Notes to Orlando:

The Magic lost a big one last night. We all knew game 4 was going to be pivotal, and after blowing a big halftime lead and losing in OT, I feel Orlando needs some constructive criticism and a pep talk.

• Dwight Howard is limited offensively. He isn't your go-to-guy down the stretch. It's Hedo Turkoglu. Hedo passing up shots Overtime to dish it in to Howard was really uncharacteristic.
  
• Please, next time you have timeouts to burn and can't get the ball in, call the timeout. On a side note, why exactly is Hedo inbounding that ball? Pietrus is only 2 inches shorter and is an afterthought in that situation anyway
  
• Rafer Alston is an extremely confident player. When he gets in a rhythm, you don't, repeat, DON'T take him out. He's also a better defender right now than Jameer Nelson, who's still getting the feel of the game back. Alston should have been in the game down the stretch.
• I understand starting Courtney Lee during the regular season. He was your best player at SG. But now Mickael Pietrus has clearly surpassed him... on both ends of the court. Rather than giving Kobe giant first quarters by putting a rookie on him, start your best defender. (See San Antonio/Bruce Bowen)
• You aren't losing this series because you're less of a team, Orlando, it's because you're inexperienced. Some of the plays that Derek Fisher and Kobe Bryant make, especially on defense, are plays they only make because they're very used to these situations. They've been there before... a lot.
• You also need to cut down on the turnovers...badly. Orlando could have blown the game open in the first half, but didn't have enough possessions to do it. A couple of suggestions I have:

1. Have Hedo Turkoglu bring the ball up more, especially early. When he handles the ball late, turnovers aren't as big of a problem. Alston isn't going to be running a lot of pick-and-rolls anyway, keep him on the perimeter where he's most effective.
   
2. Patrick Ewing, you need to make sure Howard stops bringing the ball down to his waist when he's being hounded inside. The reason he does it is because he's able to get more power that way. But he NEEDS to understand that: a) He is powerful enough that he doesn't need to do that. b) Fisher and Bryant know that he is going to do it and are going to go for the strip EVERY TIME. Watch Pau Gasol in the post. His whole game is above the shoulders. Howard has a lot of improving to do offensively, but he should start there. He's averaging more than 4 turnovers per game in the finals, and is the biggest turnover culprit on the Magic.
3. Play more high-low sets with Howard and Tony Battie. Battie fits the twin towers set better than Marcin Gortat because he has a nice mid-range shot. By putting Battie at the high post, they can take a defender away from Howard, who gets flustered when he gets converged on. They can also bring Rashard Lewis to the high post more often and play high-low, although we haven't seen that at all this series.

I didn't agree when the media didn't give Orlando a chance. I thought Orlando was a much better team than people gave them credit for, since they're a nightmare matchup due to their unique personnel. I still picked L.A. in 6, and I'm sticking to that. Orlando HAS showed up so far. This isn't Cavs-Spurs in '07; this series IS competitive. But the Magic are in a really deep hole and lost a pair of heartbreakers. I'll give the Magic a 5% chance of pulling this one out. I doubt they lose game 5 at home. It's that game 6 in L.A. that will be really tough to get.