Official Speculation Thread (Pt. XLV "Re-Building" Edition)

[Mule Tears]

So....we trade the best center this decade to "tank" and hope to land 17 or 18 year old that will become a star?

[bigmoe1952]

I don't understand the backlash towards this trade.

I think the general assumption moving forward was "rebuild mode" from the gate, right? Unload contracts, bring in youth/picks/assets.

Some of you guys wanted a "tank" this season, in hopes for a lottery pick.

Looks like all of the above is happening..

The problem is the draft picks will most likely suck. And they are protected. That;s B.S. The Laker pick is reported to be in 2017 and the Philly pick in 2015. I was all for a rebuild. But I certainly thought we would be getting some lottery picks. Not 1st rounders probably in the teens, or higher, and 2 second rounders? That sucks. Hopefully there is more to the deal.

Our own pick is going to be a top 10 easily. This team is not making the po's not even close.

B&W, we were not trading for one of our own draft picks. Even with the Houston deal we would have had a top 10 pick of our own. The draft picks we got for Howard suck and portend a LONG rebuild.

[Blue_and_Whte]

Yeah I'm going to wait until this whole thing plays out. I don't believe the houston was either that good or not there at all.

[UCFJayBird]

These future 1st rounders truly suck. Magic basically traded Dwight for Harkless (15th pick in draft), Nikola Vucevic (16th pick in draft) and Aflalo (27th pick in draft) with a few future first rounders that will be in the 20's about 3-5 years from now. And, only Aflalo is a legit starter.

Hennigan is officially, a freaking idiot. What a dumbass! Magic would be better off keeping Dwight for the year and making a splash in 2013. Or at least, waiting for a better offer at the trade deadline.

Magic didn't even get One Single All-Star for the most dominate Center on the planet. A travesty in modern sports history.

The Magic are now the laughing stock of the entire NBA and no superstar and not many all-stars should ever consider joining this team.

Here is your future Magic fans, a lifetime of mediocrity. This is what you get when you panic and give in to Stern and Dwight Howard.

THIS... Man, seriously i've been a magic fan sense day 1 but this is a tuff pill to swallow. EVERYBODY is saying we didnt get enough. Not only that we are the Lakers farm team, Every 10 yrs we send them a HOF Center...

10 years? really?

[Driguez]

Everyone needs to **** relax.

[MagicFan41]

Adrian Wojnarowski‏@WojYahooNBA
HOU offered ORL $12M in space (instead of Afflalo), recent 1st picks, future lottery and unprotected picks. Would've taken bad deals (cont.)

Adrian Wojnarowski‏@WojYahooNBA
(cont.) and no need to take on Harrington contract.

if this is true we should seriously stop trying to defend this trade

It's not true, they didn't offer all of that at once, it was a combination of some of those things, i.e one or two prospects, one or two picks, and taking back a bad deal or two. Much like we have ended up getting from this current deal. It all depends on which flavour of crap you wanted, because we were never going to get a good deal out of this.

Also, and I feel like a broken record here (and this is directed at people like Woj), but CAP FLOOR. We have to spend at least $50m on salary this year. Simply wiping out our bad contracts whilst taking back nothing in return is a nice idea, but you can't go through a year with only $35m on your books any more. If we took the cap clearing option from Houston, we would have had to go out spend that space we created on a free agent to meet the minimum salary cap figure defined by the new CBA, and then everyone could have bitched that we spent $10m on one of the crappy FAs who are left.

It has been reported quite a few times that Gilbert's $20+mil amnesty count's towards the cap floor.

[MoMM]

Rob thinks he can find something special again from Congo. Eyenga could be interesting to develop.

What will he find?



OR

[ChildishGambino]

Get more aquainted with our probable Starting Center Nikola Vucevic and his skillset....looks like a Mehmet Okur type to me.....not bad

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcgpIuD_JyQ&feature=related[/youtube]

Oh and another thing some of you guys are overreacting just a bit without knowing all the facts.....blaming Hennigan when he may have very well wanted to wait a bit longer but was overruled by Alex and the Devos Family....we simply don't know all the facts and yet we're blaming Hennigan.....the trade itself is bollocks but it's a bit early to be blaming anyone just yet....let's wait until things are finalized...we still don't know for sure who's going where.....

[pakishazi]

I'm hopeful but not betting on it that Lakers end up being the same with this big 4 as they were with their last big 4....underachievers.

Now:

Howard
Gasol
Kobe
Nash

Last big 4:

Shaq
Karl Malone
Kobe
Gary Payton


The ironic side in me would love to see the Nets beat the Lakers to the Finals if they make it that far. Or OKC whoop the Lakers in the WC Finals. Hell now that the Heat have won a championship I don't even care if they keep on winning some more.

[Def Swami]

I have a lot of problems with this deal.

We wanted three thing s in this deal.

1) Young players on good contracts (Harkness and Vuvecic). Both players might not ban out.

2) Good Draft Picks (All will be late teens to late first round)

3) Sched contracts (Turkoglu is staying and taking on Afflalo's big deal)

Ohh and were going to watch Dwight Howard on a Superteam in l.A.

