Magic do NOT extend a Qualifying Offer to Mo Bamba

[The Effect]

Waste of an asset. They clearly never planned to keep him past this season so they should have moved him for something in return and at a much earlier juncture.

I’m expecting to see him end up in Phoenix, Dallas and maybe even GSW or Brooklyn.

man, him in dallas would be nice

Luka, Dinwiddie, wood, bamba, finney, hardaway jr

That team could be great, and if Jaden Hardy lives up to his 2021 potential, that could be a serious contender for a while

[Bensational]

Waste of an asset. They clearly never planned to keep him past this season so they should have moved him for something in return and at a much earlier juncture.

I’m expecting to see him end up in Phoenix, Dallas and maybe even GSW or Brooklyn.

man, him in dallas would be nice

Luka, Dinwiddie, wood, bamba, finney, hardaway jr

That team could be great, and if Jaden Hardy lives up to his 2021 potential, that could be a serious contender for a while

I’m wondering how Dallas plan to keep Luka past his next contract. They aren’t doing anything to get him much legit help and now they’re losing Brunson. They’re kinda desperately hoping someone like Bamba or Hardy can surprisingly blow up and become diamond in the rough stars because they don’t have many other options for adding talent.

[fendilim]

Good luck to Mo!

He is also possibly looking for a multi-year deal which we arent willing to pay.

[basketballRob]

The Clippers have two TPEs, one for $9.8M and one for $8.5M. Maybe we're going to work out a sign and trade for Hartenstein.

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[richi_v25]

M. Wagner isn't a backup center. He's a end of the bench player.

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He's also the brother to our brightest player who has come out and said the transition has been much easier thanks to having Mo on the team and if that's all he's good for I'm more than fine with that. Still more than Bamba ever brought, yeah he might blow up somewhere else but it wasn't happening here.

[Magic_Kingdom]

All the physical tools, just not the motor to make the most of it. Hope he finds that elsewhere. Has to be considered a big swing and miss with the #6

Plenty of other top 6 pick busts since 2017:
Josh Jackson
Marvin Bagley
Jarrett Culver

And expand to top 10:
Frant Ntilikina
Dennis Smith Jr.
Kevin Knox
Cam Reddish
Killian Hayes
Jalen Smith

Seems pretty common now for a few top guys to flame out within a couple years. Bamba seemed like an obvious miss from the night of the draft, though.

We still have the #1 pick from 2017, the #6 pick from 2017, the #7 pick from 2018, the #5 pick from 2021, the #8 pick from 2021, and the #1 pick from 2022 on our roster. Not bad.

Top 6 picks bust from time to time, but WeltHam blew 2 straight top-6 picks. That's pretty special.

[SOUL]

Top 6 picks bust from time to time, but WeltHam blew 2 straight top-6 picks. That's pretty special.

Mo can be a serviceable player and isn't far away from one. A lot of teams want him for their backup C. We had the weirdest circumstances happen with Vuc and then Bamba showed some stuff last year but was a bit too late with the timetable of this second rebuild.

Isaac is an "injury bust" but not a talent bust. Legit game changer but can't stay on the floor.

[Ducklett]

Top 6 picks bust from time to time, but WeltHam blew 2 straight top-6 picks. That's pretty special.

Mo can be a serviceable player and isn't far away from one. A lot of teams want him for their backup C. We had the weirdest circumstances happen with Vuc and then Bamba showed some stuff last year but was a bit too late with the timetable of this second rebuild.

Isaac is an "injury bust" but not a talent bust. Legit game changer but can't stay on the floor.

Seems silly that it is too late in the rebuild as we are looking down the barrel of another 20 win season gun.

[SOUL]

And expand to top 10:
Frant Ntilikina
Dennis Smith Jr.
Kevin Knox
Cam Reddish
Killian Hayes
Jalen Smith

Might be a bit early for Jalen there. Looked really solid in Indiana. A bust for the Suns for sure though.

Hayes might be able to carve a decent career as a bench guard or late blooming guard but so far he hasn't improved the way Detroit has wanted him to.

Reddish is still interesting but not sure that he can pull it together.. the rest I've lost hope for as anything but bench guys or specialists in Frank's case.

[OrlandoMagic]

It’s funny seeing people say Bamba was a waste of a pick. When in reality only a small percentage of players drafted each year really carve out a niche in the NBA. There have been plenty of top 5 picks that haven’t turned out good as well. It’s nothing new.

Now should we have handled that pick differently? It’s hard to say, did he fill a position/roll that we needed at that time? Answer is yes he did, he just didn’t work out like we thought.

