Orlando Magic Rumors

Southeast Notes: Jefferson, Andersen, Nelson

December 8 at 10:31am CST By Chuck Myron

Al Jefferson calls his decision to sign with the Bobcats a “no-brainer,” but he also tells HoopsWorld’s Bill Ingram that he thinks the Jazz will benefit from letting go of him and Hawks signee Paul Millsap.

“Most definitely, I think Derrick Favors and Enes (Kanter) are going to be big time big men in this league,” Jefferson said. “I kind of had a feeling that it really just wouldn’t make any sense basketball wise to sign back me or Paul Millsap back when you have them two young guys coming up.  It was still tough to leave them. I felt like they were my little brothers, but it’s part of the business and it was the best decision for everybody.”

Jefferson had long been a fan of Kemba Walker, and says to Ingram that the former Connecticut guard was one of the Bobcats who recruited him to Charlotte. The ‘Cats are off to a 9-11 start, better than in years past, but they’re only in fourth place in the Southeast, the most competitive division in the Eastern Conference. Here’s more from those teams:

Southeast Notes: Heat, Magic, Beasley

December 7 at 12:26pm CST By Zach Links

Today’s look at the Southeast Division..

  • In today’s mailbag, a reader asks Ira Winderman of the Sun Sentinel if offseason pickup Michael Beasley might bump Shane Battier in the Heat rotation.  While many fans see it going in that direction, Winderman writes that Beasley won’t see the lion’s share of those minutes until he’s up to speed on the team’s defense.  Offensively, however, the former No. 2 overall pick brings a lot to the table.
  • As the Magic get set to do battle with Dwight Howard on Sunday, Brian Schmitz of the Orlando Sentinel ranked the best and worst trades in the franchise’s 25-year history.  The best deal in club history was Orlando pawning Steve Francis and the $49MM he was owed over three years on the Knicks back in 2006.  The worst deal, by Schmitz’s measure, was the acquisition of Gilbert Arenas from the Wizards.   Orlando is still on the hook for Arenas through 2016 after using the amnesty clause on him.  The Howard deal, meanwhile, ranks as the third-best swap in club history.
  • Even after moving on to the Grizzlies, Mike Miller says that he’s still keeping up with everything the Heat do.  ”I have a lot of friends over there. We went through a lot together,” he told Sam Amick of USA Today. “People don’t understand how much we went through together. We were ridiculed, had a lot of pressure on us the whole time. They’ll be fine. That’s what they do. They’ve had three long seasons over there. But they’ve got so much talent over there, and with the best player in the world, they’ll be fine.”

Southeast Notes: Oden, Nelson, Heat, Harrington

December 3 at 2:35pm CST By Luke Adams

In an incredibly weak Eastern Conference, the Southeast Division practically qualifies as a powerhouse. Led by the 14-3 Heat, the Southeast is the only Eastern division above .500 as a whole — its five teams have combined for a 46-43 record so far. Three Southeast clubs will look to improve on that mark tonight, as the Heat host the Pistons, while the Magic play in Philadelphia and the Bobcats visit Dallas.

Here’s more from around the division:

  • The Heat‘s signing of Greg Oden this summer received plenty of attention, but the former first overall pick is coming along slowly, according to Sam Amico of FOX Sports Ohio. Amico hears from several sources that Miami doesn’t plan to integrate Oden into the rotation until around the All-Star break, and even then, he’ll likely only play about 8-10 minutes per game.
  • Within the same piece, Amico asked an NBA executive for five players he thinks will be traded this season, and the Magic‘s Jameer Nelson was among the players mentioned by the exec.
  • Steve Kyler of HoopsWorld wonders if the Heat‘s Big Three could become a Big Four next summer, when LeBron James, Chris Bosh, and Dwyane Wade are all eligible for free agency. Kyler’s scenario would involve all three players opting out and taking significant pay cuts, and would mean purging the rest of the roster to create room for a fourth impact player, so it sounds like a real long shot.
  • While Al Harrington has been sidelined recently by a sore knee, he tells Josh Robbins of the Orlando Sentinel that he likes being a Wizard, and is trying to forget his stint with the Magic. Harrington came to Orlando as part of the four-team Dwight Howard blockbuster, but missed most of last season and was waived in the summer, before signing with Washington.

Eastern Rumors: Shumpert, Afflalo, Cavs

December 2 at 11:50am CST By Luke Adams

Following up on Carmelo Anthony‘s recent comments suggesting that the Knicks were missing the veteran leadership of players like Jason Kidd, Rasheed Wallace, and Kurt Thomas, Mike Woodson agreed, but stressed that the team must move on.

