Inside the Balance the Orlando Magic are Trying to Strike

The Orlando Magic have gone through one week of training camp, and now they are on the precipice of their first preseason game, in which they will face the Memphis Grizzlies on the road. 

The last week has been full of hard work for the Magic under new coach Sean Sweeney and his staff as they adjust to his system and prepare for the long road ahead, which is an 82-game season. To be properly prepared, Sweeney is striking a balance between the physical and mental aspects of the game.

On one hand, the Magic are undergoing highly competitive practices, and their first three days of training camp included two-a-days in which they maximized their time on the basketball court. Beyond the physical element of the game, Orlando is also maximizing the cerebral part.

Sweeney and his staff have placed an emphasis on communication and execution, which require elite mental processing to be achieved. It will be good that the Magic are going into the preseason in game shape, but their mental approach must also be acute for them to win.

On the latest episode of the Full Court Magic Podcast, I described how Sweeney and his team are trying to achieve this balance based on my observations from training camp:

"What is this team actually focusing on during training camp? You know? I touched on it a little bit; it's not just about the physical traits and, you know, playing full-court, heavy-contact basketball in practice. I mean, that's certainly an element of it, but the cerebral nature of the game Sweeney is especially focusing on, when it comes to both sides of the ball, is just an understanding of how to communicate what everybody's assignment is. 

You know, when you talk about Sean Sweeney, you talk about a coach who loves spacing and puts a heavy emphasis on spacing, and he's talked about whoever has the ball is the point guard. Well, if you have the ball and you're the point guard, you and your teammates better know where to be to set up the best action and get the best result in an offensive set. And so, all of that is cerebral, all of that is communication, and I think that the way he's implementing it and the balance that he's trying to strike is incredibly important because the team is being pushed. 

But then they are finding ways to talk and communicate properly. That way, no one gets pushed too hard physically, and they are getting the right reps mentally as well, and you know that is all integral to what this group will need to do to achieve what they want to achieve, because you know there were points last season where, I mean, the Magic looked disjointed, right? Like they would fail to get into certain sets or certain actions; it would lead to just empty offensive possessions. You know, they would try to push the pace sometimes, and it just looked disjointed."