Murphy13

quote: Originally posted by ThisIsTheYear: quote: Originally posted by RIP CITY:I know this is probably an old topic, and you guys are probably getting sick of talking about the contract and all that, but this is my first chance to say something about it here at this site. Really I just have a question, why, when it seemed that they were bidding for Rashard with no competition to sign him, did they give him that ridiculous contract?? I didn't hear about any teams trying to sign him (A little interest from Houston), and if there were they certainly were not offering anywhere near what he got, so why give him that much?? This move is really going to make it hard for the Magic to add much of anything to this team for a few years. I hope you guys love this team the way it is right now, because there won't be alot of new additions coming in the next five or so years. Our GM was concerned that there was a chance that Rashard would sign with Houston. Although he mentioned in the news conference that we were the obvious choice, going back to your hometown, and having a jersey in front of your house waiting for you can be a little intimidating. While some believe that Magic fans are furious with the contract, we would have been angrier if we didn't acquire him. not true. there were other options that would have provided us immediate and long term success. unless if we make the ecf this year, it was a poor choice to go with shard

this is a continuation of their article from wednesday. here are the losers: 16. Orlando Magic (added Rashard Lewis; lost Grant Hill, Darko Milicic and Travis Diener; replaced Brian Hill with Stan Van Gundy) They overpaid for Lewis, but picking him up undoubtedly will pay some short-term dividends. Fair enough. But is Lewis enough to offset the losses of Hill and Milicic? I dunno. Darko's departure leaves the cupboard looking awfully bare in the frontcourt, and I don't think signing 6 foot, 11-inch Polish import Marcin Gortat (rumored to be imminent) changes that picture much. One other thing to look at is how the Lewis signing has an impact on Hedo Turkoglu. Both Lewis and Turkoglu are 6-10, defensively limited and like to shoot jumpers from the corner. It's not clear to me how both can be on the court at the same time, at least for long stretches, and I'd like the Magic's offseason a lot better if they could trade Turkoglu for a decent big man. However, one positive is the addition of Stan Van Gundy. He was one of the best, if not the best, coaches available on the market, and his track record suggests he might improve the Magic's defense quite a bit. All in all, there are a lot of additions and subtractions to weigh here, but the end result is that it looks pretty close to a wash. http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/insider/columns/story?co...3doffseasondecliners

his reasoning for portland being losers is that he doesnt think they will win anymore games next season compared to last. but they have a good future, duh...

this is a continuation of their article from wednesday. here are the losers: 16. Orlando Magic (added Rashard Lewis; lost Grant Hill, Darko Milicic and Travis Diener; replaced Brian Hill with Stan Van Gundy) They overpaid for Lewis, but picking him up undoubtedly will pay some short-term dividends. Fair enough. But is Lewis enough to offset the losses of Hill and Milicic? I dunno. Darko's departure leaves the cupboard looking awfully bare in the frontcourt, and I don't think signing 6 foot, 11-inch Polish import Marcin Gortat (rumored to be imminent) changes that picture much. One other thing to look at is how the Lewis signing has an impact on Hedo Turkoglu. Both Lewis and Turkoglu are 6-10, defensively limited and like to shoot jumpers from the corner. It's not clear to me how both can be on the court at the same time, at least for long stretches, and I'd like the Magic's offseason a lot better if they could trade Turkoglu for a decent big man. However, one positive is the addition of Stan Van Gundy. He was one of the best, if not the best, coaches available on the market, and his track record suggests he might improve the Magic's defense quite a bit. All in all, there are a lot of additions and subtractions to weigh here, but the end result is that it looks pretty close to a wash. http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/insider/columns/story?co...3doffseasondecliners

the first thing that comes to my mind is what it took to get him. then 'what do we do about our holes left'. in response to the first post, i dont think its soley the price tag, for me, its giving up a couple pieces for one piece. also, we dont know that he will improve our team, thats just speculation at this point, but i hope your right. i also will feel a whole lot better if we can obtain a good pf, not just someone who gives us minutes and fouls.

i wouldnt do this trade, even though i always liked harpring. i like redick and turk better.

