EP. 518 – East Is Wide Open – Orlando Magic Podcast

EP. 518 – East Is Wide Open – Orlando Magic Podcast

What’s going on Orlando Magic fans? Kevin here. We’re back. We’re getting going to get into the episode in just a moment. But before we start the episode, did you know that less than 10% of the people that regularly consume our show are part of our Patreon community? Pretty surprising when you think about it. Again, not just people that randomly listen to one episode every, you know, few months or whatever. the people that regularly consume our content whether it’s on YouTube or on audio podcast platforms are part of our Patreon community less than 10%. And what I Jonathan and I want to ask is as we enter into this offseason as we enter into the next season would you consider if you find value in what we do if you enjoy the content that we bring if you enjoy the coverage of this team would you consider joining with us financially at patreon.com/the6manshow. There’s two reasons for this. Number one, we are about to embark potentially this summer on one of, if not the biggest projects we have ever tackled as an Orlando Magic content stream thing. You know, like we we’ve got something really really big planned and it’s not going to be free. Okay. Uh but it’s going to be potentially very very cool for a lot of Orlando Magic fans. Uh and so for that end, we’re asking for people to, you know, partner with us. Uh the other half of that is it’s no secret Jonathan and I have said on the show many times we would love to be able to provide Orlando Magic content as our full-time job. Imagine, you know, think about what we do now. Think about all the content that comes out of the six-man show hub these days. And and this is not our job. We both have full-time day jobs, right? If we were able to ever go full-time, which could only happen with our help of our patrons, the amount of content, the quality of the content would go crazy. And so that’s no secret. We want that, too. So, those are the two reasons we’re asking. And the other reason that, you know, maybe you guys could consider joining our Patreon is it’s full of some of the wildest and most amazing Orlando Magic fans out there. We have a bunch of Magic maniacs who love this team, love this fan base, and have an amazing community. And if you just want to join that, you want to be a part of some big time Orlando Magic fans, you want to talk about Magic Basketball 24/7 in our Discord or whatever it is, again, consider joining us. patreon.com/the6manshow. several different tiers available that you can choose based on whatever is right for your budget. Speaking of budget, the last thing I have to say is this. Money is hard these days, right? It’s 2025. We all know that. Do not join our Patreon if you are struggling to get by. Please, that is the last thing Jonathan and I want. There are things in life that are way more important than than an Orlando Magic podcast. Okay? So, please take care of your family first. Feed yourself first. Make sure you have food and clothes. and don’t go into debt just to support the six-man show. But if you do find yourself having extra money at the end of every month and you’re like, you know what, I love the content that these guys put out, whether it’s the podcast every Monday and Thursday, the postgame lives after every single game, the sixfan show outside of Kia Center after a lot of big Orlando Magic games or at watch parties and everything in between. If you value it, if you enjoy it, consider joining us again at patreon.com/the6man show. And now, let’s get into our episode as we kick off the offseason. This is the Sixman Show, an Orlando Magic podcast with your hosts Kevin Tucker and Jonathan Osborne covering all things Magic Basketball by fans for fans. Go Magic. What’s going on, Orlando Magic fans? You guys are back with the six-man show. We’re back with the six-man show. Jonathan Osborne here as always joined by my co-host Kevin Tucker. Kevin, we almost forgot how to do this, man. What’s going on? Hello. Hello. Is this thing on? Are we Are we still good? Yeah. Yeah. What’s up, man? It’s uh What? It’s good to be back. Yeah, it’s been, you know, we started this last season. At the end of the season, we take a week and this season because the the season ended on a Tuesday and then we didn’t come back until Monday, then we took another week. So, we’ve done like one episode in the last 12 days or something like that, which we have never done that ever. Like, that’s the longest stretch with only one episode ever. So, definitely weird, but you know, it’s nice to step away a little bit. Uh, but it’s even nicer to be back to be back to talk about Magic Basketball and the offseason, all those kinds of things. How are you doing? I’m doing really well. It’s good to be back. I’ll say that if there was ever a season where you might have needed like a prolonged break from this is the kind of season, you know, unless something crazy happened where, you know, you’re up 3 0 in the finals and you lose the finals and whatever, like you’re just completely and utterly heartbroken or if you know your favorite team trades away the, you know, franchise player beloved and then, hey, just, you know, three and a half months later, you end up winning the number one overall pick in the draft. Like, yeah. Wow. Do we want to start there? I know we’re going to talk about some of the NBA stuff and maybe we won’t jump right into that. Let’s if this is your first off season with us, the offseason gets a little bit weird because we have to like we want we like doing episodes. We want to keep putting out content, but sometimes we’re just going to need to fill some space and there’s not basketball actively going on for the magic. So, sometimes we’re going to go off on tangents. But before we get to the NBA, Kev, do we want to talk just a little bit about like if this is your first off season with the show, what that will look like? We already got like the next, you know, month and a half already kind of mapped out, which is exciting, you