“They’re not here this season and they’re not going to walk through that door,” Woodson said of those ex-Knicks, according to Al Iannazzone of Newsday. “We’ve got to go with what we have. And I think what we have is good enough to win with.”

Let’s round up a few more stories on the Knicks and several other Eastern Conference teams…

  • In their stories on the Knicks‘ Sunday loss to the Pelicans, Marc Berman of the New York Post and Frank Isola of the New York Daily News both suggest that the strong play of Tim Hardaway Jr. and Iman Shumpert‘s confrontation with Carmelo Anthony might make Shumpert even more available.
  • Arron Afflalo is playing the best ball of his career so far this season, which could put him in the All-Star conversation, but also means his trade value may never be higher. Brian Schmitz of the Orlando Sentinel takes a look at Afflalo’s unusual situation with the Magic.
  • In addressing the possibility of the Cavaliers starting Anthony Bennett at small forward, Sam Amico of FOX Sports Ohio passes along a tidbit from a scout this past offseason. In the scout’s opinion, no matter what other moves the Cavs made, “if they’re still starting [Alonzo Gee] at small forward, they’re not gonna be that great.”
  • While many Bulls fans would like to see the team tank and grab a pick near the top of a strong 2014 draft, Joe Cowley of the Chicago Sun-Times cautions against that approach. Speaking to Cowley, Bulls GM Gar Forman suggests it’s possible to find value in the first round no matter where the team’s pick lands.

Trade Candidate: Jameer Nelson

December 1 at 10:16am CST By Chuck Myron

Dwight Howard is long gone from Orlando, but the hangover from the team’s run to the Finals in 2009 remains. GM Rob Hennigan took an aggressive step toward complete overhaul of the roster a few months after he took the job last summer with the Howard trade, but he’s otherwise embarked on a slow rebuild. One of his most curious moves was re-signing Jameer Nelson in the summer of 2012 to a three-year, $25.2MM contract.

The deal came before the Howard trade, so it’s possible that Hennigan brought Nelson back with aspirations of remaining a title contender. It seems more plausible that the Magic simply wanted him around to mentor their young players, since they’re fond of the point guard’s off-court leadership. Regardless, the Magic are stuck with another veteran they’d like to swap for a younger player and Nelson, who turned down a lucrative player option to sign his three-year deal in the hopes he wouldn’t become a trade candidate, finds himself in that very position.

Nelson wants to remain with the Magic for the rest of his career, but he also wants to have a significant role. He has reportedly been upset with his lack of fourth-quarter playing time this season, though his amount of minutes per game is consistent with the level he’s seen ever since taking over as the Magic’s starting point guard back in 2005/06. Orlando has no in-house candidates to replace him in that role, barring its experiment with Victor Oladipo as a point guard, so it’s not as if his presence in the lineup impedes the development of a younger player.

The Magic instead hope to acquire a prospect in return for Nelson, as they’re reportedly seeking a first-round pick in trade talks involving him. That won’t be an easy ransom to extract, considering how highly NBA executives have come to value first-rounders, especially for the prized class of 2014. Nelson’s contract wouldn’t do much to clog another team’s cap beyond this season, since his $8MM salary for next year is only guaranteed for $2MM, but expiring deals aren’t the trade chips they used to be. The shorter contracts brought about by the latest collective bargaining agreement allow more teams to clear cap room every summer without having to give up assets to acquire deals like Nelson’s.

His performance this season could depress his value even further. His PER is at a career-low 12.0, thanks in large measure to his 37.3% shooting, also the worst mark of his career. His three-point shot is off, and he’s also making less than 50% of his shots at the rim for the first time, per NBA.com. It’s just a month into the season, so there’s a chance those numbers could improve over time. Still, it’s been seven years since his assists-to-turnover ratio, currently at 6.1-to-2.9, has been as low as it is, so his struggles aren’t confined to his shot.

The Magic give up nearly seven more points per 100 possessions when he’s on the floor compared to when he’s on the bench, according to NBA.com. That’s an astoudingly high number, but it’s not nearly as impressive as the nine point jump in points per 100 possessions Orlando experiences when Nelson is playing. The net effect is that the team has been better off when Nelson is in the lineup, but it should be, considering that E’Twaun Moore, Ronnie Price and Oladipo, a rookie playing out of position, are his backups.

