For any small-market or rebuilding team like the Orlando Magic, the draft is at the heart of everything they do.
Not every team is the Los Angeles Lakers or Miami Heat where they can camp out and wait for free agents to fall into their laps. Even the Boston Celtics, a big free-agent player, have built the core of their team largely through the draft.
The free-agent piece is the final piece of the puzzle, not the first piece. That was perhaps the backward way the Magic tried to build in 2000 after signing Tracy McGrady and Grant Hill.