Now looking back it’s easier to say we should have drafted this guy, or we should have traded down and all that. But if I recall correctly Bamba was one if not the leading BPA when we picked? So at the time it more than likely was the correct call. How we develop players is a different story though.

[Skybox]

All the physical tools, just not the motor to make the most of it. Hope he finds that elsewhere. Has to be considered a big swing and miss with the #6

Plenty of other top 6 pick busts since 2017:
Josh Jackson
Marvin Bagley
Jarrett Culver

And expand to top 10:
Frant Ntilikina
Dennis Smith Jr.
Kevin Knox
Cam Reddish
Killian Hayes
Jalen Smith

Seems pretty common now for a few top guys to flame out within a couple years. Bamba seemed like an obvious miss from the night of the draft, though.

We still have the #1 pick from 2017, the #6 pick from 2017, the #7 pick from 2018, the #5 pick from 2021, the #8 pick from 2021, and the #1 pick from 2022 on our roster. Not bad.

Top 6 picks bust from time to time, but WeltHam blew 2 straight top-6 picks. That's pretty special.

Isaac's a "blown pick" because he's injured?

this first taste of free agency has got to be the worst thread yet...btw, I had Bridges, so...

[Knightro]

M. Wagner isn't a backup center. He's a end of the bench player.

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He's also the brother to our brightest player who has come out and said the transition has been much easier thanks to having Mo on the team and if that's all he's good for I'm more than fine with that. Still more than Bamba ever brought, yeah he might blow up somewhere else but it wasn't happening here.

Moe Wagner's not going anywhere. He's only set to make 1.87M. He'll be on the roster.

[fendilim]

All the physical tools, just not the motor to make the most of it. Hope he finds that elsewhere. Has to be considered a big swing and miss with the #6

Plenty of other top 6 pick busts since 2017:
Josh Jackson
Marvin Bagley
Jarrett Culver

And expand to top 10:
Frant Ntilikina
Dennis Smith Jr.
Kevin Knox
Cam Reddish
Killian Hayes
Jalen Smith

Seems pretty common now for a few top guys to flame out within a couple years. Bamba seemed like an obvious miss from the night of the draft, though.

We still have the #1 pick from 2017, the #6 pick from 2017, the #7 pick from 2018, the #5 pick from 2021, the #8 pick from 2021, and the #1 pick from 2022 on our roster. Not bad.

Top 6 picks bust from time to time, but WeltHam blew 2 straight top-6 picks. That's pretty special.

2 straight? Who?

[uraverage]

I guess I get the move, but sucks to miss with such a high pick.

Now what I don't get is how management didn't at least make a second round pick for a backup center that may have potential in the last 2 years. They had to see this move possibly coming and should have been looking for cheap #2/3 center. How do they not see WCjr will play about 60 games and you need a butt in a seat for 20-30 games. Maybe there is some greater plan, but I get this feeling that we sign (overpay) some vet to a 1 year deal for flexibility.

[magicfan217]

If we aren't tendering Mo a contract that should be a major red flag to anyone wanting to sign him.

[[whistler]]

I think people are overthinking this news a bit too much. If I were the Magic I'd be like:

"Listen Mo, we aren't extending you a QO because we can't afford the cap hold and need the flexibility for free agency. We'd like to have you back but we won't insult you with a lowball offer so we'll let the market decide how what kind of contact you'll be able to get. If you get a great offer from a team you like you'll obviously be free to leave, but if you want to stay and come to us with all of the offers you get we'll see what we can do based on how free agency works out."

It's the best for Mo and the team. If Mo's market lets him get paid, good for him let him go. If the market says he's not worth much then bring him back at a fair deal.

[pepe1991]

Reading those 2018 threads is funny

But most problems that people were pointing fingers at, were true in 2018, and relevant to Magic true problems since this front office took on job.
Even if Bamba was BPA, he was always in position where he would probably fail, because they had zero desire to clean up roster.
Right after a draft Magic roster was made out of : Gordon ( resigned) ; Isaac (drafted 1 year ago) , Bamba (rookie) , Biyombo ( 2 years left on contract) , Vuc ( 1 year left of contract ), Khem Birch ( 1 year left ), Aminu ( 2 years left).

So 7 Magic players were competing for 2 positions. While starting PG was snail race between DJ Augustin, ability to hold onto Shelvin Mack... and they "solved" this by trading for Fultz, half of a year later, and signing MCW who was fresh off being cut for like 12th team in 3 years. In whole this process, Magic, as usual, had 0 SFs on roster.

I liked Bamba, execlly because he, on paper was BPA, but right on draft night i kept repeating : now trades have to follow. And, as usual, they never did. Just like Magic now have Paolo Banchero for drive and kick game ... and those will recive "kicks" are 2 of worst shooters NBA has to offer (and majority of roster can't shoot).


