando came to Summer League with three players who were already on the roster and trying to fight for their place on the team. The Magic had to see whether these young players would be ready to contribute to the team in the regular season. They needed to look good.
In that respect, the Magic should feel pretty good about how their Summer League went. All three of these players—Anthony Black, Jett Howard and Tristan da Silva—showed them something that will carry over to training camp and create competition and decisions for spots in the rotation.
That is what the Magic ultimately wanted to see from these players. But what did they show in Summer League? That is what the team will evaluate as they prepare for training camp in a little more than two months.
As Summer League shuts down and the Magic go quiet before training camp, here are three things the Magic showed in Summer League as we now turn our attention to the start of training camp and the regular season.