The Underwhelming Magic Are Finally Winning

I was looking up, as we were prepping the show over the last 24 hours, I'm looking at some of the storylines in the NBA.

They're all the ones that we talked about.

But then I'm looking at the standings, and I'm seeing Orlando starting to climb.

The, the resilience that this group has and.

You know, just staying with the plays, staying with, with making the right plays down the stretch, um, you know, stepping up to the moment, um.

Not, not being discouraged by what the what the opponent does or what has happened.

I thought the Throughout the rest of the game early in the game, um.

But yeah, I mean, especially with a with a situation with, you know, JI going down um in that in that 3rd quarter.

You know, just to kind of, kind of come back and You know, regroup ourselves and, and You know, come back to, to a positive mindset is, is, is huge .

The Magic have now won 6 games in a row.

Now, the schedule has not been great.

2 of those wins over Washington, one of them is over Dallas.

So, you take that into account.

But over the last 6 games, The Magic have the 5th-best offensive rating in the NBA and they have the 2nd best defensive rating in the NBA.

They also have the 2nd-best net rating in the NBA behind just the Atlanta Hawks, which is another team that's playing good basketball as well.

Um, this Magic team coming into the season, there were a lot of expectations for it.

They get Desmond Bain, you've got the core of a team that before the injuries derailed them last year, you thought they'd be a top 4 team last season.

This year has been a huge disappointment.

The defense has not been what we expected it to be or what it should have been.

The injury to Franz Wagner certainly seemed to take them out of contention.

But now here they are, Evan, playing that defense that we're used to seeing them play.

Playing an offense that has been statistically pretty productive.

How serious should we take this late-season charge by the Orlando Magic?

I think you have to take it serious for the sake of just, uh, anytime any player feels good or a team feels good, you might be in trouble, especially when basketball is like a game of runs.

One thing I remember talking about at the beginning of the season, last year, Orlando had like a great historical like defensive run.

And then this year they tried to play at a higher pace.

And I believe it took a little bit of time to get your legs under you and get that identity under you to be able to do it at a high pace offensively and defensively.

It also doesn't help that Paulo has been playing a little bit better as well.

I think, uh, when it's coming down to playoff basketball, Those dudes have like a playoff identity.

You got Jalen Suggs leading the way, he plays physical.

Desmond Bain, he plays very, very physical.

He has the tenacity, and then you got like the two big twin bashers that are going to be hard at any, any type of half-court set.

I think it just still comes down to, uh, The end all be all is if, you know, If somebody can assist Desmond Bains with the scoring down the stretch.

You've seen Banchero struggle a little bit, have bad shooting numbers off and on this year.

He even said like, hey, I, I didn't deserve to be an All-Star.

I didn't play well.

But I think if you match them up, anytime you have 3 guys, 3 scores that you have to worry about, and, uh, defensive intensity, that usually molds well for a playoff series, but it, they still have to get over that hump and, and, and, and show and improve, to be honest with you, and do it consistently.

Yeah, um.

It goes without saying that the Wagner injury is paramount here.

Like , I don't think they can win a first-round series against any of the top 3 teams, Detroit, Boston, and New York without this, without Wagner back in the lineup.

And there's not a lot of encouraging updates coming out of Orlando about Wagner.

He's got that left high ankle sprain that's had him playing just, I think 4 games since December 7th, a couple of false starts along the way.

Um, he's a missing piece there.

He's a big part of what they do, uh, offensively, and he's still out, um, indefinitely.

That said, like, One of the things that makes me believe the magic can be, uh, a threat in, in the conference playoffs is that they are really close, really good in close games.

Uh, they've got great records, a great record in games decided by like 5 points or less, a great record in games decided by 3 points or less, and they do have that defensive identity.

They are a team.

That you can look at and say, all right, well, they can get stops in the playoffs.

They can grind games to a halt.

