Who's to blame in Orlando?

[Prof. Clutch]

Otis Smith, who decided to blow up a contender for no good reason. 

When you have a team as close as Orlando was, you add to it, rather than destroying it.  Gilbert Arenas wasn't a good gamble at the time, and nothing about his play has changed my thinking on that one.

Like usual Roy you're one of the first to respond and you are completely correct.

[Fafnir]

Otis Smith.

He made his team weaker in the short term and the long term with his trades. I can understand the trade for Hedo/J. Rich it didn't work but hey I get him trying, but the acquistion of Arenas was indefensible.

[CelticG1]

In fairness I don't think the Magic would be much better without doing the trade. Those other guys didn't exactly flourish where they ended up.

I don't know how much of a contender they were before that either. We almost swept them in the ECF (game 4 went to OT) and they had HCA.

Also I don't know if anyone could have predicted Arenas being as bad as he was. His numbers this season were beyond bad. As the games went on he just got worse

[greenpride32]

I don't consider trading Perk "breaking up the team".  ORL trading Lewis and Carter would be the equivalent of the Celtics trading any 2 of Rondo, Allen, Pierce, Garnett.  Additionally ORL traded 2 key rotation players; the only consistent BOS rotation player is BBD, so we can't even match up in that respect in terms of extremity.  

It's not even close what BOS did and what ORL did.

I don't know that you can pin the blame on any particular individual in ORL.  The past 3 years they're just a 3 point shooting team (pre and post trade).  When they're hot they can beat any team.  But overall they were never a good team.

[MBunge]

Otis Smith, who decided to blow up a contender for no good reason.  

When you have a team as close as Orlando was, you add to it, rather than destroying it.  Gilbert Arenas wasn't a good gamble at the time, and nothing about his play has changed my thinking on that one.

You think Orlando would have gone further with Carter, Rashard, Gortat, and Pietrus?

Smith's errors started with letting Hedo walk.  He looked pretty smart at first because Hedo's game fell off a cliff, but maybe that doesn't happen if Hedo stays where he's comfortable in Orlando.  Regardless, Smith broke up a NBA Finals starting 5 in order to bring in Vince Frickin' Carter.  That was never going to work and while Rashard Lewis imploding the last two seasons made it all wthe orse, Smith should have never given Lewis that ginormous contract in the first place.

Then, instead of just letting it ride and seeing what he could do under the new CBA, he traded the only size he had besides Howard to get back the struggling Hedo with his big contract that has 3 more seasons to go and shipped out Lewis to bring in the just-as-bad-and-with-an-even-worse-contract Arenas.  And remember, even if Arenas suddenly starts playing great...are you going to play him and Jameer 35 minutes a game as your starting backcourt?  Orlando is going to spend 26 million dollars a year for the next two seasons for their starting and back-up point guards.

Mike

Hedo was enormously overrated when he was in his Orlando hey-day. I don't see, considering Hedo's play over the last three seasons, how anyone can criticize Smith for letting him walk.

Smith does look smart to let Hedo walk, considering how his play has declined, but to replace him with VC?  And I have to wonder if Hedo wouldn't have played better if he'd stayed in Orlando and they'd kept the chemistry of Howard flanked by two 6'10'' guys who could shoot the three.

Mike

[Chief]

Is anyone else dumb enough to take Arenas off their hands?

[fairweatherfan]

Is anyone else dumb enough to take Arenas off their hands?

Hey guys, anybody know why my ears are burning all of a sudden?

[LooseCannon]

I hope those of you saying Otis Smith realize Ainge made the same mistake.  He just had better personnel to begin with.

Otis Smith and Danny Ainge had two different mentalities in the deals they made.  For Otis Smith, there is no future if he doesn't win in the short term, so from the perspective of self-interest, if it seems likely he will be fired based on the trajectory of staying the course, he can be willing to gamble without regard to the future consequences if things go bad since he has nothing to lose.

