The Orlando Magic are about to do what NBA teams do when expectations collide with reality: They’re about to blame the coach for all of the team’s shortcomings.
And when that happens, Jamahl Mosley — a good coach and an even better man — will be the fall guy for a team that is embarrassing itself on a national scale and getting exposed in the league standings.
Let’s not sugarcoat this.
You don’t lose Sunday by a franchise-worst 52 points to the Toronto Raptors — a team you were supposed to be miles better than — because of bad play-calling.
You don’t lose Wednesday by 29 points at home to the Atlanta Hawks in another monumental game with playoff implications because the coach didn’t draw up the right out-of-bounds play.
When you lose by 52, that’s not strategy.
That’s pride.
That’s professionalism.
That’s passion.
And right now, the Orlando Magic have none of the above.
And the fans know it.
Wednesday night at Kia Center, as the Hawks were running the Magic out of their own building, the boo birds came out. Then came some chants calling for Mosley to be fired as the game slipped into humiliation territory.
Think about that for a second.
This team gets blown out by 52 on Sunday, comes home for another huge game, falls behind big again, and the response is to fire the coach.
That tells you everything about this process works.
Because when a team underachieves, the coach is always the easiest target.
Mosley knows what he signed up for, and even says the fans should have booed him and the team Wednesday night.
“Rightfully so,” Mosley said of the fans being disgruntled with him. “Did we put out the effort we needed to? Did we have the energy that we needed to? Nope. The fans deserve a better product on a night like this. They deserve to see us play harder. … You put on that, you need to play hard from the beginning of the game to the end of the game.”
But let’s be very clear about something: When you lose by 52 points, that’s more than X’s and O’s. When you follow that up by getting blown out at home in a must-win game, that’s not about rotations or halftime adjustments.
That’s about players.
That’s about effort.
That’s about whether the guys in uniform are competing like NBA players.
This isn’t so much about Mosley’s X’s and O’s as it is about the Magic’s E’s and T’s — effort and toughness.
With their playoff lives on the line, the Magic had two golden opportunities in the past three games to make up ground on teams directly ahead of them in the standings. Instead, they got humiliated by Toronto and then run out of their own building by Atlanta, who had 102 points after three quarters Wednesday night.
Where’s the fight?
Where’s the anger?
Where’s the leadership?
Where is the moment when somebody — anybody — steps up and says, “Enough! This is embarrassing. This is not who we are.”
Because what we saw this week wasn’t just losing.
It was quitting.
And that’s not on the coach.
That’s on the players.
Now, to be fair, this season has been a mess from a health standpoint. The Magic’s three core players — Paolo Banchero, Franz Wagner and Jalen Suggs — have barely played together. Until Wagner returned Wednesday after missing 22 consecutive games and 47 of the last 51, that trio had played just 13 games together all season and 19 games together over the past two seasons.
Try building chemistry. Try building continuity. Try building anything when the nucleus of your team never see the floor together.
Meanwhile, two of the Magic’s best bench players — Anthony Black and Jonathan Isaac — have been out for weeks. And Moe Wagner, once the emotional engine of the second unit, hasn’t been the same since his ACL injury and has been virtually unplayable.
But fans don’t want to hear about injuries.
Fans don’t want context.
Fans want someone fired.
And Mosley knew coming into this season that the heat was coming. That’s the nature of the NBA. Every coach is on the hot seat — every single year — unless your name is Erik Spoelstra or Steve Kerr.
Just ask some of the most recent examples:
Just ask Michael Malone, who won a championship in Denver and was out of a job less than two years later.
Ask Tom Thibodeau, who took the Knicks to heights they hadn’t seen in decades and still got fired last season.
Ask Mike Budenholzer, who delivered Milwaukee its first title in 50 years and was shown the door two years later.
That’s the job.
When expectations rise, patience disappears. And the Magic raised expectations the moment they paid Paolo Banchero, Franz Wagner and Jalen Suggs and traded four first-round picks for Desmond Bane. Those are not “be patient” moves. Those are “win now” moves.
When you make win-now moves and you don’t win now, someone takes the fall.
Spoiler alert: It won’t be the guys making $30 million–$50 million a year.
It’ll be the coach.
But here’s the uncomfortable truth nobody wants to say out loud:
If the Magic flame out, it won’t be because Jamahl Mosley can’t coach.
It’ll be because this roster — the one everybody hyped, the one everybody said was ready to contend — might not be as good as we thought. And even more damning, it might not be as tough as we thought.
Remember when this team was one of the nastiest defensive units in the league? When they defended, rebounded and competed like every possession mattered?
That team is gone.
This team is inconsistent, sloppy and soft.
Yes, soft.
The Magic are softer than the room-service pancakes they order when they’re staying at the Ritz.
Hell, the way this team is playing, they should be booked into the Red Roof Inn during road trips.
What happened? What happened to the Magic’s toughness? Tough teams don’t lose by 52. They don’t follow it up by getting blasted at home in a must-win game. They don’t allow 102 points through three quarters with their season on the line.
That’s not a scheme problem.
That’s a heart problem.
And if we’re being honest, firing Mosley with six games left — or firing him after the season — won’t fix that. It won’t suddenly make the roster tougher. It won’t suddenly make players dive on the floor, rotate harder, box out, communicate and play with urgency.
Coaches can draw up plays for players.
They cannot instill pride in players.
If the Magic end up firing Mosley, it won’t be because he is a bad coach.
It will be to cover up for a disappointing team.
Email me at mbianchi@orlandosentinel.com. Hit me up on social media @BianchiWrites and listen to my new radio show “Game On” every weekday from 3 to 6 p.m. on FM 96.9, AM 740 and 969TheGame.com/listen