We saw it last year when, or last couple of years really in their first-round series with the teams that played, they've given those teams hell, uh, because of their defense.

So, Again, manufacturing offense is going to be a problem for this team, but I think if they can find a way, if they can get Wagner back, even if it's just the last 5 or 6 games and get him into the playoffs.

I don't know, man, like this is one of those teams that maybe they can live up to that potential.

Maybe they can be the team.

That we thought they were gonna be.

I just pulled up some of the numbers on these close games.

They're 15 and 7 in games decided by 5 points or less.

It's pretty damn good.

They're 11-3 in games decided by 3 points or less.

That's really good.

They're 6 and 1 in games decided by 1 point.

Like, so when, when they're playing close games, they're getting stops and they're finding ways to manufacture enough offense to win them.

I don't, I mean, I was really bullish on the Magic coming into the season.

I think I picked them to make the conference finals coming into the year, and in fact, I did.

Um, the way they played, the, the way they played to start the season made no sense to me.

They were trying to play at a faster pace and the defense suffered as a result of it.

The injuries took them out of play, but now here they are.

And, and look, Suggs, I think you're right.

He's the head of the snake in that backcourt.

You know, Ban Banchero, I think is playing much better as of late.

I was reading some stories about him, like he seems to have, you know, taken some accountability with, you know, kind of what he's been doing and what he's not been doing this year, uh, they took him out of the All-Star mix.

I don't know.

I, I'm kind of talking myself into it as we're, we're speaking right here.

The Magic can be like the Magic played the Knicks in the first round.

That's tough, man.

They're gonna be physical with Towns.

They're gonna be physical with the, with Brunson in the backcourt.

Like that's a fit, that's a tough series for, for, uh, for the Knicks in the first round.

Yeah, you get Wendell Carter back there.

Like when they're full throttle, they're a big ass team.

They're a big physical team that can physically like take you out.

So I think if they did get full throttle, I mean, it's the Eastern Conference, you're going to set up playoffs, set up a tone , can you outlast their intensity for 4 games?

And I always love a team that can, uh, defend over, you know, offensively, obviously at this day and age, because no matter what, they can neutralize what's going on and give themselves a chance at any part.

Yeah, I, I mean, Getting I mean, getting Suggs back into the rotation, keeping him healthy, that's been big for this team too.

I'm looking up some of his numbers right now over the last, over the, and let's just say the month of March.

He's averaging 16.5 points, shooting 47% from the floor, 36% from 3.

And he's playing nearly 30 minutes per game.

That is the high water mark for him on this season.

Like he has been such an instrumental part of this team's success.

If he can stay healthy, if they can find a way to get Wagner back, and again, the updates are not encouraging from that ankle sprain, but if they can find a way to get him back.

That's, that, that's not the team I'd wanna play in the first round.

That's for sure.

You're, you're absolutely right.

And, um, shoot, only thing bad about that team, like, god damn, Jalen, grow a little bit of hair back.

Oh God, who the fuck?

like who did that?

Like, and, and I'm not even trying to be funny.

I'm like, bro, like it's, it, it destroys.

Tracks the game.

Sometimes like I damn near watched the Memphis Pelicans game.

I'm like, bro, you're gonna watch this bullshit.

This *** ain't got no hair.

Like, you know what I'm saying?

Like this *** out here playing around.

So grow that shit back, bro.

This, this is a business.

This is a commercial business, bro.

You wilding.

Am I wilding for saying that?

I don't even know where to go from that, but I think we just wrap it up right there and put a button on it and say, Jalen Suggs, Evan Turner wants to have a word with you about your hair.

Cause I love you.

Get your shit together, man.

All right.

That shit was, don't that fuck up the game?

It's like, bro, can we talk about the cancer patient?

It shit, but like, no, it, it should like that should be like a violation of dress code.

I'm not even trying to be funny.

I'm being dead ass serious.

If you can't wear like a headband around your neck, you damn sure can't be out here that raw.