quote: Originally posted by D-BoFats: quote: Originally posted by murphy13: quote: Originally posted by D-BoFats:Just for joy, let's compare that team with the '05-06 championship Miami Heat team: PG - Nelson vs. Williams (Nelson wins) SG - Ariza vs. Wade (Wade destroys) SF - Lewis vs. Posey (Lewis destroys) PF - Swift vs. Haslem (split) C - Howard vs. O'Neal (O'Neal wins) i would agree with everything you said except pf, haslem is way, way, way better than swift. like a previous poster said, swift is extremely injury prone. I'll give you injury-prone, though 67 games isn't that bad (compared to TurkoFLU), but Stro isn't way, way worse than Haslem. They're about equal in the scoring department, Haslem will get more rebounds, and Swift will get more blocks. Haslem also gets more minutes, so his stats are going to look better. i like haslem because of his IQ. personally, thats the first thing i analyze about a player, and thats why i like haslem. i have seen ballers with better skill get outplayed by the smarter player too many times to fall for this trade proposal.

quote: Originally posted by D-BoFats: quote: Originally posted by murphy13: quote: Originally posted by D-BoFats:I am so sick of the "Darko + Grant > Rashard" argument. It doesn't work that way, and even if it did work that way, it could easily be used against you. I hate it when people make arguments that can be easily reversed. If we wanted to keep Darko, we'd have to get rid of at least Dooling and Arroyo. Rashard + Dooling + Arroyo should average a combined 38 PPG, 9.8 RPG, and 6.9 APG. Please stop with this combined stats theory! It's WEAK, and very inaccurate! I guaruntee if we traded Arroyo and Dooling to keep Darko, we'd have the same people on here complaining about a weak backcourt. i think we discussed this before debo... you cant use players from different teams in the analogy i used, it doesnt make sense. you have to use players that played on the same team, ala ghill and darko. is it not true that ghill and darko obtained those previous stats for the magic last year? now isnt it also true that someone has to pick up the slack from them leaving? someone will have to score 22 extra points to make up for them leaving(among all the other stats listed). there is no way around that...what are you arguing for? your argument isnt very well thought through on this particular issue, unlike the majority of your posts... "I hate it when people make arguments that can be easily reversed. If we wanted to keep Darko, we'd have to get rid of at least Dooling and Arroyo. Rashard + Dooling + Arroyo should average a combined 38 PPG, 9.8 RPG, and 6.9 APG." this can only happen in NBA live. it isnt ever accurate to take players from different teams and combine their stats and project them on a single team the next year. just look at the lakers a couple years back when they got malone and payton...it didnt work out. my whole point to the original post is that there is a given amount (-Y) of production that has left(darko+hill). if (Z) represents what our team averaged on any given night last season, a 40-42 squad, then (X) would need to equal (-Y) to obtain (Z) X-Y=Z also, in order to keep darko, we wouldnt have needed to give up our exp. deals at all. we just couldve easily not overpaid shard, picked up wallace for way less, and retained darko. hell, we could have even possibly been able to retain ghill or atleast s&t him for a pick or something. I know it doesn't work that way, but a lot of people seem to think you can add stats like that. I keep hearing Darko + Grant > Rashard. I'm just saying, according to the Lewis haters' theory, you can also say Dooling + Arroyo + filler > Darko. It's a dumb argument, and I was just pointing out that it could be used against the Otis haters. I'm not saying it works, but it can be reversible. i just hope that ariza is ready to take his game to the next level...we will be needing him this season, regardless of what lewis does.

