Around the League: 2024-25 Season

[CarraT]

I'm happy for Aaron Gordon, what a clutch 3

but damn, did we get shafted in his trade. If only we traded him before he went public with demands for a trade and had more "mystique" since he was younger

Getting Gary Harris & the 25th pick in this draft for him was an awful haul

He asked for a trade, and months passed by as Weltman hoped he forgot about trade request, once he went in public, all the leverage was gone.


Hey, don't remember RJ Hampton
Allegedly he grew up to be 9 foot this summer

We easily won that trade. RJ Hampton won rookie of the month for us!! AG never achieved that for Denver!

[J the Drafter]

I'm happy for Aaron Gordon, what a clutch 3

but damn, did we get shafted in his trade. If only we traded him before he went public with demands for a trade and had more "mystique" since he was younger

Getting Gary Harris & the 25th pick in this draft for him was an awful haul

R.J. Hampton looked intriguing as a speedy guard. We’ll likely never know why his play declined.

[pepe1991]

I'm happy for Aaron Gordon, what a clutch 3

but damn, did we get shafted in his trade. If only we traded him before he went public with demands for a trade and had more "mystique" since he was younger

Getting Gary Harris & the 25th pick in this draft for him was an awful haul

He asked for a trade, and months passed by as Weltman hoped he forgot about trade request, once he went in public, all the leverage was gone.


Hey, don't remember RJ Hampton
Allegedly he grew up to be 9 foot this summer

We easily won that trade. RJ Hampton won rookie of the month for us!! AG never achieved that for Denver!

but don't forget that haul for Evan Fournier trade.

Got $16M in salary pocket where we could add just about any player we wanted or needed. We got nobody as expiration date passed

But Weltman is great at his job.

[Optimus_Steel]

Boston in the 3 rd quarter attempted 20 shots, 19 of them were 3s….i hate this type of play.

[SOUL]

Too many people look at trades with benefit of hindsight.

Basically got a young prospect (24th pick) + future 1st + Gary Harris (one year older guard version of AG at the time) who was kind of in a similar situation as AG - had better years but had recently seemed stunted in growth with role on team. Also AG publicly wanted out and Magic are obsessed with sending players in "good situations" so.

The archetype of that package seems about fair for what AG was at the time. Unfortunately, Gary broke down way quicker than AG, RJ Hampton busted, and the pick is TBD. But I think a lot of us knew that AG in the right situation would be a useful player.

People would be saying same thing about Vuc trade if Franz wasn't so good or was Kuminga.

Kuminga + Jett + WCJ for Vuc suddenly looks way worse lol

[drsd]

Lucky meaning her can attach himself to 2 SuperStars and ride their coattails. lol

Big-shot Bob was the most clutch bench player in NBA league history. EVERY NBA team would be better with a "Horry" on its roster.

If Jabari Smith becomes an elite bench player for a 20 year career, that is not a bad way to spend one's 20s and 30s in life. Not worth the #3 pick, but still a nice career.

[drsd]

Kuminga + Jett + WCJ for Vuc suddenly looks way worse lol

And-1

Look at the Boston trade for example: Evan Fournier for draft picks.
This will be the #57 pick in this draft and the Boston SRP of 2027.

Hard to see how Orlando "won" this trade. This was a pure salary dump. As was Gordon and Vučević. That the Magic got positive assets in F-Wagner, Carter, and Harris is a a side positive. It was never the actual goal.

[pepe1991]

Too many people look at trades with benefit of hindsight.

Basically got a young prospect (24th pick) + future 1st + Gary Harris (one year older guard version of AG at the time) who was kind of in a similar situation as AG - had better years but had recently seemed stunted in growth with role on team. Also AG publicly wanted out and Magic are obsessed with sending players in "good situations" so.

The archetype of that package seems about fair for what AG was at the time. Unfortunately, Gary broke down way quicker than AG, RJ Hampton busted, and the pick is TBD. But I think a lot of us knew that AG in the right situation would be a useful player.

People would be saying same thing about Vuc trade if Franz wasn't so good or was Kuminga.

Kuminga + Jett + WCJ for Vuc suddenly looks way worse lol

I don't really agree.



G. Harris was fried. He was on decline for 3rd year in a row, and for 3rd year in a row he was hurt.

RJ Hampton in moment of trade averaged 2,6 ppg on 49% TS for Nuggets. His value as prospect nosedived after he sucked in NBL. ( 9 ppg, 40% FG, 29% for 3 , 2,4 apg - 1,5 TO ). That's how he went from 5 star recruit to late first round.
So only objective value of a trade was a pick with low protection. Issue? Well... There was that 7 foot serbian guy who's prime would overlap with pick, who in moment of trade is 27-14-8 guy, who's team is coming off 47-25 season where they went to second round without Jamal. oh and that serbian guy is already league's MVP.

