Orlando Magic: 3 takeaways from 2021 media day

Orlando Magic media day takeaways: 1. Markelle Fultz will have his say

Point guard Fultz had the most telling line of the day when he said that they were going to “shock a lot of people” when addressing the media. He’s got a point, because Fultz, Anthony, Suggs, Isaac, Hampton, Harris, Carter Jr., Bamba and Chuma Okeke is a nice place to start. A young group that could grow to be really, really good, and who won’t get their recognition until it actually happens they play in a smaller market.

For Fultz personally, though, that statement rings just as true. We have all gotten caught up in the potential of Suggs, while the two inches Hampton grew over the offseason was mentioned as well. If his game took a leap forward as his height did, he could be the real x-factor for the Magic in the near future.

Anthony had a solid rookie season and has a chip on his shoulder that his teammates feed off. All three of these players are guards, and they made it easy to forget about Fultz. A guy who had been the second-best player in a playoff series for the Magic in the past, and who looked comfortable playing with the older core before they were all traded.

But the ACL injury he sustained early last season meant he went away just as Anthony was beginning to assert his personality on the team. Hampton’s arrival at the trade deadline and the stroke of luck to get Suggs then buried Fultz altogether. But make no mistake, he can still be the best player of all four mentioned.

He may not be back in time to start the new season (although watching him shoot at the Magic’s first official practice back together was encouraging), but at some point soon he will be. When that happens he will return as the best passer of the four, with an ability to get everybody to play at his tempo, while also still hopefully being the best penetrator too.

If the Magic are going to shock some people, and even flirting with the play-in tournament would probably constitute that, then a healthy Fultz looking like his old self would be a huge help. In what has been a stop-start career for him, now is the moment where he could lead a young crew to heights they did not yet seem ready for.