quote: Originally posted by D-BoFats:I am so sick of the "Darko + Grant > Rashard" argument. It doesn't work that way, and even if it did work that way, it could easily be used against you. I hate it when people make arguments that can be easily reversed. If we wanted to keep Darko, we'd have to get rid of at least Dooling and Arroyo. Rashard + Dooling + Arroyo should average a combined 38 PPG, 9.8 RPG, and 6.9 APG. Please stop with this combined stats theory! It's WEAK, and very inaccurate! I guaruntee if we traded Arroyo and Dooling to keep Darko, we'd have the same people on here complaining about a weak backcourt. i think we discussed this before debo... you cant use players from different teams in the analogy i used, it doesnt make sense. you have to use players that played on the same team, ala ghill and darko. is it not true that ghill and darko obtained those previous stats for the magic last year? now isnt it also true that someone has to pick up the slack from them leaving? someone will have to score 22 extra points to make up for them leaving(among all the other stats listed). there is no way around that...what are you arguing for? your argument isnt very well thought through on this particular issue, unlike the majority of your posts... "I hate it when people make arguments that can be easily reversed. If we wanted to keep Darko, we'd have to get rid of at least Dooling and Arroyo. Rashard + Dooling + Arroyo should average a combined 38 PPG, 9.8 RPG, and 6.9 APG." this can only happen in NBA live. it isnt ever accurate to take players from different teams and combine their stats and project them on a single team the next year. just look at the lakers a couple years back when they got malone and payton...it didnt work out. my whole point to the original post is that there is a given amount (-Y) of production that has left(darko+hill). if (Z) represents what our team averaged on any given night last season, a 40-42 squad, then (X) would need to equal (-Y) to obtain (Z) X-Y=Z also, in order to keep darko, we wouldnt have needed to give up our exp. deals at all. we just couldve easily not overpaid shard, picked up wallace for way less, and retained darko. hell, we could have even possibly been able to retain ghill or atleast s&t him for a pick or something.

quote: Originally posted by D-BoFats:Just for joy, let's compare that team with the '05-06 championship Miami Heat team: PG - Nelson vs. Williams (Nelson wins) SG - Ariza vs. Wade (Wade destroys) SF - Lewis vs. Posey (Lewis destroys) PF - Swift vs. Haslem (split) C - Howard vs. O'Neal (O'Neal wins) i would agree with everything you said except pf, haslem is way, way, way better than swift. like a previous poster said, swift is extremely injury prone.

quote: Originally posted by richnba: quote: Originally posted by murphy13:whoa whoa whoa, first of all, subjegating was used in the wrong context...to subjugate someone, you are enslaving or overcoming(overpowering them). i feel like a dork actually knowing what that means... secondly, jjz and smack daddy have the right idea. people are knocking milicic and hill. during the reqular season they averaged a combined 22.8 ppg, 9.1 rpg, 3.2 apg, and 2.3 bpg. it was even higher during the playoffs. rashard would have to be a beast to even get near those numbers. that means two things: first: we have made more subtractions than additions to our team, except for our payroll...hence the insider article. on paper, we are not as good a team as we were last year. all these people are saying that shard is the perfect compliment to dwight and that we will be way better, i hope they are right. but in reality its just speculation. the numbers dont lie. someone on our squad is going to have to account for those stats that walked away for nothing. you would assume that would fall on your team's newly acquired max salary player. second: more importantly, we need someone else to step up. jj can help in the point department. but i am concerned with the other catagories. milicic only averaged about one less rebound per game than lewis, and lewis played nearly twice as many minutes. scary. hill only averaged .15 less blocks per game than lewis, and he played half as much. both hill and milicic shot a better fg% than lewis as well. i am not knocking on lewis, i really hope he steps up, but he has been getting opportunities to play well, unlike tmac when he came here from tor. so i wouldnt expect a monumental improvement. also, dont expect more than 6rpg from him next year. he has never gotten more than 7 in a season, and he only averaged 16 ppg during that season. we will see... in conclusion, the key to next season is trevor ariza!!! Subjugate also means to put down, which was how I was using it. ...ok...how about the basketball aspect of the post?