know, and then it’s also like, well, what are we going to do when all that’s done? Because that’s when we kind of get to the dry part of the off season. Yeah, that that’s part of also why we take this break after the end of the regular season isn’t just to totally just abandon everything. We did take several hours the other night and kind of talk about the off season and look ahead and those kinds of things. So, like you said, we’ve got a lot of things planned, but in general terms, you know, what we’ll do for these next several episodes is review um the season that was talk about the highs and the lows. We’re going to grade everybody. We always do that. you know, whether it’s players, coaches, front office, we grade them all. Um, sneak peek, you know, assuming schedules stay the same, we have an an amazing guest on Monday’s show that you’re not going to want to miss that. That’s going to be one of my favorite episodes ever. Again, assuming assuming assuming schedules stay lined up, you know, things can change. But that’s going to be great. Uh, but yeah, I’m really surprised that I was thinking like, hey, do we want to talk about this? We’re still far enough out that things could change. That’s why I’m not saying who. This is very uncven like. Well, that’s why I’m not saying who. It’s a teaser, but you know, we’ve had people on the schedule before and they’ve had schedules change and so I’m not going to say who it is, but if if it happens, I’m going to be really happy. So, anyway, that’ll be Monday’s episode. But, yeah, we’ll we’ll do grades. We’ll talk about players and front office and everything. The cool thing is like we’re not that far away from draft stuff. So, after we do all the grade stuff, you know, we’ll have a a week early in June with some other things. And then we will we’ll roll right into pre-draft stuff, we have an amazing list of guests that we have every off season to help us prepare for the draft because I’m not a big college basketball guy. I’m not a big, you know, um, European basketball guy. So, I don’t know a lot of the prospects that are coming in. And these guys always get us super prepared for the draft. Then we’ll hit the draft, you know, in about a little over a month. Then after that, you know, it’s a whole different chapter of the offseason with free agency and trades and all those kinds of things. So that’s the general idea of what an offseason looks like around here. But I will say this, every Monday and Thursday, we’re going to be here whether there’s news or not, you know, whether it’s, you know, fun conversations. We also have all kinds of random different shows we do during the offseason, which is fun. Uh, but yeah, if you’re new around here, first off season, you can trust we’ll be here every single Monday and Thursday. We already have it planned out talking about like kind of weird fun episodes that we do. Last year we started doing like the anything but magic mailbag where you can ask us whatever you want as long as it doesn’t have to do with the magic. We’re already planning that is annually moving forward. That’ll be our last episode of July. So I mean you’ve got a month and a half two two and a half months two months something like that. Yeah. two and a half months to start planning those questions, to start working on those. We if that episode’s two hours long, I I really don’t care. Like, it’s just always so much fun to do that. Definitely uh one of my favorite things. But yeah, and then we’ll try to have different guests throughout the off season. You know, some familiar faces, maybe, you know, some new faces. Who knows? And then, you know, there’s there’s rumors of things changing with the the Magic to a certain extent. So, if that does end up happening this off seasonason, obviously we’ll we’ll talk about that, too. So, really pumped for that. And, uh, yeah. I have one more thing one more thing to add. You mentioned guests, and we, like you said, we have a list of guys and and gals that we have every offseason. Looking forward to that. If there is a guest that you have in mind, please let us know. You know, I actually, let me preface it. We I I I we get some recommendations sometimes in the off season like, “Hey, you guys should have you guys should have Dwight Howard on.” And those always crack me up because it’s like, you think we haven’t we haven’t thought or tried to have Dwight on, you know? So, like the really obvious lowhanging fruit, you know, you can recommend it all you want, but I promise you we’ve chased that rabbit as far as we can and haven’t had success yet. But if you have any other ideas, Magic related or NBA related or whatever, please let us know in the comments, Twitter, Instagram, whatever, give us your suggestions of potential offseason guests that aren’t, you know, the Mount Rushmore of the Orlando Magic that we always try try to get. So, yeah. All right. Before we jump into like the NBA and then talk more about the Magic, what did you do with your time away? Cuz I I really don’t know what you’ve been doing. Um, sleeping more. That’s good. I I find again, especially since my surgery, like I sleep, Jonathan knows I used to never sleep like an unhealthy amount of lack of sleep. Like 4 hours a night, you know, six nights in a row and the seventh night I’d sleep, you know, seven hours maybe like bad. Uh, but Kevin introduc Kevin has introduced a lot of terms over the course of our friendship that I had never heard before, like surrender cobra. Like I had never heard of that until Kevin introduced it to me. And Kevin also introduced the term sleepless elite to me which Kevin used to be a part of and you know had to hang up his his uh his jersey in that regard. But yeah, Kevin used to never sleep. So hearing that you were able to catch up on sleep, but anything exciting like anything outside of sleep? No. Worked a lot, slept a lot. I didn’t even really like watch anything. I I had some stuff I wanted to watch. I didn’t do that. Mainly just the playoffs. I have been watching a lot of the both NBA and NHL playoffs. Yeah. What