Nelson is nursing a sprained foot, but that minor injury shouldn’t have any significant impact on his trade value. The Magic don’t appear to be in a hurry to get a deal done, and they shouldn’t be, considering his poor start. Hennigan has higher priorities for now as he oversees a roster with other misplaced veterans like Nelson. Arron Afflalo and Glen Davis are trade candidates as well, and the Magic have a little more than a month left to find a taker for Hedo Turkoglu before they’d have to eat the $6MM guarantee on his contract.

Perhaps an another Eastern Conference team sensing an opportunity to steal a high playoff seed among a weak field of contenders will grab Nelson at the trade deadline. Maybe an injury to a point guard on a team with legitimate title hopes prompts a call to Hennigan. Other teams will likely drive the market for Nelson, so the Magic would be wise to see what the market bears and choose the best offer come February.

I don’t think any team will be desperate enough to give up a first-rounder, unless it’s one that’s destined to fall at the very end of the round, but perhaps Hennigan will find an intriguing young player who hasn’t had the chance for much playing time, as he did with Tobias Harris last year. Nelson’s partially guaranteed contract for next year means the Magic probably won’t have to keep him around much longer if they don’t want to, even if they can’t find a trade partner. His leadership ability means he holds value to the Magic’s rebuilding project, so there’s really no need to trade Nelson short of an offer that’s clearly in Orlando’s favor.

Southeast Notes: Magic, Vucevic, Heat, Beasley

November 30 at 12:30pm CST By Zach Links

Worried about your team’s playoff hopes as we approach the quarter-mark of the season?  As Shandel Richardson of the Sun Sentinel pointed out earlier this week, the 2010/11 Heat started out 9-8, leading some to wonder if the superstar packed club could succeed.  That Heat team found its way to the 2011 Finals and went on to win back-to-back titles.  Here’s a look at the Southeast Division..

  • As he plays out the third year of a four-year contract, the Magic are looking to determine Nikola Vucevic‘s value, writes Josh Robbins of the Orlando Sentinel.  While the center was impressive in his first season with Orlando and has had strong flashes this season, he hasn’t taken a noticable step forward.  As it stands, the Magic are expected to retain Vucevic when he becomes a restricted free agent after the 2014/15 season.  A deal for Vucevic would probably fall in between the five-year, $60MM deal that Nikola Pekovic signed with the T’Wolves and Larry Sanders‘ four-year, $44MM contract with the Bucks.
  • In today’s mailbag, Ira Winderman of the Sun Sentinel writes that offseason pickup Michael Beasley looks to have taken a huge leap in his first month in Miami.  The Heat are more than comfortable turning to the forward for offense, which isn’t something that most observers expected when they signed Beasley to a non-guaranteed pact.
  • Dwayne Wade says that the Heat are the deepest team he’s ever played on, writes Ethan Skolnick of Bleacher Report.  ”No knock on any other team that I’ve ever played on, besides the Olympic team, this would probably be the deepest team that I’ve played on,” Dwyane Wade said Friday night.

Odds & Ends: Tanking, DeRozan, Vucevic

November 29 at 11:03pm CST By Ryan Raroque

While ownership, team executives, and coaches may sometimes choose to tank games (usually referred to by some as “focusing on the future”), Alex Kennedy of Hoopsworld writes that players aren’t in on it, especially if they’re trying to prove themselves or avoiding the possibility that their potential replacement gets drafted.

Here’s more of tonight’s miscellaneous news and notes:

  • Ryan Wolstat of the Toronto Sun (via Twitter) wonders if the Raptors should look to move DeMar DeRozan while his value is high, especially if they can’t find a taker for Rudy Gay.
  • Brian Schmitz of the Orlando Sentinel writes that the Magic are trying to figure out center Nikola Vucevic‘s worth and thinks that the potential numbers on an extension could be between what Larry Sanders and Nikola Pekovic got from their respective teams this past summer.
  • Looking back at how his tenure as the Trail Blazers’ head coach came to an end, Pacers assistant Nate McMillan tells Joe Freeman of the Oregonian that his one regret was trying to fit Gerald Wallace into the starting lineup (to keep the veteran from becoming disgruntled) despite Nicolas Batum needing the development.
  • ESPN looked to 5 of its writers to give their thoughts on how much hope that Knicks, Nets, Cavaliers, Bulls, and Lakers fans should have moving forward this season.
  • Hoopsworld’s Moke Hamilton discusses what he calls the “Derrick Rose dilemma” for Chicago – deciding whether or not to stay the course or start tear down the current team in order to build for the future.
  • Although it’s possible that the Bulls will make a move or two to address the team’s current situation, Herb Gould of the Chicago Sun-Times points out that the return of Jimmy Butler to the lineup will help and how Chicago already proved they can at least stay competitive during the regular season without Rose.

