By John Denton Sept. 6, 2016
ORLANDO – Forced to relocate his family several states away and familiarize himself with a new NBA organization for the first time in nine years, Orlando Magic head coach Frank Vogel has been through a busy and chaotic offseason.
But that doesn't mean that Vogel's focus has ever strayed very far away from basketball.
“I haven't stopped thinking about it, to be honest,'' Vogel said recently when asked if he's started entertaining thoughts of how he wants his Magic to play this season with various styles and rotations. “I've thought a lot about it. There's a lot of different ways that we can go. We'll go into training camp with a plan and see what it looks like on the court in training camp and the preseason games and then we'll adjust from there with the things that need to be tweaked.''
With the start of his first training camp with the Magic less than three weeks away and players starting to trickle back into Orlando for voluntary workouts, Vogel is ramping up planning these days. He said that there is not a day that goes by that he isn't sketching out plays on napkins, watching film of Orlando's past season or thinking about player groupings and rotations that he wants to use in the season ahead.
Vogel spent the past nine seasons in Indiana – the final 5 1/2 as the head coach of the Pacers. He quickly put his blue-collar, hard-working imprint on those teams, turning the Pacers into perennial playoff powerhouses.
Now, after taking over as Orlando's head coach on May 16, he expects to do the same with a Magic franchise desperate to get back into the postseason for the first time since 2012. The formula for success, Vogel said, is one that he's relied upon throughout his time in the NBA: Team-first offensive play, trust and togetherness on the floor and in the locker room and defense, defense, defense.
“We're going to be a great defensive team and a team that likes to run the floor,'' Vogel said. “And we're going to be a team that plays an exciting brand of offensive basketball. But at the end we're also going to be a team that's going to be really tough to score on.''
Magic GM Rob Hennigan and his staff made sure of that this offseason by dramatically upgrading the team's roster with a flurry of moves. The Magic used every avenue available to them, acquiring talent via trades (Serge Ibaka, Jodie Meeks and C.J. Wilcox), via free agency (Bismack Biyombo, Jeff Green and D.J. Augustin) and via the draft (Stephen Zimmerman). Throw in the re-signing of Evan Fournier and the further maturation of Nikola Vucevic, Aaron Gordon, Mario Hezonja and Elfrid Payton and the Magic figure to have a team that is as deep and versatile as it is talented.
Having three big men in Vucevic, Ibaka and Biyombo and Swiss Army Knife-type of players in Gordon, Green and Hezonja is keeping Vogel up at night because of all the options that he will have with various lineups. Vucevic has worked on extending his already solid shooting range in hopes of playing more power forward alongside of Biyombo and Ibaka, while Gordon and Green can guard three positions in smaller and bigger lineup combinations.
“I love the versatility. I've not had a team that has had this much versatility and that's going to be exciting to play with this season,'' said Vogel, who led the Pacers to five playoff trips. “In a lot of ways, the versatility allows you to stay who you are and stay true to yourself. With all of the players that you have you can counteract the systems that you face – a small-ball team, a bigger team, a slow-it-down team and a speed-it-up team. It doesn't matter to us when you have guys who are as versatile as we are.''
With seven new faces in the locker room and a completely new coaching staff, the Magic will be faced with trying to build chemistry on the fly. Vogel has tried to jump-start that process by talking extensively with each player about their likes and dislikes and the expectations that will be there this season. Also, with players who have spent most of their offseason in Orlando, Vogel has dined with Fournier, Ibaka and Payton.
Vogel said that he's tried to keep his space from the players as they systematically return to the Magic's training headquarters as the Amway Center so as to give them their space as ready for training camp. In time, Vogel said he will do everything in his power to help the Magic come together and be the team that he thinks they can be. Vogel hasn't shied away from the fact that he fully expects Orlando to not only be in the postseason in the spring, but also to “make some noise in the playoffs.''
Like with the rotations, player groupings and style of play, that is something that Vogel has given a great deal of thought to this offseason. And he can't wait to get started molding and shaping his first Magic team.
“Every little bit that you can do now in August and September helps the process,'' Vogel said, referring to the process of building chemistry. “This is (the players') time now and I believe in letting them have that to themselves.
“As they get in here, we'll spend enough time together throughout the year. But we'll talk about building chemistry and togetherness every day throughout training camp and the entire year,'' Vogel continued. “To me, it's a vital ingredient to building a winner and we'll achieve that here.''
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