about you? Well, actually, I know what you’ve been doing. You’ve been playing that new game or not. I don’t know if it’s new, but it’s new to you. That’s what you Oh, it’s new. Oh, it’s new. Yeah. Expedition 33. Uh, by now you’ve probably heard of it, I think, on Metacritic. I believe it is the highest rated game of all time right now on Metacritic. I’ve been watching YouTube videos, watching like commentary stuff and uh some videos of like documenting the process of of that studio creating the game. And that was one little tidbit that came out of it. I don’t know how true that is. That’s kind of like, you know, lazidasical internet research that I haven’t done myself, but yeah, I’m a big turn-based RPG guy. Like grew up on the Final Fantasy games. Kevin knows all this. But it is it’s a perfect game, man. Like I I beat it earlier today. I I genuinely think it’s the best game that I’ve ever played in my entire life. Just from the writing and the story and the combat and the music and the visuals and just all of that. Even if you’re not really a turn-based RPG guy, they have introduced enough like active elements like dodging and parrying and things like that that you can’t just like do your turn and then look away and then come back and do whatever you’re doing. like other turn-based games like you have to be locked in every second and it’s just so so so like it’s I think it’s the best game that I’ve ever played. So I’ve been doing that and then sleeping and then I posted a video to my personal Twitter account. I was going to try to be accountable going to the gym and then Expedition 33 happened and I have admittedly fallen off the bandwagon, but my goal is to be at the gym tomorrow at 7:00 a.m. and get right back into that now that I’ve beaten Expedition 33. You remember when you were a kid? For me, we would always go to like Hollywood Video and like rent games and I would get a new game and I would play it over the weekend and then I would be at school on Monday and Tuesday and all I could think about while I was at school was getting home to play that game. Do you remember having this feeling as a kid? Sure. Of course. Yeah. I’ve had that feeling with like two or three games in my adult life and this has been one of them. Wow. So, now that I’ve got that out of the way, still going to continue to play it, do all like the endgame stuff. But, yeah, that’s a goal of mine for this off season to get in shape, stay in shape, stay healthy into next basketball season, all that good stuff. I I want to add one more thing and then I promise we’ll talk about Magic Basketball. I mentioned my surgery and since we had I had like such an outrageous amount of support from the viewers and listeners of this show during that time I just wanted to give an update that actually happened and I don’t I haven’t really told you this Jonathan kind of since the season ended. So last or it’s I guess it’s been two Thursdays ago now. I went to Atlanta which is where I had my surgery to get my six-month follow-up appointment with the surgeon. Um so basically there’s like two parts of heart surgery recovery. one is like the actual surgical procedure like how is everything healing how are my new valves the good news is all that’s great like the surgeon was like as far as I’m concerned I’m done with you so I was like that’s awesome that’s great news we did all the imaging and everything which means like what made me think of it is when you talk about the gym I’ve been in the gym three out of the last 5 days which is I know which is a big deal for me cuz I got cleared by my surgeon to start like going to work you know so that’s amazing I have never heard you step in a gym since I have known I know because because it’s been so hard. It’s been so hard for me physically to do those things. But yeah, I’ve I’m like running on a treadmill, which is huge. I know. It’s a It’s I’ve never seen you run. I know. I It’s It’s It’s been so hard for me for my heart and my lungs to keep up with my body for most of my life. And so, but now that I’ve gotten the green light, Gump with the the braces falling off. Now, now that’s a little far. That’s a little far. Um but yeah, so I wanted to give that update. There’s the other half of heart surgery recovery is rhythm and I still have some rhythm issues like sometimes I have palpitations and all that kind of stuff. They’re not super concerned. They they do think it’ll get better on its own. But from the surgical side, I’m good. I got cleared. I’m in the gym. I’m getting my heart and my lungs back up. You know, actually past where they ever have been, hopefully. So anyway, again, big shout out to everyone who showed love and and support during that. And yeah, hopefully that chapter is nearing an official end maybe with the surgery stuff. I’m a little bit disappointed because I put in the the group chat that we’re still in with you, myself, and Luke a few weeks ago or a week week or so ago and I said, “Hey, let’s let’s get really good at golf and get jacked this summer.” I understand maybe not wanting to get, you know, into the golf stuff, but like you’re working on getting jacked here. I’m still I can’t get jacked. Like I still can’t do heavy like I will never be able to do heavy like full-on lifting like things where you have to you know that kind of thing. When I say get in the gym like I’m mainly cardiac right now like I’m I’m getting on the treadmill doing the bike like all that kind of stuff. I am doing some weights. My biggest thing right now I have to fix my my chest and my core cuz it got all jacked up. You know it got sawed in half and all that kind of stuff. So you know big deal. So I got to I got to get that back to being tight and all that kind of stuff. So I’m working on that. But I’ll I’ll never be swole. I’ll never be jacked, unfortunately. But that’s okay. 30 plus years old, none of us should be lifting heavy, right? Like I I I lift just enough so like it it feels a little bit heavy. I’m not straining or anything crazy. You just don’t want to hurt yourself. We