The Return of Paolo Banchero
This past week marked a spectacular moment for the Orlando Magic, as their star forward Paolo Banchero returned after nearly 10 weeks sidelined with a torn oblique. Banchero had a spectacular first game back with 34/7/4, despite the celebration being spoiled by Giannis and the Bucks. Despite his great level of play, the Magic are 1-4 since his return, including a 29-point loss to the Bucks and a 27-point loss to the Celtics. The Magic didn’t record over 100 points in either of these games. Perhaps it was a matter of shaking off the rust and re-establishing team chemistry with a new starting five, but the concern, if this poor stretch of play continues, is that the game plan has reverted to ‘get the ball to Paolo and watch the Magic.’ Paolo’s overuse is what has caused him injury in the past, and with the way they were playing before his return, there is no need to force the offense to run through him every possession.
Sacramento Kings Win 8 of Last 10
Since firing head coach Mike Brown in Week 9, the Sacramento Kings have shown a resilience previously unknown for this group. After a somewhat average start to the season, going 13-18 and looking like another lacklustre campaign, the Kings have had a mid-season resurgence and now sit at 9th place in the West with a 21-20 record, with their star players looking connected in the way the Sacramento front office had hoped since acquiring DeMar DeRozan this offseason to join De’Aaron Fox and Domantas Sabonis.
Impressive wins over the Grizzlies, Celtics, and Rockets have this team believing in themselves. Under new head coach Doug Christie, this is the perfect start. De’Aaron Fox is having a great season, averaging 26/5/6, with Domantas Sabonis averaging 20/14/6, and DeMar DeRozan averaging 21/3/3. Looking beyond their big three, Malik Monk is having a very impressive season, averaging a career high in points, rebounds, and assists: 17/4/5. Meanwhile, Keegan Murray has been solid with 12/7.
This is a good spot for the Kings to be in, considering their past few weeks. Losing a head coach is always a tough situation for a team to bounce back from, but the Kings have done exactly that. If they can keep up this impressive level of play, they could work their way into playoff seeding, especially considering they are only two games removed from 5th place in the West.
Adam Silver ‘Correcting the Issues’ of 3pt Dominance
With 3-point shooting attempts per game at an all-time high, an unprecedented 41.4% of all shots across the entire NBA, Commissioner Adam Silver noted in a recent interview on Colin Cowherd’s program The Herd that the league is considering significant changes to attempt to rectify this issue. Silver suggested that they will review this issue from the perspective of game rules: “As stewards of the game, Joe Dumars leads our competition committee here; we will tweak it, we will correct those issues.” Adam Silver empathised with frustrated fans yet also made the valid point that the NBA is going through a transformation, specifically referencing the style of play adopted by individuals such as Nikola Jokic and Victor Wembenyama, accomplishing offensive production which “big men never did historically.”
Silver addressed a few potential rule changes yet stated that moving the 3-point line is a last resort. This is an extremely difficult task to manage—establishing a rule change that would mitigate the natural progression of the game, yet not so major that it would completely reshape the state of modern basketball. As elaborated upon by Silver, moving the 3-point line is much more than forcing a deeper 3-point attempt: “If you move the 3-point line back, you'll end up just sort of clogging up the area under the basket, and that's not such attractive basketball either.”
Silver is actively relaying to fans that he is aware of their concerns and frustrations, yet it is also important to realise that a rule change will likely have major influences on all facets of the game, regardless of whether the intention is simply to halt the volume of 3-point shots. There is no clear solution, and I believe it will likely remain unresolved, at least until the end of next season. However, it will be extremely interesting to consider possible rule changes that could limit the surge in beyond-the-arc offence.