The media is amazing.

[yoyojw17]

I'm not sure where you've been or what media source prompted reigniting a top that has been debated exhaustively, but this is a curious time to try to defend it. It was difficult enough to defend the trade when it happened. Given Harris' role in Detroit's ascent, coupled with Orlando's struggles, I think your position is untenable. I mean, we used that money to sign Green. We need to let this one go and move on.

What ascent? They're a .500 basketball team, and they are basically fighting for the 8th seed. That's who they are, and they're at their ceiling. Orlando is looking to take the opposite approach of the Detroit Pistons, and go for broke.

My position is the only one that's right. Orlando wasn't winning with Harris, because he's a glorified role player. Orlando didn't land a player with real star potential in the draft, not because of bad drafting, but because they had unfortunate draft positioning.

That means, the only chance we had to improve is acquiring a star via trade or free agency. We clearly struck out on acquiring a star via trade, so our only remaining hope was free agency. So we traded Harris for cap space.

It wasn't one of many options, it was the only course of action we could take. We are clearly not looking to be a middling playoff team. We are looking to go all or nothing. Which is the approach every franchise should be taking. Any other approach is wrong, and a detriment to what your ultimate goal is....winning a championship.

We dealt Harris for cap space as we should have, it didn't work out, but Hennigan played the hand he was dealt correctly. If he's in that position 100 more times, he should play it the exact same way every time.

and we and our dysfunctional band of misfits that haven't pulled it together yet are 1 game behind them in the standings(8th seed)..... and .5 behind the oh so mighty Boston Celtics. Oh... and the hornets are tied for the best record in the east. SMH.... we're only 8 games into and 82 game season.

Vogel and Forcier are doing their best. But as of now.... many of the players are playing inconsistently and well below what we know they are capable of providing. Our defense and defensive effort is straight lacking. Guys are currently seeming to be lost at times. Once we are able to lock down on these things... we can start evaluating this team much better. Until then... there is no reason to start selling the farm because we think the one next door looks better on the other side.

[Rumncoke25]

I agree with not being able to analyze what we have. I think across the board every player is playing below expectations. Is this new system woes, a wise spread slump, or just bad players? It's tough to know and because of that, I fear getting rid of players that SHOULD improve.

I will say that the line ups have to be toyed with. Gordon has been ok at the 3, but having him at the 4 provides ability for some stretch play, and having a shooter at the 3 hopefully clears up spacing. Elf need to drive and the team needs some lanes.

[AshBlackstone]

People say we used the money to sign Green. That's a short term truth only. Green expires at the end of the year and is clearly not a long term pice of this team.

We traded Harris for cap flexibility because we did not forsee him as a core member of the team. It's been explained already why by guys who were in the locker room after games (Adamos for one), but many still choose to not accept facts and instead continue to twist words to make things seem gloomy.

Cap space and flexibility is never gloomy, even if the team we currently have is not performing well. Gloomy is having this roster and not being able to do anything about it for years.

That's not the point. The fact of the matter is we got nothing for Tobias. Yes, we have capspace, but so does pretty much everyone else. We got fleeced in that deal, I said it the day it happened and I'll say it now. No way in hell should we not have gotten AT least a first rounder

Getting "nothing" for Tobias was the point. Because the commodity was cap space. Detroit did not give us a first round pick, because they knew we valued the cap space. We weren't in a position to bargain for a first round pick. Harris isn't a star, he's a really good role player who had just signed a long term deal. Detroit is picking up that tab, so no pick for us.

[AshBlackstone]

Regardless of how you perceive Harris, you can't justify that trade in any way. The Magic ditched a young, productive starter on a playoff team who can score the ball for essentially nothing in return. The Magic were never in a position to just cut losses on an asset with that much value, and for a team deprived of talent, scoring especially, it made no sense to just get rid of a player who could get buckets at a more efficient clip than most of the other wings on the team. Harris on his contract was and is a far more valuable commodity than the cap space we acquired. I wish we still had that trade chip in our back pocket still smh.

I accept that the national media is always going to underplay the Magic. But to be fair, the Magic have given them very few reasons not to over the last few years and especially this season so far.

The trade is only unjustifiable to people who don't understand basketball economics. Cap space was the commodity. We wanted to sign high end free agents. It didn't work out. That's life.

[Def Swami]

Regardless of how you perceive Harris, you can't justify that trade in any way. The Magic ditched a young, productive starter on a playoff team who can score the ball for essentially nothing in return. The Magic were never in a position to just cut losses on an asset with that much value, and for a team deprived of talent, scoring especially, it made no sense to just get rid of a player who could get buckets at a more efficient clip than most of the other wings on the team. Harris on his contract was and is a far more valuable commodity than the cap space we acquired. I wish we still had that trade chip in our back pocket still smh.