interrupt this episode to bring you a word from our friends over at Jam Hot Chicken. Proudly serving the city beautiful. Jam Hot Chicken is bringing jams, culture, and hot chicken to the heart of Winter Park. Jam Hot Chicken is a Nashville and LA inspired hot chicken shack locally owned and operated in Winter Park, Florida, located at 400 West New England Avenue, Sweet 13 in Hannibal Square. Be sure to follow Jamh Hot Chickicken at Jamh Hotchicken on all social media. Go over to jamhotchickenickfl.com to access their menu, online ordering, and all things JamHot. Now, also available on Uber Eats. So, if you’re at home, don’t want to leave, and you want the hot, delicious goodness of Jam Hot Chicken delivered to your door, download the Uber Eat Eats app, and as long as you’re local, get that delivered again right to your door. Jam hot chicken, uh, just literally some of the best chicken in the world. Every listener that’s been there, they always think we overhype it, read, you know, putting too much into it, whatever the case may be. And every single time they come back and tell us that not only sometimes is it as good as we say, but some people think it’s even better than we say. Um, yeah, if you’re there, the box, the sando, some of mine and Kevin’s favorites, be sure to stop by jamhotchick over there in Winter Park and let them know that your friends over at the sixman show sent you. Yeah. Big shout out to some of our patrons at patreon.com/the6man show. Specifically, Ellis, Teddy, Sylvia, Caleb, Pete. Oh, that’s one one patron. Caleb Pete Gotam Grails and Jamal Miller. Those are five of our Hall of Fame and elite tier patrons again over at patreon.com/the6man show where you can join our mission which is to raise up this Orlando Magic fan community and make it stronger and better and more vibrant every single season. If you believe in what we’re doing, you want to join us or maybe you just appreciate the content that we put out. Maybe that’s maybe that’s your way of saying thank you. You can go to patreon.com/theixmanshow and check out the different tiers that we have available. We also shout out brand new patrons whenever we have them. And so this episode we’re shouting out Cameron Close who has joined us on our Patreon as well. So Cameron, welcome to the family, a bunch of magic maniacs over here and glad you’re with us. But yeah, if you want to join us, if you want to be like Cameron and join in our mission, go to patreon.com/the6man show. And now let’s get back to the episode. All right, that’s enough life updates and old man talk, all that kind of stuff. What an NBA playoffs and wow, there there’s been a lot of exciting stuff, but it’s also just been like kind of shocking some of the things that have happened. Obviously, the one seed Cleveland Cavaliers going down in five games to the Indiana Pacers and this uh Boston New York series right now, New York leads 3 to1. Boston, as we’re recording, is up 15 heading into the fourth, but lost game four and lost Jason Tatum probably for the next year and a half. Really will probably be the next time that we see Jason Tatum on a on a basketball floor tearing his Achilles. What are your thoughts on what’s going on? What are what have been your thoughts about the playoffs? Like, how you feeling? Yeah, shocked is such a great term to use because I mean, think about like this second round has been in like the number like we we didn’t even talk about the Western Conference, right? Like you just everything you just mentioned was the East. Like the West is crazy. The amount of road wins in this second round has been in I’ve never seen anything like it. Like it’s been crazy. Um so that’s been wild. You mentioned the injuries obviously Tatum. Um that that was obviously a huge thing not just for this series but like you said likely next season as well. So that’s all big. Um some of the stuff though isn’t all that surprising and really the first thing that comes to mind for me is the Cleveland Cavaliers. Like it’s been talked about many times on this show. I I’ve shared my opinion on them many times. Just didn’t believe them until they could do it. And once again they couldn’t do it. and in really really disappointing fashion. Like they won one more game in the second round than the Orlando Magic did. So like that which is pretty crazy which is a little bit frustrating cuz there were a lot of people myself included that were like man I wish we had Cleveland in the first round instead of Boston. But obviously you didn’t want to take the risk of like you know the one and done playing game that eight seed game. But um the other thing that I texted this to you like maybe game one or game two of these second round games. I want to taste the second round so badly. It is a totally different experience than the first round in the NBA playoffs. And this year has like confirmed that for me cuz the NBA the first round of the NBA playoffs which we’ve we’ve experienced the last two seasons is it it it’s intense. It’s a different level of intensity than the regular season obviously but it’s not it’s not the same. Like I don’t know what it is. I don’t know how to describe it. Maybe it’s just a different level of desperation in the second round when you can like taste the conference finals when they’re that close. Or maybe it’s just the level of competition is better because, you know, you’re whittling down to the four best teams from each conference. I don’t know what it is, but there’s something in the air in the second round in both conferences, especially this season, that I’m just I’m like an addict, man. I’m like, “Oh, man. I need my Orlando Magic to taste that. I think it’ll be so much fun.” Insanely stressful, but so much fun. And that’s kind of some of the things I’ve been feeling through the second round. Yeah, the Cleveland thing doesn’t surprise me a ton. Like we talked about it last year. Like it just didn’t feel like this is a really just a non-basket kind of, you know, trendy thing to say, but they don’t have like dogs on that team. Like I I look at