“No, seriously, this is the farthest I could get distance myself from Rob.”
((Would-be gamethread, it was gonna be Schröder'd anyway because I was stuck at the movies. ~lw3))
“We tried. What we tried wasn’t working. So now, we’re just going through the motions until it’s over.”
The above could apply to the Atlanta Hawks’ occasional approach to playing games, to swinging deals and making roster moves through the trade deadline, or to competing in the Eastern Conference. It could just as easily apply to the Orlando Magic’s approach to this whole season.
21-win Magic in the air! There were no designs on having the fourth-worst record in the NBA when the season got started for the Magic. Now, with Dwight Howard and his Atlanta Hawks back in town (7:00 PM Eastern, Fox Sports Southeast and 92.9 FM in ATL, Fox Sports Florida in ORL), it’s hard for Orlando to lay out a blueprint to fans for what comes next.
Tank mode? That’s what the prior four seasons were for. Out of five lottery picks (three among the top-five), only Dunk Contest flop Aaron Gordon and Mario Hezonja remain standing down in the Tragic Kingdom. Two plum talents were shipped to OKC for Serge Ibaka, who in turn was shipped this month to Toronto in exchange for Terrence Ross and a late first-rounder.
The fifth lotto draftee, Dario Saric, was shipped (back) to Philadelphia along with a 2017 swap option back on Draft Night 2014 for Elfrid Payton. Saric’s career-night came at Payton and the Magic’s expense just a couple weeks ago, the rookie registering a career-high 24 points plus eight boards to help the Sixers eke out a 112-111 comeback win. And with Ersan Ilyasova out of the way, Saric will be given even more time to shine in Philly.
Even the second-rounder Orlando threw into the Saric deal (which became the Knicks’ rookie center Willy Hernangomez) is showing more upside than Payton. Now in his third season, Elf’s scoring is naturally up, but his assist-making (career-low 5.6 APG) and perimeter shooting (26.6 3FG%) has managed to be almost as bad than it was in prior seasons.
Forced out to the wing while Ibaka was here, Gordon (28.9 3FG%) has been only marginally better, even though perimeter shooting has never been his forte. His free throw shooting has unacceptably plummeted (career-low 64.7 FT%), making it harder to justify him as a banger or a slasher in the paint. But he’ll be shoe-horned back into the starting 4-spot with Ibaka gone, as the Magic try to make use out of Ross (4-for-17 FGs in his Magic debut on Thursday) and Evan Fournier at the wing positions.
So where does Orlando (21-38) go from here? Tanking for tanking’s sake won’t helped the Magic due to the risk of continued blown decision-making from the front office. And it won’t help the beleaguered Frank Vogel, who instantly becomes a lame duck coach the minute Orlando’s top brass finally elects to do away with GM Rob Hennigan (team president Alex Martins vows not to shake up things until at least after the season ends).
Vogel’s best bet is to allow the young core of Gordon, Payton, Nikola Vucevic (team-high 25 points but 8-for-20 FGs vs. POR on Thursday) and Hezonja (4-for-5 FGs vs. POR) to sink-or-swim together, with the occasional spark from Ross, and hope there is enough defensive support to pull off a few wins and give Magic fans a sliver of hope going into next season.
That murky future doesn’t really include any of Fournier, Bismack Biyombo, D.J. Augustin, C.J. Watson, or Jeff Green, yet only Green’s contract comes off the books this summer. Counter-intuitive to the urge to go young, Vogel also needs to keep his vets productive enough to maximize their off-season trade values and further relieve what is, presently, the ninth-biggest salary load in the NBA.
The maddening schism between playing-to-win and losing with a young core played out for Orlando in Thursday’s home loss to the Blazers. Orlando built up a 14-point lead early in the second half, only to have it evaporate due to a 35-17 disadvantage in the fourth quarter. Payton and Augustin could do little to keep the Blazers’ Damian Lillard (17 4th-quarter points) in check.
The Magic guards should have continued trouble tonight dealing with Dennis Schröder, who found himself getting additional rest after being suspended mere hours before last night’s abomination against the heat. The Menace’s offensive efficiency against Orlando is the second-highest (min. 2 games played) versus any Eastern Conference foe this season, averaging a season-best 10.0 APG (3.0 TOs/game) to go along with 18.0 PPG in three meetings with the Magic. His five steals are also the most against any NBA club thus far.
Thanks largely to Schröder, Atlanta exhibited some rare mastery of a lower-ranked team during their last matchup at Philips Arena earlier this month, a 113-86 Hawks victory. Howard and Paul Millsap flustered Orlando’s front line, a reversal of fortune from the December game at Philips when the Magic seemed to get any shot they desired. In the February game, Atlanta outrebounded Orlando, 48-33, including a 10-7 offensive rebounding edge despite the Magic missing 14 more field goals in the game.
Keeping the Magic cool from outside will be crucial to putting them away decisively again. Orlando was a blistering 15-for-34 on threes in their December victory against the Hawks, but just 16-for-55 in their last two contests with Atlanta combined. Properly contesting Ross and Fournier without fouling will go a long way to avoiding a repeat of Friday night, where the Hawks (32-25) held Miami to 23-for-62 shooting on two-pointers, and 13 free throw attempts, but was still run out of their own building in a 108-90 loss.
Orlando’s next most frequent perimeter shooter, Jodie Meeks (40.4 3FG%) remains sidelined with a sprained thumb, and no one else aside from Augustin (36.4 3FG%) or Damjan Rudez (35.2 3FG%) makes more than 34 percent of their shots, contested or otherwise. The Magic are 6-31 (one win since January 1) when shooting below 35 percent on threes.
Orlando ranks 23rd in O-Reb%, and that is inclusive of Ibaka’s contributions. His replacement, Ross scores in bunches, but is usually a binary-code contributor in other categories. Continuing to box out Vooch, Biyombo, and Gordon (5 O-Rebs vs. POR on Thursday) ought to minimize the Magic’s extra-chance opportunities.
So, of course, Hawks fans should expect the opposite of what Mike Budenholzer’s team needs to do to stay competitive and defeat the teams they need to beat. Coach Bud always projects the persona of being smarter than the average bear, but he has few answers when his team starts playing like Boo-Boo.
The work it takes to keep Coach Bud’s team middle-of-the-pack is enviable to clubs like Orlando, but smoke-and-mirrors is never fun when his own team is choking from the smoke. We’ll simply have to wait and see if Schröder’s return is enough for Atlanta to put off their inevitable 16th double-digit defeat of the season for another day.
Let’s Go Hawks!
~lw3