I accept that the national media is always going to underplay the Magic. But to be fair, the Magic have given them very few reasons not to over the last few years and especially this season so far.

The trade is only unjustifiable to people who don't understand basketball economics. Cap space was the commodity. We wanted to sign high end free agents. It didn't work out. That's life.

Coming off 3 straight seasons of no playoffs, 4 coaches in a 20 month timespan, topping out at 35 wins, no all-stars or all-star potential in sight, small market, and a summer in which almost every team had cap space, the team was never in position to sign high end free agents because high end free agents were never going to waste their time. It was a dumb calculation.

[tiderulz]

Are you ignoring the fact that he was pretty good when he was here? No one thought he was a bad player, just no real role on this team as a bully scorer. The criticism comes from us dumping guys for a playoff push, when we weren't really at that point on the rebuild timeline.

I'm not saying he's bad. But the media acts like we unloaded a superstar for nothing. He's a role player, and one that is playing the same caliber of basketball he was here, at best.

I'll let go of a role player to roll the dice in free agency. The long shot of landing a superstar in free agency or via trade has always been our only real path to being a contender based on our slot in each draft.

He was traded to clear cap space, we didn't lure anyone. It doesn't mean we made the wrong move. It was the right play considering our circumstances.

that role player playing better than "star potential" AG.

[tiderulz]

People say we used the money to sign Green. That's a short term truth only. Green expires at the end of the year and is clearly not a long term pice of this team.

We traded Harris for cap flexibility because we did not forsee him as a core member of the team. It's been explained already why by guys who were in the locker room after games (Adamos for one), but many still choose to not accept facts and instead continue to twist words to make things seem gloomy.

Cap space and flexibility is never gloomy, even if the team we currently have is not performing well. Gloomy is having this roster and not being able to do anything about it for years.

That's not the point. The fact of the matter is we got nothing for Tobias. Yes, we have capspace, but so does pretty much everyone else. We got fleeced in that deal, I said it the day it happened and I'll say it now. No way in hell should we not have gotten AT least a first rounder

Getting "nothing" for Tobias was the point. Because the commodity was cap space. Detroit did not give us a first round pick, because they knew we valued the cap space. We weren't in a position to bargain for a first round pick. Harris isn't a star, he's a really good role player who had just signed a long term deal. Detroit is picking up that tab, so no pick for us.

we absolutely were in a position to get a pick. Stan even said he couldnt believe Orlando didnt ask for a pick.

[PennytoShaq]

People say we used the money to sign Green. That's a short term truth only. Green expires at the end of the year and is clearly not a long term pice of this team.

We traded Harris for cap flexibility because we did not forsee him as a core member of the team. It's been explained already why by guys who were in the locker room after games (Adamos for one), but many still choose to not accept facts and instead continue to twist words to make things seem gloomy.

Cap space and flexibility is never gloomy, even if the team we currently have is not performing well. Gloomy is having this roster and not being able to do anything about it for years.

That's not the point. The fact of the matter is we got nothing for Tobias. Yes, we have capspace, but so does pretty much everyone else. We got fleeced in that deal, I said it the day it happened and I'll say it now. No way in hell should we not have gotten AT least a first rounder

Getting "nothing" for Tobias was the point. Because the commodity was cap space. Detroit did not give us a first round pick, because they knew we valued the cap space. We weren't in a position to bargain for a first round pick. Harris isn't a star, he's a really good role player who had just signed a long term deal. Detroit is picking up that tab, so no pick for us.

Yep. I explain this and it was even documented in the media and people still want to argue it. It was the GM's decision that he will have to live with if it doesn't work out, but the Magic are clearly still in asset collection and cap management mode.

Our team was so young that we simply had to get some good vets and stop adding youth unless it's a can't miss talent.

[sportsrock37]

With Tobias, AG would still be on the bench and you've wasted 2+ years of his development. For AG to play you have to bench either Dipo or Harris which would have been a reason to trade Harris or Dipo or you bench Fournier and start the worst shooting team of all time with Elf, Dipo, Harris, AG, Vuc.

We deemed that Harris for 15 million isn't worth benching AG over so we traded him. We still have the extra cap space for this year because we don't have Harris' contract. Don't forget the Pistons were a lotto team when we made that trade for Harris, no way they give up a lotto 1st rounder for Harris, so the first we would have received was a late first from the Thunder. I'm not going to lose sleep over not getting that pick. From a basketball perspective it was a good trade. From a value perspective you could say you wanted more, but personally I'd rather have the cap space and flexibility rather then a bad contract and a mid round 1st.

I'm 100% on board with the trade.