It was a rainy evening in Orlando, Florida last Thursday. Dark, gloomy clouds penetrated the Central Florida skyline just before the 2021 NBA Draft, casting an atmosphere that Orlando Magic fans were used to. It was symbolic in a way. The Magic have seen little success in the Draft this past decade, as missing out on franchise-altering talent has recently become an annual tradition for our front office. Why wouldn’t it rain on draft night? The basketball gods have rained on Orlando for years.
But after every rainstorm, no matter how long it may last, comes a rainbow that will stay for even longer.
But who were we, as Magic fans, to tell ourselves that? We had long been numb to this never-ending thunderstorm with teardrops raining down our face year after year. This year would likely not be any different. Four of the players taken in this year’s NBA Draft had the potential to become superstars and the Magic were picking fifth. One of the better players out of those four was Jalen Suggs, who led his Gonzaga Bulldogs to an undefeated regular season and captivated basketball fans across the nation with an outstanding run in the NCAA Tournament. Magic fans wanted him. Nay, Magic fans would kill to have him. We would have rejoiced at taking any of the top four, of course, but Suggs and his electrifying game had the potential to change the entire culture of Orlando’s now-disinterested fanbase. He would have looked so good in pinstripes, but that was only just a dream. The Toronto Raptors were widely expected to take him with their fourth overall selection. It seemed inevitable, almost as inevitable as the draft robbing Orlando of their luck yet again. We were going to miss out on Suggs by one selection and the Magic would instead have to settle for yet another long, defensive-minded forward with a shooting allergy such as Scottie Barnes or Jonathan Kuminga, as we had done for several years. Or…not.
The Raptors shocked the nation by selecting Barnes fourth overall, and not Suggs! It was a surprise that few saw coming, including the Raptors fans themselves. That was all anyone could talk about for the next few minutes or so. Everyone, except for Magic fans attending the Draft party at Amway Center. Only three words were able to leave our lips:
“We want Suggs!” “We want Suggs!” “We want Suggs!”
Those chants filled the arena after the Raptors drafted Barnes. They were loud, loud enough so that we could barely hear ourselves think. That did not matter. We were thinking the exact same thing: Jalen Suggs, one of the best college basketball players in recent years, could be wearing a Magic jersey next season. He had the potential to turn any team into a winning one, and that team would likely be Orlando. It did not feel real. Draft success was foreign to us and walking away with a player like Jalen Suggs seemed impossible after how poorly most of our drafts went. We did not know what to think, except for one thing: “We want Suggs!”
Soon the clock next to the Magic logo disappeared at the bottom of ESPN’s draft presentation. In its place read the words, “Pick is in.” A decision had been made. Would it be Suggs? Would our dreams of draft day success finally come true? Would we finally have a franchise cornerstone for years to come? We were about to find out. The arena darkened in suspense in hopes that we would no longer see dark days as Magic fans ever again after this pick. We stood up out of our seats as NBA Commissioner Adam Silver walked up to the podium to announce our selection.
“With the fifth pick, in the 2021 NBA Draft,” Silver declared, “the Orlando Magic select… Jalen Suggs from Gonzaga University!”
Before Silver finished saying Suggs’s name, the arena erupted in celebration. We shouted for joy as Suggs put the Magic’s official draft hat on his head. It was a special moment for Magic fans. After years of draft-day failure, the Orlando Magic finally found its next star player.
I did not think Jalen Suggs would wind up Orlando. Almost no one did. I fully expected to write this article about Scottie Barnes. I even bookmarked a page of messy notes I wrote about Barnes’s play style in my notebook, so that I could begin writing about him when I returned home from the Amway Center on Thursday night. But this was a surprise… a pleasant one at that. Jalen Suggs was unanimously considered a top-five player in this year’s NBA Draft. Some experts even regarded him as the second-best prospect behind Cade Cunningham, the consensus number one selection. To have him fall all the way down to fifth was unlikely, and the Magic somehow getting lucky enough to draft him was simply inconceivable. This is the team that drafted Mario Hezonja with their fifth overall pick in 2015, the same pick that they used to take Suggs six years later. But we’re not complaining. In fact, we’ve never been happier. Suggs is an outstanding basketball player, arguably more outstanding than anyone else on this roster. With him leading the way, in his words, “the sky’s the limit” for us.