Donovan Mitchell, I look at Darius Garland, and while those guys are are capable of of having good games and having like big explosive offensive performances, like they when their back is up against the wall, they just don’t really seem to always rise to the occasion. Like Donovan Mitchell last year, was it game six? Like almost had 50 or or had 50 in in that game six. And um but like you’re seeing other games throughout these playoffs where he’s like you know three of 11 from the floor and you know finishing with 11 or 12 points. Like that’s not what you want out of your like star player especially that might happen like in a in a game in a series but especially you know when you’re down you know two to one or three to one in a series like that just that kind kind of stuff can’t happen. and winning 64 games this season for the Cavs. Like they can win like 75 games next year in the regular season and it doesn’t matter until they prove that, you know, they can win a a second round series. So that’s been crazy. Uh the Celtics now up 20 or that as I said that the lead just got cut to 19. Uh 10 minutes 44 seconds left in the fourth. So, probably expecting the Celtics to win that game unless something crazy happens. Derek White’s been going insane. That series probably still going to go the Knicks way. Would be very crazy and that would be legitimately shocking for the Celtics to come back and win that series. But you can’t really talk about this series without talking about Jason Tatum. And then you can’t talk about Jason Tatum without acknowledging the fact that there were already reports that this Boston team is going through an ownership change. They’re going to be going under like a financial crunch this year. You know, they’re a second apron team. They’ve got all these guys making a ton of money. And are they going to be able to keep this team together in a year that, you know, is really going to have a ceiling? is that a first round or a second round exit as talented as that team is without Jason Tatum. And then when you look at what’s happened in these Eastern Conference playoffs, Cavs going down in five Pacers team who for the second straight year have had a lot of injury luck like in their favor. Talk about Dame in the first round. I know there was some Garland and uh Evan Mobley stuff, you know, in the second round. last year, whether it was the 76ers or the Bucks in the first round without Giannis last year, like they’ve had a lot of injury luck, but they’re playing really well. Look like a good team. And then you’ve still got the Knicks, you’ve got the Pistons, like all teams that I think right now we would really like our chances again like going up against even if we’re not whole. No, Jaylen, no Mo. If you’re telling us we have the Knicks or the Pistons or the Pacers in that first round instead of the a healthy Celtics team, I think we all would have liked our chances in that series perhaps getting to the second round and now an off season where this front office has a lot of pressure. I think this adds pressure to that because you look at the Eastern Conference next year and it feels as wide open as ever. So maybe they were do we absolutely have to make a move going into this off season. To me, if we were at 100% yes, we’re at 150% yes now that moves need to be made. Obviously, that’s not where you like your brain to go. As soon as a guy is hurt, you feel bad for him. And honestly, I even feel bad for Celtics fans, even after all the things that we just went through with them, you know, three, four weeks ago, whatever now. But after you get over that, it’s like, well, wait a minute now. Like, we’re probably not seeing Jason Tatum until opening night in 2026. Thoughts, Kev? Well, I think it’s interesting because obviously the Celtics are one thing. The the Bucks are another thing that’s interesting. the whole Giannis thing, like what’s going to happen there? That’s a huge talking point. Um the Cleveland, like yeah, they won 64 games, but they fell apart in the playoffs. Are they going to re-evaluate their team and look to make moves? And if so, do those moves work, or do they do that puts them does that put them, you know, falling backwards a little bit? Um, obviously you mentioned the Pacers. You mentioned injury luck for the Pacers. I that has gone both ways for them two seasons in in a row. Not only have they been playing opponents with injuries, they have had stellar injury luck on their own roster. They have been very healthy for large stretches of the regular season these two years and the postseason, right? But Indiana looks like they’ll still be a threat next season. Uh Detroit obviously they should only be getting better. Um and then New York, we’ll see, you know, how the rest of this series goes. and the the the rest of these playoffs for them. But yeah, the East, it just feels like anything’s possible. Um and and especially for a Magic team that we all feel like doesn’t need a ton of moves, right? This is not like, oh, we got to go crazy and reinvent who we are. And I I think we believe in this identity, the core of this team. Need to make a few moves to make things better. But if that happens, again, this team won 41 games, missing so many dudes for so many games. You improve a couple spots, you have a little better health next season, and it definitely feels like we could be right there in the mix for the Eastern Conference. That leads me to my next point. Now that we’ve had, you know, a weekend change away from the Celtics series and the Magic season as a whole, I know we talked right after like how we felt about the season and I think we both kind of have come to the conclusion that we’re going to look back on this just kind of as a loss season and I think what’s happened in the playoffs is really only reinforcing that for me at least. But any new thoughts, feelings, opinions when you’re looking back on this season? I I feel like we’ve been having the same conversation since December, since January of we could just get healthy, if we could just get healthy. If