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2018 Official Offseason Thread

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17 minutes ago, Mauro Pedrosa said:

I agree and at some point you have to look at the pieces you already have and build around their specific needs. That's why I'm against drafting BPA at every opportunity. When you have an empty drawer, you obviously take BPA but not all the time

Kind of depends on what bpa is. If we're talking about mostly equal guys then you can use fit to push one guy ahead. If there's noticable talent gap you're better off just trading down or taking the better player. 

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58 minutes ago, Franchise408 said:

I'm not being dishonest about anything.

This franchise was light years away from contending the entire time Hennigan was in charge. There was absolutely no reason to trade away our top young player, and another 1st round draft pick, for Ibaka who was a glorified role player with success playing alongside Durant, Westbrook, and Harden. That move was awful in every sense of the word.

While trading for Arenas was also awful, at least the team was in somewhat of a contention window at the time, so bringing in a vet like Arenas made a lot more sense. Especially since Rashard Lewis was on the decline and on a max contract.

Just because other bad franchises do the same thing doesn't mean that we should too. Would be better to make no move than to overpay for mediocre talent and hinder this franchise for the foreseeable future from being able to make any sort of improvement. 

I am in agreement with my "contrarian" friend.  Must make me contrarian too.  Hennigan initially puts together a roster yoiu could build around and then panics (I think due to his "we will be in contention within 3 years" comment)  and makes bad decision after bad decision.  One lost in this discussion is when Al Horford became a free agent.  We had a lot of advantages on our side.  And that was the job of Hennigan to use those advantages.  He failed (my guess is either a reluctance to spend what was necessary or totally not understanding what it would take).  All Star goes to Boston we get Biz!!!  Skiles debacle not a feather in his cap either, nor was Vogel hiring.  Yes he was that bad!  The only difference I have with my new friend is about tanking and that we failed at tanking.  Tanking (absent of FA pick ups) means you get pick 1, 2 3, or at least 4 and no lower.  And you do it 2 or 3 years in a row.  That is the only way to make it work.  But we have had some luck in the last two drafts due to this Fo so it may work out. This FO much more pofessional and at exploring all options.  I think they have a good vision and will find the talent we need.  I like where we are going. 

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8 minutes ago, ?4thewin said:

Kind of depends on what bpa is. If we're talking about mostly equal guys then you can use fit to push one guy ahead. If there's noticable talent gap you're better off just trading down or taking the better player. 

Yup.   Posiible example and I am Not saying this will happen but  would we do if we got the #1 pick next year and Bol Bol, after his first year, was the BPA.  My thought then is trade down a space or two to get someone who fits while picking up another first round  pick.

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I don't know how we're going to project this team's record this year. I can see a 6th seed. I can see a path to 29 wins. 

On paper we have enough to cause damage. There's enough defense and offense available to be above average at both. 

Functional point guard depth is lacking. I like Grant as a backup but I'm not sure how a potential "dj Augustin has high ankle sprain, out 3-5 weeks" ends any way but badly for us. Same deal with power forward. Kind of wish we had like Dante Cunningham back there. If Gordon and Isaac both play 70 games and never miss games simultaneously that's still 24 games where you're piecing together a rotation with who at 4? Simmons? Birch? I'm praying Jackson impresses in preseason or else that gets ugly too. On top of that Bamba is still a rookie. He might not make a short term positive impact no matter how optimistic we are. 

 

So basically if we have a season like 15-16 where 7 of our top 10 guys in the rotation play 72+ games I think we're going to be good. 

But our depth is so crappy that losing key pieces long term would be devastating. 

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I say 33-35 wins with the current roster. Injuries are going to happen and our depth isn’t there. I was hoping Frazier would be a day 1 contributer but he doesn’t look like an NBA player. Was also hoping Iwundu would be improved but he by all accounts looks worse than he did last year.

Our bench isn’t good at all. I’m optimistic about Grant though. I think he could be surprisingly good.

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1 hour ago, Originalticketholder said:

I am in agreement with my "contrarian" friend.  Must make me contrarian too.  Hennigan initially puts together a roster yoiu could build around and then panics (I think due to his "we will be in contention within 3 years" comment)  and makes bad decision after bad decision.  One lost in this discussion is when Al Horford became a free agent.  We had a lot of advantages on our side.  And that was the job of Hennigan to use those advantages.  He failed (my guess is either a reluctance to spend what was necessary or totally not understanding what it would take).  All Star goes to Boston we get Biz!!!  Skiles debacle not a feather in his cap either, nor was Vogel hiring.  Yes he was that bad!  The only difference I have with my new friend is about tanking and that we failed at tanking.  Tanking (absent of FA pick ups) means you get pick 1, 2 3, or at least 4 and no lower.  And you do it 2 or 3 years in a row.  That is the only way to make it work.  But we have had some luck in the last two drafts due to this Fo so it may work out. This FO much more pofessional and at exploring all options.  I think they have a good vision and will find the talent we need.  I like where we are going. 

Alex Martins and Skiles influence. 

Henny made the mistake of putting his eggs in Payton.

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Even with a healthy team, this is a 35 win roster as currently construction. As long as we have DJ Augustine and Jarian Grant as our PG's, we are not a threat or a contender.

If we address the PG means, either through possible and available means (i.e. Isaiah Thomas), or some other splash via trade (which will probably gut the roster otherwise), we can be an 8th, or maybe even 7th or 6th seed in the East.