Odds & Ends: Waiters, Knicks, NBPA, Vucevic

November 28 at 1:51pm CST By Luke Adams

Happy Thanksgiving to our American readers! There may not be any games on the NBA schedule tonight, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t still a few updates from around the league to pass along. Let’s check out the latest….

  • While Dion Waiters may be available, don’t expect to see him in a Knicks uniform, says Marc Berman of the New York Post. According to Berman, New York is seeking frontcourt help rather than another shooting guard as the team explores the trade market and gauges Iman Shumpert‘s trade value.
  • Jeff Zillgitt of USA Today rounds up recent union developments and passes along the highlights of fellow USA Today scribe Sam Amick’s Q&A with former NBPA president Derek Fisher, who isn’t wavering on his plans to retire.
  • Nikola Vucevic doesn’t hold any hard feelings toward the Sixers, who traded him to the Magic a year ago. Josh Robbins of the Orlando Sentinel has the details and the quotes from Vucevic.
  • Pierre Jackson is in an unusual situation this season, playing for the D-League’s Idaho Stampede despite the fact that his NBA rights are held by the Pelicans. Dakota Schmidt of Ridiculous Upside takes an in-depth look at the former Baylor guard, attempting to determine whether he has an NBA future.

Chuck Myron contributed to this post.

Eastern Notes: Amar’e, Raptors, Bulls, Magic

November 25 at 1:38pm CST By Luke Adams

Knicks owner James Dolan spoke glowingly of Amar’e Stoudemire last week, telling the New York Post that he has no regrets about the signing and that he credits Stoudemire for making the team a desirable landing spot for players like Carmelo Anthony and Tyson Chandler. As Marc Berman of the New York Post details, Stoudemire was appreciative of Dolan’s comments, and indicated that he hopes to get healthy and productive again for the Knicks.

“My mission is to become a great player and hopefully become a future Hall of Famer,’’ Stoudemire said. “My goal is to do it in New York, to finish out my career here. That’s the goal. That’s the mission — trying to get better and better and try to dodge injuries.”

Here’s more from around the East:

  • GM Masai Ujiri and the new decision-making group in the Raptors‘ front office are trying their best to be patient and evaluate the roster before making any changes, says Marc J. Spears of Yahoo! Sports.
  • Steve Rosenbloom of the Chicago Tribune argues that, with Derrick Rose sidelined for another season, the Bulls ought to blow up the current roster and do what it takes to become a lottery team. However, a team source tells Sam Amico of FOX Sports Ohio that Chicago has “no interest in playing the draft lottery.” Given how weak the Eastern Conference looks this year, it would likely take several big moves for the Bulls to bottom out, so I’d be surprised if they chose that route.
  • Expect the Magic to be active in exploring potential trades this season, but they won’t make a move unless it advances their long-term goals, writes Steve Kyler of HoopsWorld.
  • In addition to discussing the Sixers‘ surprising start and his success early on in the season, Evan Turner said he isn’t thinking about his uncertain future with the team, according to Keith Pompey of the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Southeast Notes: Afflalo, Smith, Magic, Hawks

November 18 at 8:30pm CST By Zach Links

Sometimes, it’s the moves you don’t make that define your team.  The Magic reportedly received “lots of interest” in guard Arron Afflalo, this summer, but ultimately decided to hang on to him.  They’ve been handsomely rewarded for rebuffing the advances of other clubs as Afflalo is putting up 21.7 PPG – more than double his career average.  Tonight’s look at the Southeast Division..

  • Pistons forward Josh Smith told 92.9 FM that the Hawks never came to him with a contract offer this summer, writes Chris Vivlamore of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.  “No, there wasn’t,” Smith said when asked if there was a contract offer. “During free agency, during that period, there were a lot of guys out in L.A. that were meeting with various teams. I was one of those guys. That’s where I work out in the summertime as well. The only time I saw the Hawks during free agency was when they came to one of my workouts just to say hello. I think they were meeting with Dwight Howard that day. They never came in or sat down with me during the free agency period to offer me anything.”
  • Veteran point guard Jameer Nelson is less-than-thrilled about his playing time situation with the Magic, but he’s refusing to blow it up into a major issue, writes Josh Robbins of the Orlando Sentinel.  The 31-year-old wants to contribute, but at the same time, he wants to remain with Orlando for years to come.
  • Guys like Afflalo and Nelson have trade value, but their stocks will be even higher around draft time after logging productive seasons, tweets Steve Kyler of HoopsWorld.