if we could just get healthy. I think I’m I’m still kind of there. It happened five games into the season and it continued. That was the common thread from the second week of the season all the way until, you know, you lose in five to Boston. I think that series did show us that there are certain guys that probably are not going to be here long term or maybe shouldn’t be here long term or are the more obvious upgrades on this roster, but we’re still coming away from we know Paulo and Fronn like 1A 1B, however you know you want to talk about that, that’s your prerogative. But this se just injuries never gave this team a chance this season. Yeah. I Yes. Obviously I think that is the like most overarching theme of the season for sure and it should be. But I think as I sit here, I still think of the many, many, many, many, many, many opportunities that other guys had to step up in some of those absences. And a lot of times it just didn’t work out. We had we had a great stretch there in December. Obviously, probably most people’s favorite stretch of the season. May maybe, I’m not sure, but the stretch in December where you’re having miraculous wins over Miami and Brooklyn and Boston and and those were great. And those were moments where guys stepped up with major absences on the team. The problem is that was a span of like 10 days, you know, over the course of an entire season. That’s just not going to cut it. We had lots of opportunities for guys to step up and they just didn’t. And so I think that points again to some of the weaknesses in this roster. some that we probably knew going into this season, but there were a lot of things that I think we learned about this team and about the personnel of this team this season. Like I had much higher expectations for a lot of the guys. Uh injuries aside, you know, if you told me preseason, you know, some of these guys are going to go down with injuries, I would have felt okay. Like I would have been like, that’s fine. We’ve got player X. they’re going to step up and fill the void and it’s not going to be great but we’ll be fine. And now looking back from the experience of this season that yeah that just didn’t happen. It didn’t happen often enough. Uh and unfortunately that’s kind of what led us to you know with the injuries being the main reason but beyond that we just didn’t have the personnel to step in and fill some of those uh some of those voids. My favorite stretch of the season was from November 6th to the December 6th. You had three losses in that span. That third loss was Fran’s last game where Fron is injured at Philadelphia, you know, and then he’s out for the, you know, next two plus months. But when Fron was just lighting the world ablaze and the Magic were winning more often than not, like the Magic were 16 and eight going into that Philadelphia game. And you just I can’t help but think like even if you know Paulo still is hurt and you know he comes back and struggles for the first month or so like he did if Fron was able to stay healthy just how different this season could have been for the Magic when you go ahead and you take a look at the standings. And I’ll just say while you’re pulling that up, Allstar FRS, by the way, that’s a guarantee if he’s healthy. Yeah. NBA.com for whatever reason not loading the standings. So, we’re going to go over to ESPN.com. Like, you finished three games back of Detroit, seven games back of Milwaukee. Maybe you don’t finish five, but you at least finish six in the Eastern Conference with that the way that everything broke down. Now, if we’re adding if Jaylen was healthy, if Mo was healthy, like, yeah, this team is finishing as like a top four, top three seed in the Eastern Conference, but it it just wasn’t really our year. And if nothing else, if when I’m in my rocking chair telling my grandkids about Paulo and Fron and well, maybe maybe I don’t even have to tell them cuz maybe they, you know, their early magic days. No, my kids are still too young for that. Maybe maybe my kids will tell my kids, you know, about Paulo and Fron and all that kind of stuff. But if we can look back at this time and say that just had to be that season had to happen because it’s it’s what accelerated the the team and kind of push everything forward. Yeah. When they say, “Grandpa, why am I named Paulo?” You just can explain right then and there, you know, why they are named that. But, uh, yeah, I think I’m glad you talked about the standings because we talked about at the end of the regular season with all of the issues that happened this season for the Magic, they still only finished six games back of the year before, right? The other thing to think about when you talk about the top three in the East, the New York Knicks, now they had their share of injury issues this season as well. So, I’m not going to sit here and say they had the best possible season they could have had, but they only had 51 wins. Magic were only 10 wins off of the three seed with Paulo and Fron and Jaylen and Mo missing an outrageous number of games. And so when I in spite of all the the flaws and shortcomings of this season that we saw, that is still ultimately the biggest silver lining is health. Like if you’re healthy, I definitely think this team wins 10 more games, right? like even though a bunch of other guys on the roster did not have a good season, your core guys, I would have trusted them enough to get you 10 more wins if they were on the floor that I I really believe that. I think this could have been a top three team. Um, and so if anything, that does give a little bit of fuel to the fire going into the offseason, but it should also fuel the fire of, hey, we need to improve the supporting cast around those guys. Yeah. When we start talking about the East being wide open next season and the moves that the Magic can make, I think what is maybe not as equally important as bringing someone else in to help with the offense is we’ve been kind of in this cycle the last man, when did it start? New Year’s Day of 2019. So the last 6 and 