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When the Orlando Magic were bounced from the first round of the playoffs last season, they were missing a core member of their roster. Jalen Suggs underwent season-ending arthroscopic knee surgery in March. That limited him to 35 games and forced him to be a spectator as the reigning champion Boston Celtics dispatched his team in five games.
Suggs was ready for the start of the current campaign. However, he is still working on his way back. He has missed time due to knee maintenance, and has yet to play in both halves of a back-to-back.
If this injury is a footnote and no longer limits him, the former fifth overall draft pick isn’t trying to get back to the level he reached before; he is working on an evolution.
“I don’t even think I’m chasing my past self. I’m reaching for who I can be: player and person,” Suggs said after a recent win over the Los Angeles Clippers. “For me it’s about, ‘How do I continue to evolve in this league so that I can continue to be present, continue to improve and continue to help us rise in the rankings to become one of the better teams?’ The fact that I improve myself and who I am is directly related to that.
“So, [I’m] I just try to be better for everyone,” the fifth-year guard said. ‘It will come in time. I know I have more steps to go. I have a higher level to stand on. So just try to take it day by day, stay honest about how I’m feeling – mentally, physically – and just keep growing, to be honest. I’m in a good place now, I’m just trying to trust it again. That’s the biggest part, and everything else will come to me in time.”
Jamahl Mosley shares the key to Jalen Suggs’ evolution
With Suggs indicating he wants to grow his game, sharing that vision helps him stay present. The Magic’s head coach, Jamahl Mosley, spoke to Forbes about what that maturation looks like in a way that elevates Orlando’s offense.
“For him, I really believe it’s just staying present in the moment,” Mosley said prior to a recent tilt against the Celtics at TD Garden. “I think he’s talked a lot about that, just being in the moment, wherever he is in the game. If that’s offense or defense, just stay in the moment and keep communicating with his teammates and stay as present as possible as the game goes on.”
Suggs is producing 13.7 points, 4.8 assists, 3.9 rebounds and 1.7 steals per game in 15 appearances this season. That’s an impressive and important two-way effect when it comes to limited availability.
He’s only 24, making even his play in the present an easy way to acknowledge that there’s plenty of room for growth. To maximize that development and achieve the evolution that Jalen Suggs envisions, it is important, as his head coach noted, that he focuses on the moment and makes the most of the 24 hours ahead of him.
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