We, as fans, tend to be right or wrong, and it's fine. Front officies ,especially GMs and Presidents of basketball operations are making around $2- 10M a year to get this things right. And it's very depressing when you figure most of forum fans have better basketball brain in terms of building funcional basketball team than "experts".


Luka, Trae, Ayton were not unanimous green lighted by fans here, but Skin's thread about Mikal Bridges was. I think whole forum pretty much knew that Mikal won't be star ,but in same time he will make sense of roster and become starter from day one. But nop, Magic drafted "BPA" , on team without single PG, on team with no SF, on team with already existing 6 PF-Cs.
Next year, and every year that followed until Gordon decided he is done with Magic, Bamba was buried in rotation. And Magic, in whole that process, never had starting level PG of SF. But army of PFs .

Mo Bamba is excellent example of draft pick, who is BPA, but awful fit ( we can argue was he BPA, but at times he was viewed as such).

[Skin]

Reading those 2018 threads is funny

But most problems that people were pointing fingers at, were true in 2018, and relevant to Magic true problems since this front office took on job.
Even if Bamba was BPA, he was always in position where he would probably fail, because they had zero desire to clean up roster.
Right after a draft Magic roster was made out of : Gordon ( resigned) ; Isaac (drafted 1 year ago) , Bamba (rookie) , Biyombo ( 2 years left on contract) , Vuc ( 1 year left of contract ), Khem Birch ( 1 year left ), Aminu ( 2 years left).

So 7 Magic players were competing for 2 positions. While starting PG was snail race between DJ Augustin, ability to hold onto Shelvin Mack... and they "solved" this by trading for Fultz, half of a year later, and signing MCW who was fresh off being cut for like 12th team in 3 years. In whole this process, Magic, as usual, had 0 SFs on roster.

I liked Bamba, execlly because he, on paper was BPA, but right on draft night i kept repeating : now trades have to follow. And, as usual, they never did. Just like Magic now have Paolo Banchero for drive and kick game ... and those will recive "kicks" are 2 of worst shooters NBA has to offer (and majority of roster can't shoot).


We, as fans, tend to be right or wrong, and it's fine. Front officies ,especially GMs and Presidents of basketball operations are making around $2- 10M a year to get this things right. And it's very depressing when you figure most of forum fans have better basketball brain in terms of building funcional basketball team than "experts".


Luka, Trae, Ayton were not unanimous green lighted by fans here, but Skin's thread about Mikal Bridges was. I think whole forum pretty much knew that Mikal won't be star ,but in same time he will make sense of roster and become starter from day one. But nop, Magic drafted "BPA" , on team without single PG, on team with no SF, on team with already existing 6 PF-Cs.
Next year, and every year that followed until Gordon decided he is done with Magic, Bamba was buried in rotation. And Magic, in whole that process, never had starting level PG of SF. But army of PFs .

Mo Bamba is excellent example of draft pick, who is BPA, but awful fit ( we can argue was he BPA, but at times he was viewed as such).

Same. I was able to support Bamba, but that was all under the assumption that Vuc would be traded. Isaac next to Bamba was a tantalizing thought!

Then WeHam decided to have an "evaluation year" which prolonged beyond one year. On top of that Clifford had zero interest in developing players and Bamba was especially the victim of being in his doghouse.

I wonder if Bamba would have been the pick if WeHam knew Clifford would bury him. With how much Clifford played Iwundu, had WeHam had known that Clifford would use him so much, I bet they would've taken Mikal Bridges who would have had way more time on the court than Bamba got.

BPA does not work if the fit is terrible.

[drsd]

M. Wagner isn't a backup center. He's a end of the bench player.

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He'd even be bench player in europe

Where is the minus-one button?

M-Wagner is clearly one of the top-400 basketball players on earth and thus earned his spot on this roster. On any team in the NBA he would be a competent 3rd string combo-big playing 10 mpg on 40 games played.

His real role is as a practice squad player. His offensive game helps Carter (and others) work on their defensive game.

For me the grander question is whether M-Wagner can ever develop further. I think he is very far off from being a competent rotational player until he gets his defensive spacing in line with team-based concepts of position. Also, he needs to work hard on the fundamentals of rebounding on both sides of the ball.

[basketballRob]

Weltman doing the same thing with Suggs. He was the #1 PG in his class and gets drafted to a team he may not have even wanted to go to, just like Bamba. Then the situation is so weird because the have 3 point guards already.

By the way I'm not sure why Magic fans have to crap on Bamba while he's a FA. Some fans are on the GB calling him a lazy bum. Just let him go.

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