Whole thing is typical Weltman BS. it was well reported that Gordon "asked for trade last month", at March 24th, 2021 when he went in public. Meaning Weltman was sitting with trade request on his hands for at least 25 days and did nothing until Gordon went in public.

You really can't tell me he couldn't get more for Gordon but late first round pick, broken player and pick 4 years in advance.

[SOUL]

Magic will end up trading him to some Nesmith + Smart and some mid 20s Celtics pick, because he turned off almsot all potential suitors with his demands and requests. IF he didn't, Magic would do Houston trade - probably week ago

This was your prediction though back then - it's basically the same structure (AGAIN arguing about structure, not outcome) from a guy who had limited suitors.

Nesmith is actualized version of a young prospect working out, RJ Hampton is bad version of it. Boston gave up on him by his second year when he regressed to 39/27 shooter and no place on the Celtics. Marcus Smart, oft-injured role guy (like Gary Harris) who is on the Wizards now, and mid 20s pick (Denver '25 pick).

It's really not different from what you projected. And yes, obviously looking back you would take Nesmith if that was an offer, but at the time, people would be like "eh, Nesmith, Hampton, coin flip on who works out" - just like people were convinced Bouknight over Franz here

[SOUL]

So yeah like again, the haul turned out to be pretty ass, but we're arguing over very minute details unless someone can show me how high they were on Nesmith compared to Hampton, and the careers of Gary and Smart who have turned out to be pretty similar win share guys with GH being better on offense and Smart better on defense.. but also we did NOT want to be good to end that year lol.

[Bensational]

Some nice upsets to start the 2nd round.

[pepe1991]

Magic will end up trading him to some Nesmith + Smart and some mid 20s Celtics pick, because he turned off almsot all potential suitors with his demands and requests. IF he didn't, Magic would do Houston trade - probably week ago

This was your prediction though back then - it's basically the same structure (AGAIN arguing about structure, not outcome) from a guy who had limited suitors.

Nesmith is actualized version of a young prospect working out, RJ Hampton is bad version of it. Boston gave up on him by his second year when he regressed to 39/27 shooter and no place on the Celtics. Marcus Smart, oft-injured role guy (like Gary Harris) who is on the Wizards now, and mid 20s pick (Denver '25 pick).

It's really not different from what you projected. And yes, obviously looking back you would take Nesmith if that was an offer, but at the time, people would be like "eh, Nesmith, Hampton, coin flip on who works out" - just like people were convinced Bouknight over Franz here

So, when i take over as GM?

I remember wanting to trade for one of Murray/ Harris back in 2018 or 2019, especially Murray, but guy from gates was so good that it's not like i had any special vision. I actually really liked Harris for several years, than he just started to age like fresh milk as his health took massive nosedive.

Nesmith thing, i liked him in 2020, ofc he was already taken 1 pick before we could. I always had irrational hate for Smart

[jezzerinho]

Too many people look at trades with benefit of hindsight.

Basically got a young prospect (24th pick) + future 1st + Gary Harris (one year older guard version of AG at the time) who was kind of in a similar situation as AG - had better years but had recently seemed stunted in growth with role on team. Also AG publicly wanted out and Magic are obsessed with sending players in "good situations" so.

The archetype of that package seems about fair for what AG was at the time. Unfortunately, Gary broke down way quicker than AG, RJ Hampton busted, and the pick is TBD. But I think a lot of us knew that AG in the right situation would be a useful player.

People would be saying same thing about Vuc trade if Franz wasn't so good or was Kuminga.

Kuminga + Jett + WCJ for Vuc suddenly looks way worse lol

Soul, if you are seriously defending the AG trade then I'm finally coming down on the side that you DO in fact work for the team!

That was a horrible deal, made so by Weltman's typical procrastination and inability to be a credible trade-maker.

[basketballRob]

Too many people look at trades with benefit of hindsight.

Basically got a young prospect (24th pick) + future 1st + Gary Harris (one year older guard version of AG at the time) who was kind of in a similar situation as AG - had better years but had recently seemed stunted in growth with role on team. Also AG publicly wanted out and Magic are obsessed with sending players in "good situations" so.

The archetype of that package seems about fair for what AG was at the time. Unfortunately, Gary broke down way quicker than AG, RJ Hampton busted, and the pick is TBD. But I think a lot of us knew that AG in the right situation would be a useful player.

People would be saying same thing about Vuc trade if Franz wasn't so good or was Kuminga.

Kuminga + Jett + WCJ for Vuc suddenly looks way worse lol

Soul, if you are seriously defending the AG trade then I'm finally coming down on the side that you DO in fact work for the team!

