The Orlando Magic fired head coach Jamahl Mosley on Monday, one day after their season ended in a Game 7 loss to the Pistons. The official line from team president Jeff Weltman: "While this was a difficult decision, we feel it's time for a new voice and fresh perspective."

The unofficial line: you don't blow a 3-1 lead including a 24-point home lead in Game 6 where your team missed 23 straight shots and keep your job.

Meanwhile, up I-95 in Boston, Joe Mazzulla is still employed despite presiding over the Celtics' own 3-1 collapse against the 76ers two days earlier. He started Luka Garza, Baylor Scheierman, and Ron Harper Jr. in Game 7. They combined for zero points the first starting trio to go scoreless in a playoff game since 1970-71. Bill Simmons called him out. Boston sports radio is out for blood. "If Mazzulla isn't fired by midnight, we riot," one local host wrote.

So why did one coach lose his job and the other didn't? And more importantly should the Celtics be looking at Orlando and asking the same question?

Let's break it down.

Two Collapses, Side by Side

The Magic: Up 3-1 on the No. 1 seed Pistons. Lose Game 5 in Detroit (excusable). Lose Game 6 at home after leading by 24 in the second half (catastrophic). Lose Game 7 on the road to close out a third straight first-round exit. Mosley fired the next day.

The Celtics: Up 3-1 on the No. 7 seed 76ers (a Philly team that didn't even have Embiid until Game 4). Lose Game 5 at home. Lose Game 6 in Philly with a clearly compromised Tatum. Lose Game 7 at TD Garden 109-100 the first Celtics team in franchise history to ever blow a 3-1 lead. Mazzulla still has his job.

On the surface, the Celtics' collapse is arguably worse. Boston was the higher seed. They had home court for Game 7. They were facing a team without its best big man for half the series. They had every structural advantage. And they still found a way to lose three straight games to a team that, frankly, had no business beating them.

So why is Mosley unemployed and Mazzulla still drawing a paycheck?

The Case That They're Comparable

Let's start with the angle the user is asking about yes, this should absolutely be compared, and Boston fans have a right to be furious about the inconsistency.

Both coaches had reported tension with their stars. Mosley's relationship with Paolo Banchero was reportedly strained all season. Banchero himself acknowledged "moments of conflict" in March. Mazzulla? Jaylen Brown went on a Twitch stream after Game 7 and accused referees of having an "agenda" against him which says nothing about Mazzulla directly, but the broader vibe in Boston is that Mazzulla's eccentric in-game decisions have worn on the locker room. The starting lineup gambit in Game 7 reportedly blindsided veterans.

Both coaches made tactical decisions that backfired spectacularly. Mosley couldn't generate offense after Detroit started double-teaming Banchero. Mazzulla apparently treated the playoffs like a regular-season experiment Bill Simmons, who voted for Mazzulla as Coach of the Year, said Mazzulla "screwed this series up" by abandoning the deep-rotation, fast-paced identity that had defined Boston's regular season. The Celtics jacked up 323 threes in seven games. They missed every one of their nine fourth-quarter threes in Game 7.

Both coaches were responsible for getting outcoached. Nick Nurse made adjustments. Mazzulla didn't. JB Bickerstaff made adjustments. Mosley didn't. In both series, the lower-seeded team flipped the script, and in both cases, the head coach was a half-step behind.

Both teams had won a championship well, only one of them did, but you get the point. Boston won it all in 2024 under Mazzulla. The bar is different in Boston. A 3-1 collapse against a 7-seed when you've already proven you can win a title is, by some measures, an even bigger indictment.

If we're being consistent and Magic fans certainly are demanding consistency Mazzulla and Mosley should both be looking for work right now.

The Case That They're Not Comparable

Now the other side, because this is more nuanced than the hot takes are letting on.

Mosley had three straight first-round exits. Mazzulla has one championship, one Conference Finals appearance, and one second-round exit in his three previous seasons. That's a fundamentally different track record. Orlando hadn't gotten out of the first round under Mosley. Boston has hung a banner under Mazzulla. Hard to fire that guy after one bad series.

Tatum was injured. This matters more than people want to admit. The Celtics played most of the series with a Jayson Tatum who had been back from a torn Achilles for less than two months. He was visibly compromised in Game 6. He didn't play in Game 7. Mosley lost Franz Wagner to injury too, but Wagner is not Tatum. Tatum is a top-five player in the NBA. Losing him in the middle of a playoff series is a different kind of hole.

The roster math. Orlando shot 27th in the league in three-point percentage this season. Mosley was fired in part because the front office sent out four first-round picks for Desmond Bane and still couldn't get this group to compete. There's a sense that Orlando has hit a ceiling under Mosley and needs a different voice to get the next level out of Banchero, Wagner, and Suggs. Boston's situation is different they had a top-3 offense and a top-5 defense in the regular season. The system worked. The execution failed in seven games.

Boston's front office plays the long game. Brad Stevens is famously deliberate. Wyc Grousbeck was famously deliberate. The Celtics don't make emotional firings. Mosley got pink-slipped within 24 hours of the season ending that's a reactive move from a frustrated front office. Boston has had time to do this and chose not to. That's a meaningful signal.

So Should Boston Pull the Trigger?

Here's where I land: not yet, but the leash just got significantly shorter.

Mazzulla earned a longer rope by winning a title in 2024. You don't fire the guy who lifted Banner 18 after one bad series, even a really bad one. The Tatum injury is real. The fact that Boston was still competitive without him for most of the year is a credit to the coaching staff, not an indictment of it.

But the Game 7 starting lineup decision has to be examined. Starting three guys who had never started a playoff game when you have Sam Hauser, Neemias Queta, Nikola Vucevic, and Payton Pritchard available — is the kind of move you make when you've lost the plot. Mazzulla treating a playoff series like a tinkering exercise, as Simmons put it, is a real concern. The over-reliance on threes (323 attempts in 7 games, missing all nine in the final five minutes of Game 7) is a real concern. The reported disconnect with veterans is a real concern.

If next season starts slow, if Tatum's return is bumpy, if the offense looks lost again Mazzulla won't get the benefit of the doubt twice. Mosley got two playoff first-round exits and a chance to prove things were trending up before the third one cost him his job. That's the math Boston is doing right now.

The Bigger Picture

Coaches get fired in the NBA for two reasons: results and relationships. Mosley lost both. Mazzulla still has the results (a ring, three deep playoff runs, a 56-win season without his best player) and presumably still has the relationships, even if the latter is fraying.

But Magic fans watching from Florida have every right to look at Boston and ask, "What's the difference?" The honest answer is: a 2024 championship and a slightly more patient front office. That's it. The collapses themselves? Eerily similar. The coaching mistakes? Eerily similar.

If Mazzulla doesn't course correct, this comparison is going to come up again. And next time, the answer might be the same on both ends of the East.

For now, Mosley's gone. Mazzulla's not. The basketball gods will have their full reckoning next May.