But as constructed, even healthy, there's no way we are competing for playoffs. Whatever optimism we may have about Gordon, Isaac, and Bamba, and their future development, they are not at present, nor possibly ever will be, the kinds of #1 guys you build a team around. Gordon, Isaac, Bamba, Fournier, etc. need a legitimate player alongside them. 

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7 minutes ago, Franchise408 said:

Even with a healthy team, this is a 35 win roster as currently construction. As long as we have DJ Augustine and Jarian Grant as our PG's, we are not a threat or a contender.

If we address the PG means, either through possible and available means (i.e. Isaiah Thomas), or some other splash via trade (which will probably gut the roster otherwise), we can be an 8th, or maybe even 7th or 6th seed in the East.

But as constructed, even healthy, there's no way we are competing for playoffs. Whatever optimism we may have about Gordon, Isaac, and Bamba, and their future development, they are not at present, nor possibly ever will be, the kinds of #1 guys you build a team around. Gordon, Isaac, Bamba, Fournier, etc. need a legitimate player alongside them. 

You don't need a number one guy to make the playoffs

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1 hour ago, Originalticketholder said:

I am in agreement with my "contrarian" friend.  Must make me contrarian too.  Hennigan initially puts together a roster yoiu could build around and then panics (I think due to his "we will be in contention within 3 years" comment)  and makes bad decision after bad decision.  One lost in this discussion is when Al Horford became a free agent.  We had a lot of advantages on our side.  And that was the job of Hennigan to use those advantages.  He failed (my guess is either a reluctance to spend what was necessary or totally not understanding what it would take).  All Star goes to Boston we get Biz!!!  Skiles debacle not a feather in his cap either, nor was Vogel hiring.  Yes he was that bad!  The only difference I have with my new friend is about tanking and that we failed at tanking.  Tanking (absent of FA pick ups) means you get pick 1, 2 3, or at least 4 and no lower.  And you do it 2 or 3 years in a row.  That is the only way to make it work.  But we have had some luck in the last two drafts due to this Fo so it may work out. This FO much more pofessional and at exploring all options.  I think they have a good vision and will find the talent we need.  I like where we are going. 

I don't agree with tanking, because you are purposefully sinking your team and developing a losing culture, all on the hopes that you win the lottery in the draft and get the right positioning, at a time when a franchise changing player is available. It is far too fickle to bank on as a viable rebuilding strategy.

You can go back about 20 years or so, and the #1 overall pick is about a 50-50 at best of landing a player that is or isn't a bust. The # of teams that have successfully rebuilt their franchise into champions is even less. The premiere franchise in the league right now is doing it with 2 mid lottery picks, a 2nd rounder, and a free agent. Cleveland won 0 champions with a drafted LeBron James, and it wasn't until he came back as a free agent that they won 1 championship. The Spurs are the big example of a team who build a dynasty off the back of Tim Duncan, a guy who they paired with David Robinson who was hurt the previous year, the only reason they had the #1 pick to begin with. They didn't intentionally tank. Celtics are an asterisk because they won their championship with high draft picks that were traded. The Magic build a 2 year contender off the back of a #1 overall pick, but never won a championship, losing to a superstar that was drafted in mid lottery. One of the few non Lakers, Celtics, LeBron, or Warriors teams to win a championship was the Mavericks who won it off the mid lottery drafted Dirk Nowitzki.

Basically, what I'm saying is that in the past 20 or so years, the only "tank" draft picks that won a championship with the original team that drafted them were Tim Duncan, Dwyane Wade, and Kyrie Irving, and 2 of those guys won it with major free agent help (Wade: Shaq, and later LeBron and Bosh. Irving: LeBron)

So basically the strategy of tanking means you're gonna be the ONE team in about a span of a decade that drafts someone who will bring you a championship.

Those are not viable odds to rely your entire team rebuilding strategy on.

Of course, teams are going to naturally "tank" by circumstance - I.E. when Dwight left, of *course* the Magic were going to suck, but circumstance. I don't blame Hennigan for our first couple years being bad. But I do blame him for employing a strategy that simply doesn't work, and has been proven time and time again to not work, and not taking any other initiatives to improve the team.

I get that as an organization, the Magic have had a lot of success with the #1 overall pick in the draft, and not a lot of success outside of that spot. But just because we've had poor decisions being made in the past does not mean that tanking for the #1 pick is the only viable way to build a team. As I've stated above, it's actually the least viable way to build your team.

Just as many teams have won and competed with no big time players (ala the 2004 Pistons) as have won with their original top 3 draft pick.

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5 minutes ago, ?4thewin said:

You don't need a number one guy to make the playoffs

With *our* players you do.

I think you greatly overestimate how good our players actually are. We do *not* have a playoff caliber roster.

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6 minutes ago, Franchise408 said:

With *our* players you do.

I think you greatly overestimate how good our players actually are. We do *not* have a playoff caliber roster.

If Vuc comes off the bench, we are much better. 

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5 minutes ago, Catalina Maria said:

If Vuc comes off the bench, we are much better. 

I don't think we're "much" better with Vuc starting or on the bench.

On the bench, we are starting an unpolished rookie who may or may not be ready for the real show. I'm not for or against starting Bamba over Vuc. We're not making playoffs this year anyways so if it's more beneficial to Bamba's development to start, then he should start. But I don't think that makes us "much" better, if even better at all. At least not this year.

Long term? Possibly. Again, it depends on whether Bamba's long term development will be better starting or coming off the bench. And his long term development should be a focus over being "better" this year.

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