Emory889

Also, no matter who we draft is going to need player development. Passing on other prospects to take someone with the appearance of being "pro ready" now because we think we can't develop prospects is even nuttier than saying we need to draft someone so that we push to win 40 games next year. By the way, I'm sure the Cavs are loving the fact that they pushed for the playoffs this season. Yay 33 wins!

"Best Available Player" is typically the best available player throughout their career not best available player for their rookie season. I know you are a Kentucky homer but Julius Randle is likely not going to be the BPA when the Magic are drafting. And even if he was, he's not going to net the Magic an additional 20 wins. I'll put it another way. No one is going to look back at this draft in 5 years and justify taking an inferior player over other prospects by pointing to better production during their rookie season. Just like no one looks back at Okafor/Dwight and thinks the Magic made a mistake because Okafor won rookie of the year. Anyone that does that will get stares like they have a 3rd arm growing out of their face.

Literally the dumbest justification for not drafting a player ever.

Hats off to Kentucky. Those kids far exceeded the expectations I had for them in this tournament. They definitely deserve to be in the finals....and I'm pretty surprised UConn beat them. That is a very talented team. I still have serious reservations about the Harrison brothers and Randle in the NBA but they had a heck of a season. Congratulations.

It's really difficult to gauge his value when we don't know what other teams were offering for him. For that matter, we can't say for certain that teams wouldn't offer the exact same kinds of deals today.

What rookie does come in and make an immediate impact in terms of wins? It's a non-statement because Anez isn't actually saying anything of value. Anez made the statement because he was attempting to downplay the level of talent in this draft. The problem with that view is that no team is drafting with the hopes that their pick is going to catapult them into championship contention next year. That isn't just unrealistic; its insane. The best talent to come into the league in a decade wasn't enough to catapult his team into the playoffs. And, neither was the second. No one is going to argue that selecting Lebron and Durant wasn't the right choice however. So what exactly is Anez trying to say? What beacon of truth am I missing here? Is he suggesting that the Magic should have been fighting for the right to get destroyed by the Pacers in the first round? Help me out because I'm a little slow here, what is he trying to say?

A full strength Knicks squad gave up 51 points in the 3rd quarter to a Lakers team without Pau Gasol. That is a new level of disgraceful for that team. Carmelo is so gone.

Or we could base our entire evaluation process on how players perform in the tournament. Who's down for drafting the second coming of Tyrus Thomas?

Kentucky has been completely inconsistent all year. Great win for them today but they can easily turn around and lay an egg next Friday. They have done it all season long. Truthfully, Cauley-Stein is the only player on that team that I really care anything about.

He's a guaranteed top 3 pick. I seriously doubt he stays.

Well, you haven't provided the above information either so I'll take what I can get. Was there something that outrageous with the request to provide the info that you supposedly gathered during conversations with your father-in-law? You offered me the phone number a second time on this forum after you already read my pm response. So, you were emboldened to post your pm on the main board thinking there was no way I would take you up on the offer. The only problem is that I'm very capable of spotting bs when I see it. You don't have a Serbian father-in-law and you don't know jack squat about Serbian basketball. You spent some time deployed to Serbia and you hoped that it would somehow provide you some credibility on the subject. It doesn't. How does it feel to know that, after all the condescending and arrogant posts you have made in this thread, everyone that reads this thread knows without a shadow of a doubt that you are full of it?

Oh, I completely agree with you. I think his whole viewpoint is garbage. But if he is going to cite Darko as an example of poor coaching leading to a player's downfall in the NBA then I think its only fair to ask him to provide the reasons why he thinks the coaching was bad. Truthfully, we all know that Barnette is lying at this point, but he was sooooo arrogant this entire time that it just feels amazing to continue to keep him backed into this corner. Speaking of which, I'm still waiting for that number Barnette.

Nope, now I want Barnette to actually send me the phone number. lol

It's his justification, for now, on why we shouldn't draft overseas players. He listed Darko as an example of poor coaching affecting a player's potential in the NBA. Thus, why I'm pressing him on the matter. I haven't even engaged him further on Michael Beasley who actually had a decent college coach.

Well, you saved me the trouble of posting your pm on the main boards. So, if I have this straight, you are willing to give me, a complete stranger, your father-in-law's number but you won't simply tell us what he said about Darko's coaching in Serbia? Really? I'm willing to take his information 3rd hand. I'll tell you the truth, I think you tried to google Darko's coach and didn't find anything and now you are hoping to bluff your way out of this predicament. I tell you what, go ahead and pm me his number and I call him, explain to him that his son-in-law gave out his phone number to a stranger on the internet, and then I'll attempt to engage him in a conversation on Serbian basketball. I'll post the entire conversation on the forum and you'll be vindicated. Go ahead and send it to me.

My thoughts are you pulled Darko's name out of your *** with absolutely no idea of who is coach was. And you were called on it. You said that the reason you posted your Linkedin profile was to prove that you spent time in the area. Cool, you spent time there. I have lots of friends that spent time there as well. That doesn't make them an expert on Serbian basketball.....no more than the time I spent in Saudi Arabia makes me an expert on their soccer team. I'm waiting for the "facts" that your link supposedly provides. Am I going to somehow contradict a fact like the actual name of his coach? Just admit that you are full of crap and we can move on. And I don't give a damn about your professional accomplishments. Even though you clearly want us to based off your initial comments when you posted the link.

I tell you what, if you can tell me who Darko's coach was in Serbia along with some simple information such as coaching style, accomplishments, and why you think he is a bad coach, then I'll give your Linkedin link some credit. Otherwise, it doesn't mean a damn thing. It's the equivalent of me claiming to be an expert of the Colorado Avalanche because I spent a couple of months in Denver.