That was a horrible deal, made so by Weltman's typical procrastination and inability to be a credible trade-maker.

Buddy ball hurt Gordon's value while he was here. They traded them 5 years too late.

Sent from my SM-G998U1 using RealGM mobile app

[basketballRob]

I was wondering if Angel Reese knew some of our players when i saw her at some of our games this season. I guess she knows Wendell. Hailey Van Lith and Angel Reese both play for Chicago.

Read on Twitter

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Sent from my SM-G998U1 using RealGM mobile app

[SOUL]

Soul, if you are seriously defending the AG trade then I'm finally coming down on the side that you DO in fact work for the team!

That was a horrible deal, made so by Weltman's typical procrastination and inability to be a credible trade-maker.

If we're debating WHEN they should've been traded (a year earlier) or the overall value of the haul, then I am 100% on board with the opinion that it's not great based on simple value, black and white view.

As pepe mentioned back then, Boston haul was most likely a combination of vet + Nesmith + late 1st. I think Houston was offering a pair of heavily protected future picks or something. Magic were hell-bent on not sending him to a bad team to "do right" by him too. So that alone leaves like Blazers, Celtics, Nuggets at that time.

Just disagree with the sudden notion of "AG looks so good with Jokic, why didn't we get more?" comments - we would've gotten more at a different time, correct.

BUT at that moment, that was basically the known value and you just hoped the vet/mystery young guy/future 1st would produce an actual valuable young guy and something from the pick (like Nesmith turning his career around). But somehow Gary Harris was the prize for us lol.

[RichCollab]

I'm happy for Aaron Gordon, what a clutch 3

but damn, did we get shafted in his trade. If only we traded him before he went public with demands for a trade and had more "mystique" since he was younger

Getting Gary Harris & the 25th pick in this draft for him was an awful haul

R.J. Hampton looked intriguing as a speedy guard. We’ll likely never know why his play declined.

He is dumber than a box of rocks and was uncoachable.

[SOUL]

To be fair to WeltHam back then though, there was probably some operative to actually attempt to field a team for a year or two before blowing it up. 6 years of tanking that led to nothing from Hennigan and then having a team finally making the playoffs, the realistic operative from most owners/front offices isn't to immediately blow it up and test your luck yet again.

Fans can say this with no blowback because it makes sense to tank for a top pick, but they made playoffs (1'8-19), then had a worse year ('19-20) but still made playoffs, and then blew it up at trade deadline the following year ('20-21). That doesn't seem that egregious to me in terms of a normal timeline, even though I would've preferred it over the summer before the '20-21 season.

Their real inactivity has been recently. I was fine with standing pat with young guys the first two years, but they had to do more last offseason and this trade deadline especially. They say they didn't want rentals but there had to have been some options out there. Don't punt 2nd rounders, make moves around the edges. Put up or shut up this offseason.

[RookieStar]

Lets be real and stop the revisionist history.

AG for a FRP + rookie with potential + expiring vet

Was a good trade. RJ was even my choice before we took Cole. Dude was hyped in high school. Plus the FRP was so far away a lot of us were hopeful DEN would implode by that time.

[Skybox]

Soul, if you are seriously defending the AG trade then I'm finally coming down on the side that you DO in fact work for the team!

That was a horrible deal, made so by Weltman's typical procrastination and inability to be a credible trade-maker.

If we're debating WHEN they should've been traded (a year earlier) or the overall value of the haul, then I am 100% on board with the opinion that it's not great based on simple value, black and white view.

As pepe mentioned back then, Boston haul was most likely a combination of vet + Nesmith + late 1st. I think Houston was offering a pair of heavily protected future picks or something. Magic were hell-bent on not sending him to a bad team to "do right" by him too. So that alone leaves like Blazers, Celtics, Nuggets at that time.

Just disagree with the sudden notion of "AG looks so good with Jokic, why didn't we get more?" comments - we would've gotten more at a different time, correct.

BUT at that moment, that was basically the known value and you just hoped the vet/mystery young guy/future 1st would produce an actual valuable young guy and something from the pick (like Nesmith turning his career around). But somehow Gary Harris was the prize for us lol.

My recollection of the AG trade was that Harris was strictly expiring filler...he was coming off a season-ending injury, making $18m...we got a pick, a prospect, and some cap space...all these years later, Harris is still here

No way was the trade "for Harris"...he got caught in the crossfire. Kudos to DENs GM at the time, for seeing what AG could be with Jokic (and, perhaps, what Harris would be without Jokic). The deal was fine at the time, AG was a borderline bust for ORL, drafted at #4 and waiting and waiting for the breakout season as a primary offensive player that he was never suited to be.