De ja vu.

This is a terrible deal for the Magic.

Absolutely. Not sure I like any of the young guys coming to us and I was hoping we could at the very least get 1 potential lottery pick. And what's the point of Harrington?

[tiderulz]

I guess we got the next best in Afflalo, though I am not so sure he's that much better than JRich to be honest.

Afflalo easily better than JRich.

[Driguez]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEBK3ZUn0c4&feature=youtube_gdata_player[/youtube]

[magicman123]

This trade will only make sense if we acquire another 2nd rd pick from Philly

[MoMM]

I'm hopeful but not betting on it that Lakers end up being the same with this big 4 as they were with their last big 4....underachievers.

Now:

Howard
Gasol
Kobe
Nash

Last big 4:

Shaq
Karl Malone
Kobe
Gary Payton


The ironic side in me would love to see the Nets beat the Lakers to the Finals if they make it that far. Or OKC whoop the Lakers in the WC Finals. Hell now that the Heat have won a championship I don't even care if they keep on winning some more.

Malone and Payton were old that time, Gasol and Nash are much more productive nowadays. And you can add Jamison and Artest to this mix.

[Big A All Day]

These future 1st rounders truly suck. Magic basically traded Dwight for Harkless (15th pick in draft), Nikola Vucevic (16th pick in draft) and Aflalo (27th pick in draft) with a few future first rounders that will be in the 20's about 3-5 years from now. And, only Aflalo is a legit starter.

Hennigan is officially, a freaking idiot. What a dumbass! Magic would be better off keeping Dwight for the year and making a splash in 2013. Or at least, waiting for a better offer at the trade deadline.

Magic didn't even get One Single All-Star for the most dominate Center on the planet. A travesty in modern sports history.

The Magic are now the laughing stock of the entire NBA and no superstar and not many all-stars should ever consider joining this team.

Here is your future Magic fans, a lifetime of mediocrity. This is what you get when you panic and give in to Stern and Dwight Howard.

THIS... Man, seriously i've been a magic fan sense day 1 but this is a tuff pill to swallow. EVERYBODY is saying we didnt get enough. Not only that we are the Lakers farm team, Every 10 yrs we send them a HOF Center...

10 years? really?

ok, what, 16 yrs? who gives a F... I just woke up and read that we traded Dwight 2 one of his preferred destinations for nothing, Not only that hand the Lakers another amazing deal. I've never seen another team in any sport get as many sweetheart deals as the lakers

[GameOver25]

Everyone needs to **** relax.

It's to late, this place has turned into a war zone. Everyone knows more than the next person. We should change the name of the forum to Wheelchair GM.

[orlandomike]

I would suggest that the Heat did not win with a great Center. I would suggest that the Magic did not win the championship with a great center.

The reason the magic suck is because they dont draft well and they dont coach up their players well. This Dwight on the inside and a bunch of 3 point shooters who stand around was never going to work. The Lakers will do more with him unfortunately because they have a legit PG in nash and a perfect compliment forward in Gasol. But things didnt fail because Dwight left, they will hopefully succeed, because the GM left.

forget the Harrington thing, even with him , in 2014 we can be at least 20 mil under the cap. the trick is to assemble an inexpensive deep quality team and you only do that through the draft and drfting smart.

1. get rid of turk.
2. get rid of jameer nelson.
3. Use afflalo and the new rookies and teach them in a good system.
4. Choose wisely with your next 2 lottery picks and the extra mid round 1st pick or 2. with nicholson etc and the rest of this we could have an Oklahoma city team in the next 3 years.

[Blue_and_Whte]

B&W, we were not trading for one of our own draft picks. Even with the Houston deal we would have had a top 10 pick of our own. The draft picks we got for Howard suck and portend a LONG rebuild.

Moe we dont even know the details of the Houston deal or if it even still existed. Would you please calm the hell down before i slit my wrists? We don't know anything. It makes ZERO sense that if the Houston deal was that good hennigan would pass it up for a chance at afflalo and harrington.

[Great WhiteHope]

I am excited about this trade... especially since we kiss Duhon goodbye!

We get some young coachable talent that we can mold, draft picks (which I feel for wheeling and dealing) and get rid of some bad contracts! Its a WIN!

People are forgetting that Dwight had back surgery! That isn't a routine operation on any means. I honestly believe he won't be a factor like he was in Orlando on the Lakers. So it was let him walk for nothing or get something back instead.

Houston was offering some of the parts not all that was reported.

Rudolph is mad because his friend Dwight didn't get his wish to play with the NETS and I love it!

[KingRobb02]

Woj is saying the Houston deal was as good as advertised.....

I REALLY want to know what was truly offered.

I don't think a Houston offer is really on the table, and if it was Fegan crushed it two weeks ago. This is just other teams being angry like they were after the Gasol trade. I don't think our front office is really in the business of burning bridges with 25 other teams by only accepting deals from the Lakers. The real story is probably closer to Daryl Morey floating ideas out there until it was time to sit at the table. Can you imagine the outcry if Morey ignored Fegan's warnings and traded his whole team for an 11 month rental?