The Magic didn’t make a splashy offseason move, and that tells you plenty about where this roster sits right now.
With financial constraints hanging over everything, Orlando kept its approach measured and landed on a low-risk swing in Malaki Branham. The 23-year-old, a four-year NBA player out of Ohio State and the 20th pick in the 2022 NBA draft, arrives as a young, still-developing guard with some pedigree but plenty left to prove. He’s now headed into his third new system after spending last season with the Washington Wizards, and the fit is still very much an open question.
Branham’s case starts with upside, not certainty. He has been uneven, and that inconsistency has helped drag down his role over the last two seasons.
He played 75 games with the Spurs in the 2023-24 season, then that number slid to 47 in '24-'25 and 28 with Washington last season. He also didn’t start a game in either of the last two years after logging more than 25 starts in his first two seasons.
Still, there is something there: he’s shown he can knock down threes, even if the sample sizes have been small. That’s why this looks like the kind of move Orlando has to make now - a possible bench help piece if everything clicks, or a player who could end up on a G-League roster or be cut if it doesn’t.
That conservative stance runs through the whole offseason. Orlando is operating as a first-apron restricted team that is flirting with the second apron, and the money simply doesn’t leave room for bold swings.
The Magic aren’t going to cross that line, and they’re not building around big home runs either. Their best signing may have been the reunion with Nikola Vučević, while Jevon Carter and Jonathan Isaac also returned.
Compared with the more aggressive activity elsewhere in the Eastern Conference, Orlando has stayed restrained.
Now the real test begins.
Media day is coming at the end of the month, followed by training camp and preseason, and those are the stages where all the offseason talk gets turned into something real. Sean Sweeney is about to show what this team looks like with him running the bench, and the organization clearly believes he’s the right coach to push this group forward after dismissing Jamal Mosley.
The pressure is on the core, too. This is the point where the Magic have to show they’re more than a team with promise.
Andrew Cherico put it as “a put up or shut up kind of year for this group,” and that feels about right. Franz Wagner turned 25 before the end of August, and Orlando is leaning on a roster that is closer to its prime and more experienced than it used to be.
The challenge is bigger now, though, because the Eastern Conference has only gotten tougher after all the offseason movement around the league.
For the Magic, the next step is no longer theoretical. It’s about to be on the floor.
In Other News...
Franz Wagner May Be The Magic's Biggest Question This Season
The Magic spent the offseason trying to sort out not just their roster, but their hierarchy, with Paolo Banchero and Franz Wagner expected to carry much of the load under a new head coach. Banchero is already viewed as the franchise centerpiece, but Wagner remains just as central to how this group wants to play, especially if Orlando is going to make good on the promise it showed over the past few seasons.
What makes Wagner such a significant question is not talent, which the Magic have never lacked in him, but availability and the ripple effect that comes with it. His injury history has made him a fragile part of the equation, and if he is healthy enough to take on a bigger leadership role, the ceiling for this team changes quickly. If not, Orlando may find itself leaning harder than planned on Banchero while still searching for the kind of steady two-way presence Wagner can provide. [Read more 🡒]