Fact or Fiction: The Orlando Magic Will Lead the NBA in Defensive Efficiency for a Second Consecutive Season

In the playoffs last season the Celtics out-rebounded the Magic in 6 of the 7 games.

In four of those seven games, the Celtics had rebound advantages of six to seven boards. Overall they out-rebounded Orlando by 3.5 boards a night, and in the six games where Orlando won the battle of the boards they were over 5.1 in rebound differential.

This is without Kevin Garnett — a guy who’s a tremendous rebounder + defender who’ll create even more possessions for the Celtics.

If you go back over the games against Boston from the past two regular seasons you’ll see that this rebounding margin is nothing new in this matchup. The teams have played six teams with Boston controlling the glass in their last five meetings, only losing the very first battle — that great game in Orlando two years ago, the Magic’s coming out party.

Extra Possessions

Giving the opposition so many extra possessions = more opportunities to hurt you …

That type of disadvantage puts a huge amount of pressure on the effectiveness on the team’s defense + offense. If Orlando can maintain most of their efficiency while cutting down all those extra possessions (against Boston), then that’s something well worth doing.

One Weakness

Offensively, the Magic are golden. Defensively, very impressive.

Now with the upgrade of Hedo to Vince, giving Orlando a much improved go-to scorer plus creator … Orlando has only one major weakness left and that’s rebounding.

• Can they win a title without fixing that? Yes, of course they can.
• Does the team’s rebounding leave Orlando vulnerable? Yes it does, and a great rebounding team like Boston will take advantage of that.
• If they can fix that – while leaving their offense + defense in a comparable state – does it give them a better chance of winning? Absolutely
• Do the Magic have the players do that? They certainly have the talent (Bass, Anderson) to experiment and find out the answer.

Bass and Anderson will represent the Magics 2nd string, which probably will be more conventional. But Rashard is the lynchpin for our spread out 3pt shooting setup. here why Shard @ SF is bad.

• By having a traditional PF the other team can camp out in the paint, this double teams Dwight ( arguably his weakest part of his game) and allows them to aggressively foul him (barely 55% on line)
• Also going traditional will lower our 3pt attempts and makes which was a big reason for many of our wins last year.
• putting Shard @ the 3 is also bad for him, think about it, Traditionally SF are leaner and faster. Shard @ the 4 actually allows him to be the one exploiting quickness advantages, not the other way around.
• finally going traditional will put more load on the PG due to less competent dribblers being available. Do you see Bass dribbling out of a double and finding an open man?

To surmise moving Rashard back to SF would be a huge mistake other than in rare matchup situations. It would let teams “go big” against us and abuse Howard (more than usual). It will also insure a lower scoring form of the Magic. R.Lewis will have to start working his hardest night in night out at the peak of his career. Not the best way to save your UNMOVEABLE & biggest contract’s legs for the long run. Everything you will gain for Lewis due to height you will loss an equal or larger percentage to quickness and jumping. And finally putting Lewis @ SF will put one more big on the court, with Lewis posting up for a 3 and Carter potentially doing the same at that moment who will handle the rock? Dwight or Bass, no poor Jameer will have to dribble his shoulder out of socket every game. Lewis at the PF is one of the rare unique systems that truely grants balance and flusters opponents defenses. I dont think its in our best interst to change that.