On Thursday, it was announced that the Orlando Magic found their next head coach, former Indiana Pacer coach Frank Vogel, who agreed to a four-year deal reportedly worth $22 million. Following an abrupt departure by Scott Skiles, who resigned just last week, the Magic had an unexpected vacancy to fill and an unusual number of options to fill that spot. While there were a number of qualified and intriguing candidates, Vogel emerged as the clear favorite and now that it is confirmed, the Magic can move forward.
Orlando’s coaching spot has been a source of a lot of material over the past week. Indiana was the main source not long before that. Yes, the offseason frenzy of coaching changes is an endless cycle of speculation and hot takes. In fact, going back just about 18 months you can find turnover in over half of the NBA’s head coaching positions. And right here at The Lottery Mafia, you can read my take on the Pacers situation here, and the Magic situation here.
Some of the positions that have experienced turnover were the products of players undermining coaches, others were coaches that probably should never have been there in the first place and a few changes seemed detrimental to the respective organization, at best. While Orlando’s front office may not have initiated the Skiles departure, they moved quickly and turned an opening into an upgrade.
In the piece from last week that I wrote on the Magic opening and candidates that looked good for it, there were three guys I was okay with seeing in that position: Frank Vogel, David Blatt and Patrick Ewing.
It seems that everyone has cooled on Ewing for the time being, though it would be Christmas everyday if he were to get the job in Memphis. Also, the Blatt equation seems to go unsolved by yet another team with an opportunity. Blatt may be headed back to a lucrative deal in Europe or he could have to “settle” for an associate position for a team like the Warriors. His options seem pretty great, no matter where he goes.
That leaves us with Vogel. Orlando, sing to the heavens. Fling wide your arms, Magic fans, and fill your hearts with warmth and joy. Without having to lift a finger, Orlando’s front office freed themselves from the shackles of Skiles and his hard-nosed approach that held more bark than bite in 2015-16. It gets better, as the Magic jumped to the front of the queue for Vogel.
Now, with Vogel secured, Orlando are primed to take another step forward in 2016-17. How will Vogel help the Magic? There are a couple particular ways that he might do this – a winning mentality that is backed by a proven track record and defense.
For all the words about the Skiles effect on defense, there are really only a few ways to view what actually happened in 2015-16. The Magic weren’t anything to talk about on the defensive end of the floor last year, which flies in direct opposition to everything we have established about Skiles and defense – a lot of talk. Maybe Orlando is fundamentally broken and Nikola Vucevic is a complete sieve when he’s on the court and Skiles made this defense about as good as they will ever be without adding more wing defenders and a defensive cog in the paint. Perhaps, Skiles really hasn’t had particularly good defensive schemes or communicated effectively to his players, instead benefiting from having rosters with players named Andrew Bogut or Ben Wallace anchoring his teams. But it could always be possible that Skiles was just never the right coach for this iteration of the Magic and that is why he stepped down of his own accord.
For Vogel, the last two years in Indiana were a journey. After priming themselves as the primary contender to the Heat it all fell apart. Lance Stephenson went Lance crazy, Roy Hibbert cratered and became a shell of the rim protector his former self had been and the ugly Paul George leg break at Team USA happened. In spite of this, the Pacers still pushed it on the defensive end of the floor under Vogel’s watch. Like noted in our previous piece on Vogel and the Pacers, dating back to 2011, the Pacers were never outside the top 10 in defensive rating and opponent points per game. Including last year when the team was under .500 and without their best player for almost the entire year.
Comparing the season that both teams had last year? The Magic were in the bottom half of the league, barely, in defensive rating at 106.8 which was 0.4 points above the league average. In fairness, that was better than what they did the previous season which was split among a couple of different coaches, but still below average. Meanwhile, Indiana was 3.4 points below the league average defensive rating at 102.9. It might take some time, but it might not. Vogel likely has the acumen to help the Magic improve on the defensive end, even if they don’t perform quite to the levels that become customary for the Pacers.