whoa whoa whoa, first of all, subjegating was used in the wrong context...to subjugate someone, you are enslaving or overcoming(overpowering them). i feel like a dork actually knowing what that means... secondly, jjz and smack daddy have the right idea. people are knocking milicic and hill. during the reqular season they averaged a combined 22.8 ppg, 9.1 rpg, 3.2 apg, and 2.3 bpg. it was even higher during the playoffs. rashard would have to be a beast to even get near those numbers. that means two things: first: we have made more subtractions than additions to our team, except for our payroll...hence the insider article. on paper, we are not as good a team as we were last year. all these people are saying that shard is the perfect compliment to dwight and that we will be way better, i hope they are right. but in reality its just speculation. the numbers dont lie. someone on our squad is going to have to account for those stats that walked away for nothing. you would assume that would fall on your team's newly acquired max salary player. second: more importantly, we need someone else to step up. jj can help in the point department. but i am concerned with the other catagories. milicic only averaged about one less rebound per game than lewis, and lewis played nearly twice as many minutes. scary. hill only averaged .15 less blocks per game than lewis, and he played half as much. both hill and milicic shot a better fg% than lewis as well. i am not knocking on lewis, i really hope he steps up, but he has been getting opportunities to play well, unlike tmac when he came here from tor. so i wouldnt expect a monumental improvement. also, dont expect more than 6rpg from him next year. he has never gotten more than 7 in a season, and he only averaged 16 ppg during that season. we will see... in conclusion, the key to next season is trevor ariza!!!

quote: Originally posted by Nyce_1:Here's the trade I'd do: Hedo, Garrity, & Auggie/2nd rounder for: Pryzbilla, Jack or Udoka, and McRoberts this proposal is better, but we would be giving up even more scoring...

i say no to this trade...

quote: Originally posted by Marc Acres 3:16: quote: Originally posted by 30Assists:Doleac might even be able to be a PF against slower-footed teams. He's grown up a bit since he left here. He's got a pretty good mid-range shot and he's not a horrible rebounder. Then again, I'm pretty sure he isn't available, right? Everyone is available for a price and Miami is hurting right now. Didn't they just lose Posey? They are aging badly and need depth. They have Barron to back up Shaq and Zo so Doleac is the 4th big they have. They need a back up 2 and 1. dont forget to add haslem, their best asset aside from wade. doleac is attainable i believe. maybe we could pry a couple bigs from them for a couple guards, since they need guards, not bigs, and vice versa for us. i know that you dont normally trade bigs for smalls, but in this case i believe both teams would benefit from it. maybe bogans/arroyo(exp. deals) for doleac/haslem? heck, i would even give them a future pick for haslem... but would they go for it?

quote: Originally posted by ATL_MagicFan:I totally agree with you Mark. I'm hoping when teams run their bigs at us that Battie and Gortat will be able to contribute. Don't get me wrong, I do want a big strong PF. However,I don't think its as big a whole as people are making it out to be. We managed last year and Darko didn't give us that much at PF. I just think unless Jameer steps up PG will be a bigger issue than PF. darko was underrated last year. a lot of bigs are because their worthiness doesnt necessarily show up on the stat sheet. when darko was in, he was an effective pf. especially at the end of the season. the bottom line is, rashard is not a PF. could he play there temporarily(5-15 mpg)? yes. but it will tire him out. he is not used to defending bigs. hell, he wasnt even that great of a perimeter defender either(source: league pass). this is why rashard will not average more points next year than he already is. you will see...we need a sean may, or chris wilcox type player on this team. preferably one with a higher bball IQ. haslem would be ideal. but riley wont give him to us. something to keep in mind, the nba season is long. sometimes, players bodies wear down by the end of the season. the time the sonics made the playoffs, they lost shard due to injury. will this happen again?

quote: Originally posted by The Truth:LGM, LODM, NBR...The Truth appologizes. The Truth knows that The Truth would miss some of you. It is the offseason so as hard as it might be to believe The Truth is not totally sharp. You newbs need to read the entire posts. Not just part and say "what about ___" or "not gonna happen". And if you listen to any national radio show or broadcast outside of Orlando, this city is a sports joke to everyone. And it will keep being a joke to people if management continues to make the types of moves their making. And to the person that said scratch Deiner off the list...I read about that this morning...the two most tradable assets given away for nothing. Ridiculous. i agree with the diener comment, he couldve gotten us something from phx. before the trade deadline. the other stuff you said is true too murph

quote: Originally posted by jack l j:sport jj will prove his merit on the floor and congrats on school. winning is not about who is the best athlete but a combination of many things. i hope you learn this as you go through life. jacjlj bingo! basketball is a finesse and intellectual sport. athleticism will only take you so far.