Are you suggesting that the only way a player can receive coaching is if he receives playing time? Because that's not just wrong, it's really, really, outrageously crazy wrong. To summarize your thoughts in this thread: you went from not wanting the Magic to draft any overseas players because of Fran Vasquez, then accused a few forum members of wanting to draft players that no research or scouting had been done on, despite them saying nothing of the sort, to backpedaling and admitting that you would prefer the Magic to only draft an overseas player if Hennigan did his due diligence (as if not drafting an overseas player ever again and not drafting an overseas player without doing proper research on said player are the exact same things). Then you transitioned to poor coaching being a reason you didn't want to take an overseas player citing Darko and Beasley as examples of talented players not performing well due to poor coaching. This despite the fact that you haven't the foggiest freaking clue who coached Darko in Serbia, much less if he is a good coach or not. And I'm betting you don't know who Beasley's coach was at Kansas St either (although he only played one season there so I don't know how much on an influence he had on Beasley) but I'll tell you who it was: Frank Martin....a guy that led Kansas St to the tournament 4 out of the 5 seasons he coached there including an elite 8 appearance (not the year Beasley played there). Then you completely ignore Captain's valid questions about NBA coaches also having an influence on players and work ethic. Finally, you posted your linkedin profile for some insane reason. And you have done it this entire time in that trademark d****ey and condescending Barnettej tone that comes across as if you are attempting to explain basic concepts to children. It almost makes me believe you actually think the meaningless nonsense that comes pouring out of your fingers and taints this forum is somehow useful or informative. You are almost to the point in this conversation where you give up and congratulate yourself for making the forum more active.

I have no idea what you are trying to say or how you think this quote from Victor proves what you are saying. And if this has something to do with the beautiful women thing, then I'm really lost. I will say that while I think Victor is being genuine with his comments these comments could have just as easily have come from Dwight. He used to say the exact same thing all the time.

If the Magic are tanking next season, and it won't surprise me if they do, I could see them taking a flyer on Embiid if he comes out similar to the Noel situation in Philly. This becomes an even more likely scenario if the Magic are able to package Afflalo to improve their second first round pick and Embiid does slip. Granted there are a lot of things that have to happen for this scenario to occur but its not impossible.

Wow. If you think the only players in the league that draw beautiful women are the superstar players then you are living in a fantasy land. We are talking about young men in peak physical condition that make, at the very least, several hundred thousand dollars a year. They can get almost any woman they want.

Depressing.......or exhilarating? The tank is back baby!

I'm glad I took the time to type out that post for you to completely ignore every point I made. I take it that by ignoring my request to tell me the name of the Magic employee that is the solely responsible for the success of Penny Hardaway, twice, that you are talking out of your a**.

The responsibility for proof lies with the person making the outrageous claims. You are the one suggesting that players with extraordinary talent like Penny and Dwight wouldn't have reached their potential elsewhere (by the way, you aren't even saying they wouldn't be successful in certain NBA destinations. You are saying they would not be as good for ANY team other than the Magic. That's not just insane....its bats**t insane.). You haven't even explained who you believe is responsible for developing this talent. I would say you owe us more than proof. You owe us a name. I want to know who it was because if there is one person that is singularly responsible for practically every successful Magic player in history, I need to know it so that I can set up my shrine to them promptly. Penny, Nick Anderson and Dennis Scott all the left the Magic when they were no longer in their primes. Of course their numbers weren't better once they left. Saying that they weren't the same players when they left Orlando is not the same thing as saying they would not have had similar success had they gone somewhere else to begin with. Nick played 10 seasons with the Magic before he left. Dennis Scott played 7. The average NBA career lasts 6 years. You don't need to be a math major to realize that both players were clearly declining when they left. And I'm hoping I don't have to explain to you that 2 micro-fracture surgeries on a knee in the mid-90s was not something that athletes were bouncing back from. Or that a degenerative back, in McGrady's case, is also something that typically ends careers. Then again, maybe I do have to explain to you how difficult it would be to maintain an athletic edge with a bad back since you are so quick to dismiss Howard's year in Los Angeles when he was clearly still recovering from back surgery. He's just now starting to get healthy and you can see the difference in his production. Even if you do want to ignore his back, you do have to pay attention to the ridiculously small sample size you are using to compare his Magic career with his post-Magic career. I'll wait for him to play a few more seasons before I determine that his best years were in Orlando, and even if his Orlando days were his best, I'm going attribute a lot of that to youth and him being healthy. But getting back to McGrady, if you want to ignore his back, I could point out to you that young players, specifically players that came into the NBA out of high school, typically had a jump in production in their 3rd or 4th year....which was when McGrady joined the Magic. Kobe, KG, and even Dwight had similar spikes in production at the same point in their career. And there was the big jump in minutes that you already mentioned. So, we have a young, extremely talented player, starting his 4th year in the league, playing a ton of minutes, without any other real offensive options to shoulder the offensive burden with. Yeah, that sounds like a formula for a breakout season and it had absolutely NOTHING to do with someone on the Magic developing him. Finally, before you do something stupid like point to Scott Skiles career years in Orlando as an example of him being developed here, do yourself a favor and consider the circumstances before you do so. He was a roleplayer taken in an expansion draft that had his minutes more than doubled. Of course his production increased. He was also already 25 years old when he joined the Magic. Most 25 year old players have already developed into the player that they are going to be. But really, if you are going to insist that these players were all developed by the Magic and couldn't have been developed anywhere else, then you really need to tell us all who is responsible for it.....and probably explain to us why no one has heard of him until this point. Otherwise, there is no common connection holding this hair-brained theory of yours together.

He might be the number 1 pick in this year's draft.