Among the other things that Vogel offers, a controversial perspective is that he brings a winning mentality. This is hard to ascertain when comparing it to empirical data, which isn’t a thing when attempting to quantify effort and getting the absolute best you can out of any given roster. However, that is exactly what Vogel has done. The biggest question that came out of the surprise separation of Vogel and the Pacers was, what more did this roster have to offer? The Pacers lost David West and sported a lineup that featured players like Jordan Hill and Ian Mahinmi regularly. They were so pressed, that they went out and signed Ty Lawson toward the end of the season. On the laurels of great defense, the Pacers made up for being 25th in offensive rating last year, pushed into the seventh-seed in the Eastern Conference and forced a Game 7 against the Toronto Raptors.
You can make an argument against the Raptors playoff performance history, but you can also point to their Game 7 victory against the Pacers or in the next round against the Miami Heat and acknowledge you are talking about a second-seeded Toronto team that made it all the way to the conference finals against the Cleveland Cavaliers. All Indiana did was push this Raptors team the maximum seven games.
Vogel wasn’t perfect in the playoffs, there was definitely an opportunity for Indiana to steal the series, but even Gregg Popovich, the greatest active coach and one of the best to ever do it, made some suspect decisions in these playoffs. Now that the Pacers are behind him, it is time for Vogel to try to produce the same results for the Magic.
Orlando has a solid roster with plenty of upside and they have at least one more lottery pick headed their way next month to add to what they have already amassed. Players like Aaron Gordon, Mario Hezonja and Elfrid Payton could go either way right now. Either Vogel is going to help them thrive or determine they aren’t part of the Magic future. Gordon seems poised to be a long-term piece and Hezonja desperately needs more time on the court. His stance on Payton will be the most curious development. Skiles was low on Payton and that was assumed to be part of the ultimate separation between former coach and team. Reason would suggest that in determining Vogel was the coach the Magic wanted to lead this forward, the Payton topic would have been broached and Vogel must have said something more agreeable than the Skiles stance. Unless Orlando was determined to get the coach they wanted and compromise on-court personnel if necessary.
While the coaching addition was a major key for the Magic moving forward, they will have to see what happens elsewhere on the staff. The only potential downside to the Vogel hiring is going to be the status of associate coach Adrian Griffin who also interviewed for the head coach’s seat. Will Griffin elect to stay with the team after the failed pursuit for the top spot or will he elect to move on to other opportunities as he seeks to become an NBA head coach in the near future. The high rate of turnover around the league has the status of coaches in flux. There have been more available positions recently than in a very long time. It’s as if the change in style of play around the league and the way in which the game has become modernized has also caused a lot of teams to reconsider who they want in charge of the direction their franchise heads.
Those league-wide changes also point to another aspect of this deal that is remarkable – the money. David Aldridge was the first with the numbers which are reported at four years and $22 million. As the tweet also states, that is the same contract that Terry Stotts just signed with the Portland Trail Blazers. For perspective, Vogel and Stotts are both viewed as very good coaches. Another coach who may or may not be on the same level is Scott Brooks. Brooks just got five years and $35 million from the Washington Wizards. Similarly, the Timberwolves also got their man, but it cost them five years and they had to throw in President of Basketball Operations in addition to being head coach for Tom Thibodeau. Unfortunately, Dave Joerger is reportedly getting four years and $16 million in Sacramento. He should probably get double that as combat pay. That said, I think we’ve painted a pretty good picture of the salary landscape right now. A good coach got less to go to a worse situation, but others also got much more in terms of money and team control to go to similar or less attractive situations.
The Magic got dumped by Skiles and their rebound was a better coach on a reasonable deal without having to give up any front office control or overextend themselves on the length of the deal.
Vogel will improve the defense. The Magic will win more games next year than last year. But how far they can go might depend not just on the team adopting Vogel’s mentality or buying in to defense, it might just be about Vogel improving both the Magic and his own coaching on the offensive side of the ball. The numbers weren’t good and the Pacers rosters wasn’t good for offensive production last year, but some of that has to fall on the coach, not just the players. If Vogel can unlock the potential in Victor Oladipo, Hezonja and Gordon, the rise of the Magic could be rapid, starting in 2016.
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