quote: Originally posted by mnewballer21:haha people on here don't know what it takes to make a real point? so you are the expert on point guards? kirk heinrich and jj do not play the same style of basketball, kirk can get his own shot off the dribble, jj can't, he runs off screens and is a catch and shoot player that throws a shot fake in every now and then to free himself up....ask jj if he is better suited at sg or pg and i guarantee you he will say sg if you would have continued to read you would see that it would take him a couple years, and you are comparing jj playing 2 guard to hinrich playing pg, of course they are going to play differently. by the way, hinrich's fav. tool is screens and picks. aside from all that nonsense you just threw on this board newbie, they have very similar physical statures as well as IQ. back to school for you...

fish, i say give jameer a shot to reclaim the starting pg spot. but jj is the smartest bball player on our team, the making of a point. its easier to defend most points than it is most sg's, so defense isnt the issue. besides, no one says you cant mix and match defenses to accomodate players, its about the offense as a point. and i think jj would be a very good point(think kirk hinrich after a couple years). so dont mind all the people on here that say its a bad idea, a lot of them dont know what it takes to make a real point.

if i had to pick my poison, i would go with the second lineup you mentioned. sub battie for a better 4 and thats a good lineup.

the discussion in this thread is different than the discussion in the thread you closed. they just had similar titles, its a good idea to read the thread before closing it.

quote: Originally posted by GoM@g!C$:yes he only put up 20ppg, but he was the 2nd scoring option in Seattle. Don't forget that Allan was there putting up 26ppg. I really think Lewis will be putting up 26ppg. He will be our first scoring option, then Dwight. Excpect Dwight's numbers to go up to the 20's because of how less pressure will be on him. thats not how it works, your numbers are inflated if you are the second option. his scoring average wont go up, not after 10 years in the league and now being guarded by the other teams best defender. playing with allen created more scoring opportunities for him, not less. your optimism is appreciated though...

has the press conference started yet? i just have a black screen

quote: Originally posted by Scott430:Couple of things.. First thing...if the whole fallout with Darko was because the Magic balked at Cornstein's demands of $10 million a year for Darko, then I am glad Otis let him walk. While yes, we did pay a handsome sum for Rashard, but at least Rashard is a proven scorer. Darko has not proved much of anything yet..except that he apparently lets his agent dictate everything for him. Second thing...The more I look at that lineup...the more and more I start to feel a little bit better about it. While a frontline of Howard, Lewis and Turk is not going to get down and dirty with anyone on the block (except Dwight) it can be extremely versatile. I truly believe Turk (when he is not in one of his funks) can be a 15-17ppg scorer. With Dwight down low, Turk on the wing and the versatlity of Lewis to play low, outside or slash...I really think that could be a matchup nightmare. I think the backcourt is probably the area most in question. Can Jameer become a true point guard? Can JJ play enough D and can Trevor develop more of a jump shot to truly play the 2 guard position? I think summer league is going to help JJ immensley. I think we are going to see a brand new player next year and I think he definitely could step in and fill the 2 guard spot. I like the idea of Arroyo/Diener, Battie, Dooling and Ariza off the bench. I think that is a high energy lineup that is going to give you production and ALOT of effort night in and night out. I still would not mind us seeing making a play for another big. If Gorat continues to play well in summer I think he could be a decent contributer next year for 15-20 mins a game. People say we lost more than we gained...but I don't necessarily think that is true. We all talked about how we wanted to see more of JJ and Trevor and I think this year you are going to see very significant contributions from both those guys. Many will disagree, but I still think in some ways we gained alot this offseason. i like your optimism, really. we will need it. although you are unfortunately incorrect in your statement regarding lewis...he will never play pf, especially in the east. he cant play down low, he is soft, and weak. most of his points come from him sitting at the perimeter and getting dishes from other players, seriously, thats 2/3 of his points, the others are mostly free throws and fast break.