From ESPN insider....
Quote:
Rashard Lewis is a natural small forward, but has started at power forward since his arrival in Orlando. Magic head coach Stan Van Gundy told the Orlando Sentinel on Friday that he's considering moving Lewis back to small forward.
"That's where I'm unsettled right now," Van Gundy said. "I don't really know where we're going with that. Part of it is not just a starting lineup thing; it's what you think your second unit and your rotation looks like. That's something we've got to figure out.
"I think what we'll do is we'll experiment with that both in practice and over the eight preseason games, looking at different lineups and different combination's and then come to some sort of decision to start the season. But I think that one could be an ongoing thing, say, through the first half of the season, really trying to look at some different things and figure out sort of where we want to settle in for the long run."
If Lewis starts at small forward, either Ryan Anderson or Brandon Bass would start at power forward.
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What do you think? Would the Magic benefit from a more traditional lineup?
Rashard's post game was very good in Seattle vs other small forwards who can't deal with his length and Bass could provide better defense vs opposing PF. Or if they wanted to keep 4 shooters around Howard, they could play Anderson and still have the effects of Shard's post game vs opposing 3s as well as the shooters giving Dwight room to operate as well as Dwight creating open shots for them.
Another possible option, IMO is starting Carter at SF, which he played a lot of in Toronto to get Redick on the court at the same time. I really think Carter should be put in more of a Turkoglu role instead of being primarily a shooter. Carter is a very good passer for a swingman, actually I think he's a better passer than Nelson and being a 6'6"-6'7" playmaker helps a team.
Or, if Carter is still at the SG position, post him up more, he always seems to have success in the post. However they use Carter it should be different than last season when he wasn't as effective as he could've been, part of that falls on Carter's shoulders, but it should be clear to SVG that Carter isn't going to be a 1st option for them. The first option has to be Dwight. 10-12 FGA isn't going to cut it anymore, even with his 10-11 FTA. Howard should at the least be getting 13-15 FGA per game. I know atleast here I can say this instead of the NBA forum, but you all know that Dwight has more offensive skills than he's given credit for. Let him use them consistently, go to him a lot and let him establish a rhythm each and every game. Dwight has to do his job by avoiding dumb fouls and being patient while being aggressive at the same time. But it's not hard to imagine Dwight becoming a 23/15/4 type player if he puts it all together. I mean he had a 21/14/3 regular season and a 20/15/3 playoff run at 23 and we know that he can get better.
Either way, the Magic will have plenty of talent on their bench. They're 2 or 3 deep at every position. Nelson/Duhon/Williams at PG, Carter/Redick at SG, Pietrus/Richardson and possibly Lewis at SF, LewisBass/Anderson at PF and Howard/Gortat at C.
Everyone has forgotten about Orlando, which also makes them dangerous. They still have a ridiculous amount of talent and depth and the scary thing is that Howard, Carter and Lewis all could've played much better last season.
Rashard Lewis may start at SF
