Franz Wagner feeling himself against the Lakers? A dangerous development for all Magic foes

What stands out, in context, is the confidence.

Down two, 18.9 seconds left, under the bright lights in L.A. Anthony Davis, a 79.5% career free-throw shooter who’d canned 10 of his first 11 at the stripe through the first 47 minutes of Magic-Lakers, bricks a pair to give Orlando a chance to tie — or, perhaps, if you’re feeling yourself on the road, to go for the win.

And these days? Brother, Franz Wagner is feeling himself.

Wagner calls guard Jalen Suggs up for the ball screen, getting Davis to give up the switch and allowing him to go one-on-one against Cam Reddish — still a big, long-limbed, athletic defender, but not nearly on the level of AD, and also, crucially, a couple of inches shorter than Franz himself. Rhythm dribble, tween-tween, straight to the stepback — no hesitation, no second-guessing, and no doubt.

He cashes out. Magic lead. And, one stop later: Magic win.

Wagner made 41 stepback 3-pointers in his first 231 games across three NBA seasons, shooting 33.1% on those high-wire-act, long-range looks. When Wagner dotted Reddish’s eye on Thursday, it was his 10th in 23 tries (43.5%) across 17 games this season — the most consequential and loudest, and one that highlights the hurdle that he’s had to leap.

The German forward entered the summer with a bitter taste in his mouth. On one hand, he’d put together his strongest season as a pro, averaging 19.7 points, 5.3 rebounds and 3.7 assists per game for a pleasant-surprise Magic team that won 47 games and made the playoffs for the first time in four years. On the other, he’d ended the campaign with a whimper, capping a season-long shooting slump — just 28.1% from 3-point land, the worst long-distance mark among 181 players who launched at least 200 long balls — by going 1-for-15 from the field and 0-for-5 from deep in Game 7 of Orlando’s opening-round loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers.

The downward spiral from distance continued at the 2024 Paris Olympics. While Wagner played a starring role for his country, averaging a team-high 18.5 points per game and helping lead Germany to the semifinals and ultimately a fourth-place finish, he made just seven of his 35 attempts from the shorter FIBA 3-point arc. The consistent inconsistency left the status of his janky jumper — one that had gone in at about a league-average clip through his rookie and sophomore seasons — looming as one of the biggest questions for a Magic team in desperate need of more shot-making and offensive firepower.

That need became even more desperate on Halloween, when Wagner’s All-Star frontcourt partner Paolo Banchero, fresh off a breakout 50-point performance, was diagnosed with a torn oblique that would put him on the shelf for the foreseeable future. Suddenly, doubt was a luxury Orlando could not afford; for the Magic to stay afloat without their leader in points, assists, touches and time of possession, Wagner would have to trust in the hours of work he’d put in over the summer to make his weakness into a strength, and step forward into the spotlight that his patient, poised, effective-but-minor-key game doesn’t always receive.

Well, judging by the 37 points he just hung on the Lakers — Wagner’s fourth 30-plus-point explosion of the season, after rolling up 11 through his first three seasons — to go with 11 rebounds, six assists and four steals? So far, so good:

The Magic have now won seven of their last eight, with the best point differential in the NBA over that span. (A friendly schedule has helped: Orlando swept a five-game homestand featuring visits from the injury-ravaged Pelicans and 76ers, the disappointing Pacers and the basement-dwelling Wizards, before going on the road to take down a Suns team missing Kevin Durant, Bradley Beal and Jusuf Nurkić.) As has been the case ever since Jamahl Mosley took the reins in Central Florida, Orlando’s defense leads the way, smothering opponents to the tune of a league-low 102.2 points per 100 non-garbage-time possessions during this stretch.

But Mosley’s club has also featured a near-top-10 offense, despite missing Banchero, and despite four of the six Orlando players logging at least 25 minutes a night over the past couple of weeks — Suggs, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, Anthony Black and rookie Tristan da Silva — combining to shoot a grisly 39-for-146 (26.7%) from deep.

Wagner has been the beating heart of that offense, averaging 28.1 points, 6.0 rebounds and 6.9 assists in 35.4 minutes a night over the last eight games, posting a .587 true shooting percentage (which factors in 2-point, 3-point and free-throw accuracy) while finishing more than 31% of Orlando’s offensive possessions with a shot attempt, foul drawn or turnover.

That is a superstar-level combination of usage, efficiency and production, arrived at only by stacking possession after possession of hard drives to the paint, pristine footwork and expert leveraging of angles, soft-touch floaters and on-target passes in teammates’ shooting pockets … and, as he showed by drilling four triples in 10 tries on Thursday, the confidence to keep firing.

“A lot of stuff is mental, too, for us players,” Wagner told reporters after Thursday’s win. “For me to get over the hump a little bit over the summer and carry that into the season means a lot. I’ve come a long way since I came into the league, [but] last year was at times a struggle for me. Progress is never just linear; you just gotta stay level-headed.”

While Wagner himself needs to stay on an even keel, the results he’s producing can lead your mind to wander — and to wonder just how good he and the Magic can be.

All told, Wagner is averaging 23.2 points, 5.6 rebounds and 5.4 assists in 31.9 minutes per game for the season, back up to 35% from long range on a career-high 6.1 attempts per game. He’s one of 13 players averaging at least 23-5-5 this season — a list that includes four MVPs (Nikola Jokić, Giannis Antetokounmpo, LeBron James, Stephen Curry), four All-NBA selections (Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Jayson Tatum, Luka Dončić, De’Aaron Fox) and two All-Stars (teammate Banchero, Brandon Ingram).

He pairs that impressive box-score production with a sterling advanced statistical résumé: third in the NBA in wins above replacement according to Neil Paine’s Estimated RAPTOR, fifth in The BBall Index’s LEBRON metric, ninth in value over replacement player, 15th in box plus-minus, 18th in player efficiency rating, and 24th in win shares per 48 minutes.

It all points toward the 23-year-old performing like one of the 15 or 20 best players in the NBA thus far this season. Combine that with the role he’s played in keeping the Magic above .500 without Banchero, and thus above the fray in what looks like a truly haunted Eastern Conference, and you’ve got an awfully impressive start to an All-Star case — a gifted player bouncing back from a brush with failure, putting it all together, and putting his team in position to reap the benefits.

This time last year, Wagner told Jake Fischer that “the worst thing would be to look back and think I didn’t get the most out of myself.” If he keeps this up, he won’t have to worry much about that. Defenses, on the other hand? They’re going to have a lot to fret over; just ask Cam Reddish, JJ Redick and every other Laker who got an up-close look at how dangerous a confident Wagner can be.