1/2 years now. Or was it? No, it was 2020 New Year’s Day, I believe. Yeah. When when Ji first got hurt in Washington. Oh, yeah. So, the last four and a half years now. Is that one, two, three, four? Yeah. Or is it five and a half years? The last five and a half years now, we’ve just been in this endless cycle of one guy or another being out for an extended period of time. Whether it was Ji or Markel Fultz and or Wendell Carter Jr. or Gary Harris or Jaylen Suggs or Paulo or Fron or whatever, at some point you you you h you have to realize that some guys just do spend more time than others on the bench for whatever reason. And as important as it is to bring in someone who’s going to help with the offense, I I do think we need to move on from probably a couple of these pieces that just can’t stay on the floor, right? And you could even throw Jaylen into that. Now, Jaylen has missed a lot of time in his first three seasons. I think what was it, you know, 70 or 75 games that he played in last year. The only thing with me with Jaylen is all of his injuries to this point have been like disconnected. Like rookie year, it was the ankle and then it was the thumb. Uh this year obviously it was the back and then he’s working back from that and then it’s the knee. Now the knee is definitely the most concerning of those especially it being a cartilage type of injury. So that’s something to keep an eye on. But I still think that he is just so obvious when he was out what his impact is to this team and and what he means when he’s playing. And then when we look at Ji or we look at Gary or we look at Wendell like you you can’t continue to roster four or five guys that you know on any given night could get hurt and they’re missing a month or two months. I I I do think that’s an element that I would like to see upgraded because the Magic have been able to make deals for guys that are kind of like reclamation projects. The first was Markel Folultz, right? And I think we got more out of him than a lot of people at the time of the trade. We got more out of him than anybody ever would have guessed. You could argue that like the when Dell kind of being thrown in, you know, the return for Nicolvich, the hope for the Magic were, hey, we can get this guy healthy and kind of max out his potential. I I do feel like you’ve done that to a certain extent. The Michael Williams, you could add same same vein, I would say, as like a reclamation product. Yeah. Project. I mean, Mo Vagner, Reclamation Project, Go Betad, not injury stuff, but guys that were just kind of undervalued around the league. And you have to be able to find those kind of guys. And to the front office credit, like think they’re a little bit different compared to some of the other guys because for the most part, those guys have been healthy. Um, but like Ji made a ton of money this year, but his contract is like dropping off of a cliff heading into the future because of the injury history. Gary Harris is a guy that I don’t think we’ll probably see back. One, because he’s kind of in the twilight, but also the injury history. Like for months this year, it was the hamstring or the calf strain or whatever was going on with him. So that’s another piece to this that I think the Magic need to try to upgrade as well is like just guys being available. I don’t we don’t expect that with Paulo or Fron, but nobody can argue that it has been a common theme with this franchise the last five and a half years. Yeah. Which that’s that feels like such a hard thing to like concretely up upgrade, right? Like durability. like you can basically take bets on guys like who have good injury history but it’s sports you know that’s the hard part about it you know things can happen guys can get hurt and they can be short injuries they can be long injuries and it’s just the way it goes but I think it definitely is a point to stay away from some of the guys that have durability issues like that that is definitely something I would love to see um is us investing in some guys that at least look it’s it’s kind of like the KCP thing Right? Like KCP had the resume, shot the ball well his whole career, blah blah blah. On paper, looks like a great move. Okay, that that’s what I’m asking for. Obviously, you can’t guarantee that someone’s not going to get hurt when they come here. But if we’re going to acquire some guys this summer, let’s acquire guys who have a proven track record of staying on the floor for 65 70 games at least a year every year. And and I say at least like please like that’s got to be the bare minimum. Um, and then yeah, obviously that spills over to the playoffs. Like look at the teams that are in the playoffs right now. It’s a grind. We’re seeing a lot of eightman rotations right now, which again is just part of the playoffs. And so having guys that can withstand that gauntlet uh and play a bunch of minutes through April, May, and maybe eventually into June, I think that’s super important. So, some of the guys that have been floated, you know, names this off season and the Magic may be going after, one that I’ve heard a few times is Malcolm Brogden, you know, point guard. Last few seasons, played 24 games this year. Maybe you can argue how much of that is injury versus situation. Last year with Portland, 39 games. Year before that, 67, 36, 56, 54. Just a guy that every year seems to kind of have some of those nagging injuries. Anthony Simons even this year played 70, but last year 46, the year before that 62, year before that 57, 64, 70. That I’m not super, you know, weary about. You know, a lot of guys, you know, miss 15 to 20 gamesish a year, which is really what we’re trying to get away from. So maybe that’s a little bit of a red flag. And then the other Kobe White 747974616965. The Kobe White one to me is the one that kind of feels like the the long shot and um obviously would love for that to happen. uh but he is expiring at the end of next season and you know you’re gonna have to I think right now just like for comparing apples to apples like Kobe White is going