So who is Jalen Suggs? Well, I am not sure if you need me to tell you. You may recognize him for how he singlehandedly made the state of Minnesota one of basketball’s best during his high school years. Or maybe as the athletic, flashy point guard for Gonzaga’s unstoppable team this past year. Or maybe even as the man who hit one of the greatest shots in basketball history, sending his Bulldogs to the NCAA Championship. However you know him, you at least know about Jalen Suggs. If somehow you don’t, he’ll make sure you do by pummeling your favorite team on a basketball court. He has all the talent necessary to do so.
Suggs naturally possesses many attributes that most players can never attain. He is a gifted athlete with bounce and hustle and is bound to be a frequent star of NBA highlight reels. He uses this athleticism to play tremendous defense, picking apart passing lanes and staying glued to opposing ball handlers no matter how hard they try to get around him. This defensive prowess has earned him comparisons to recent NBA champion Jrue Holiday, as do his outstanding playmaking skills. He knows exactly where to find open teammates and he makes passes that look impossible. But most of all, Jalen Suggs is a winner. The multi-sport athlete (he was also a four-star football recruit as a quarterback coming out of high school) is no stranger to success, as his biggest claim to fame is taking Gonzaga all the way to the NCAA Finals, where they lost to Baylor University. It was their first loss all season. This track record of winning is reassuring to Orlando, a team that has lost many of its games in the past. The only knocks to his game are his streaky shooting and questionable finishing ability, both of which can be improved upon in no time. Either way, the trade-off is worth it. The Magic have needed a guy like Suggs for a while now, and he can make them successful for years.
The selection of Suggs, as exciting as it is, posed a question that many fans have asked themselves: how does this guard fit with Orlando, which is currently a guard-heavy team? The answer is: better than one may think. It is unlikely that Gary Harris or Terrence Ross will be with the Magic long-term and neither will Michael Carter-Williams. That leaves Suggs to compete with Markelle Fultz, Cole Anthony, and RJ Hampton. But is it really a competition? Suggs is able to play both guard positions, so he’s surely going to end up starting at shooting guard in no time. Alongside him, I would choose to start Fultz at point guard and bench Anthony, giving Anthony a chance to provide our bench some much-needed scoring. But you could also start Anthony and bench Fultz, or even bench Suggs until he’s ready to take control of this team. There’s one name missing from that list of guards, but I’m not convinced that’s where he will stay. RJ Hampton claims to have grown to 6’7”, making him a perfect fit as a small forward. The Magic could realistically start him at small forward, a position of need for the Magic as both Otto Porter and James Ennis are almost certain to leave in the offseason. What may seem like a logjam at guard actually fills several holes, if that is what Coach Jamahl Mosley decides to do. But whatever he decides, I am confident that Jalen Suggs will be a focal part of it. As long as Suggs stays in Orlando, the sky really is the limit for what the Magic can accomplish.
As I walked out of the Amway Center following our draft selections, I could not help but notice that the rain outside had stopped. The puddles my brother and I stepped in before entering the building dried up as we left it. It was as if it hadn’t rained at all, despite a storm brewing not too long prior. The sky was clear and the weather was perfect, two things I would not have said two hours before the draft on Thursday. This was not too much of a surprise. Central Florida rain usually comes in goes in arbitrary spurts. But what piqued my interest was when the rain stopped: after the Magic drafted Jalen Suggs. With that selection, it finally stopped raining in Orlando and in its basketball team’s front office. The tears had dried, the gloom disappeared, and calm followed the decade-long storm that always ruined the Magic’s draft day plans. Well, “calm” might not be the right word. I’ve never seen a crowd as rambunctious as we were after Suggs’s name was called. But can you blame us? We were ecstatic! Not just because we drafted a potential star, but because after this long, long rainstorm, we finally got to see a rainbow. Not a literal rainbow, but one that was even brighter: Jalen Suggs. And we will cherish him. We have not seen a rainbow in a long time, but we believe that this one will be seen all throughout the sky for years to come. It’s only fitting, as the sky’s the limit for both Jalen Suggs and the Orlando Magic.
by Luke Scotchie