to demand more on the open market than a guy like Anthony Simons at this point. So those are all things that you have to weigh when you’re trying to make moves this off seasonason. Yes, we need to add offense, but we just it it to your point like it’s one of those things to like concretely say like, “Oh, we got better at this.” But if we don’t figure out a way, whether it’s luck or otherwise for that to happen, this team is going to go nowhere. Like, if if you have the same amount of injuries that you did this year, you just don’t have a chance in in competing, right? The good news is when you talk about our core guys, they don’t have a history of this. Well, at the top, at least. Paulo does not have a history of this. Fron has had a couple of small injuries in his magic career, but has not had anything, you know, of any kind of length. You know, um Mo in his time in Orlando, you know, a couple things here and there, but nothing. Jaylen, on the other hand, obviously there have been injury issues that we’ve seen from him. Um so that of those four guys, you know, that’s the one that maybe is an exception. But again, for the two guys at the top, Powell and Fron, there’s no reason to think that this is going to be an issue, a durability issue. Um, and I’m grateful because we have seen teams in the league who their top guy or top guys are not durable. I mean, think about the Sixers, like that’s another story line for the summer. You talk about the Eastern Conference teams, a team that was built to be a contender this year and fell apart and won 20ome games because their their best guy quite literally cannot see the basketball floor right now, which is crazy. like it’s it’s it’s crazy. Um and so I’m grateful that that’s not our situation. Um our guys are reliable and durable at least thus far in their careers and so I’m not worried about them. But yeah, we need to surround them with guys that are also durable and can can be in it for the long haul. Yeah, Jaylen 35 games this year, 75 last year, 53 the year before that, 48 the year before that. So, yeah, need him to stay healthy and we need we whoever’s on the team next year, just we just need them on the floor, please stay healthy. It would it would really go a long way. So, uh yeah, Kev, uh Boston pulling away here in the fourth quarter. Looks like they’re going to I guess not go up, but they’re going to bring the series to what is that going to be now? Three to two. Force game six. Yep. Force game six. And then Minnesota could end it tonight uh at at go in Minnesota against Golden State. So yeah. All right. Uh anything else you got, Kev? Uh I don’t think so. I think um you know, we talked a little bit about some of the the postseason coverage we’ll have, you know, coming up next week. Like I said, we’ve got a guest hopefully on Monday. We got we’re starting our grades after that. Um, we will have a lot of time to talk about um non-draft offseason potential moves, right? We we dab dabbled in it a little bit tonight talking about some guys that the Magic could acquire, but yeah, I mean, once we get to like especially draft night and beyond, our attention is going to go that way. Like I I think, you know, we haven’t even talked about this, Jonathan, on the show, the fact that the Magic have two first round picks going into the draft on June 25th, I want to say, off the top of my head. Um I I definitely think the Magic are going to be one of the leading candidates to make a trade that night. So that’ll be very interesting. Um but then going forward, obviously that just kind of opens the floodgates for what could happen. Um and then obviously going into free agency on July 1st, the Magic don’t well depends on what they do with some of the guys. And we talked about this the last time we were on about some of the deadlines leading into free agency, which I think is June 29th if I’m remembering correctly. some of those team options that we have, depending on what the Magic do with those could determine if they’re even going to be even players in free agency on July 1st, right? If they renounce everybody and don’t bring any of those guys back, they might have a little bit of wiggle room to to play with. Not a lot, though. That’s the thing. That’s the the big story line for this year versus last year. We we’re not going to expect this team to be big players uh in free agency on July 1st and beyond. So, like I said, we’ll have lots of time to talk about that late June, uh, and into July. But, yeah, I’m looking forward to next week and starting to get into the nitty-gritty, reviewing some of the guys from this season, um, and seeing what went right, what went wrong, and maybe how things can be better next year. Looking forward to the off season. Be sure to stay tuned. content is going to continue to come every Monday, every Thursday, and you know, we’re we’re already mapping out as as much as we can uh basically everything through the draft right now. Like we pretty much know what we’re doing each uh each episode here. So stay tuned. Uh let us know if there’s anything reasonable obviously that you’d like us to do or you’d like to hear about. Um all suggestions very very much welcome at this point. But that is going to do it for this one for Kevin Tucker. This has been Jonathan Osborne. You all have been listening to the Sixth Man Show and we will catch you guys next time. See you. Thanks for listening to The Sixth Man Show. Be sure to subscribe on iTunes and Spotify to get new episodes downloaded directly to your phone. If you enjoy the show, please take a minute to give us a five-star rating and a review. It helps out the show a lot. Follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook @ sixmanshow. We’ll catch you guys next time. Go Magic. [Applause] Let’s go back.

We’re back! After a quick break, Jonathan & Kevin are back with the first official episode of the offseason talking the offseason schedule for the show, NBA playoffs, the East being wide open for next season, and more!

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