Ainge, on the other hand, believes that all transactions have to take the future into consideration, including salary cap implications.  That is the mentality I want in a general manager.

[birdwatcher]

Otis Smith, who decided to blow up a contender for no good reason. 

When you have a team as close as Orlando was, you add to it, rather than destroying it.  Gilbert Arenas wasn't a good gamble at the time, and nothing about his play has changed my thinking on that one.

I agree that Otis Smith is to blame, however I don't blame him for making a trade. I believe the trade was a side step, not a step forward. They upgraded by taking back Hedo, basically got a wash with swapping VC for Richardson, lost depth at C by letting Gortat go, and got a wash for letting go of Rashard Lewis and giving Ryan Anderson minutes.
They were not going to advance any further with who they had before the trade, and because they only tweaked their time instead of really improving it, they are out again. A trade was needed to be a legit contender, it just may not have been the right one. At least Smith didn't wait till the trade deadline to initiate the change, giving the team time to come together.
His comments in regards to the Heat and Celtics shortly after the trade made me feel like he either didn't really have a true concept of reality about where his team was compared to the other elite teams in the league, or he was just simply a bit classless. He made some punk statements for a gm.

[scaryjerry]

In fairness I don't think the Magic would be much better without doing the trade. Those other guys didn't exactly flourish where they ended up.

I don't know how much of a contender they were before that either. We almost swept them in the ECF (game 4 went to OT) and they had HCA.

Also I don't know if anyone could have predicted Arenas being as bad as he was. His numbers this season were beyond bad. As the games went on he just got worse

they didnt flourish where they ended up, but imo its safe to say Rashard Lewis flourished next to Dwight, and Gortat was the best backup center in the NBA (who actually did flourish with the suns) ..the pieces they got were god awful in the Magics system

and being "almost swept" in 6 games in the ECF is better than losing in the first round to a team you dominated with the old core

[European NBA fan]

Otis Smith.

Not for the deals, however, but for the flawed strategy. Dwight should be the cornerstone in a defense first team like the Celtics (groom him in the style of Bill Russell, not Hakeem the Dream).

[OsirusCeltics]

1. Otis Smith
- He shouldn't have let go of Hedo after the 2009 season. He was a very important part of that team. If he would have stayed, Magic would have had a good core to build around to add more players. Even if the contract price Hedo was asking for was a little too high, he should have just sucked it up and taken it


2. Steph Van Gundy
- He played Jameer Nelson in that 2009 NBA Finals. Plain and simple. He simply threw away the Magic's chance at a title when he let Nelson play coming off a shoulder injury. Raefer Alston was a great fit for that Magic team. Played very well, and got Howard involved way more than Nelson did

[Surferdad]

I see the criticism of Otis Smith and it's fair.  However, I felt even before the trade that ORL was a flawed team.  This goes back at least two years.  You can't just line up 3-point shooters around the perimeter with Howard down low.  That's a lousy offensive approach.  And despite Howard winning DPY in multiple years, I've always felt the ORL is really not a great defensive team.

That said, the fall guy will be Stan Van Gundy.  The coach has to take the blame for a 1st round exit vs. a mediocre team like Atlanta.  He lost his players a long time ago; you could see it in timeouts where they basically tune him out.

[CelticG1]

In fairness I don't think the Magic would be much better without doing the trade. Those other guys didn't exactly flourish where they ended up.

I don't know how much of a contender they were before that either. We almost swept them in the ECF (game 4 went to OT) and they had HCA.

Also I don't know if anyone could have predicted Arenas being as bad as he was. His numbers this season were beyond bad. As the games went on he just got worse

they didnt flourish where they ended up, but imo its safe to say Rashard Lewis flourished next to Dwight, and Gortat was the best backup center in the NBA (who actually did flourish with the suns) ..the pieces they got were god awful in the Magics system

and being "almost swept" in 6 games in the ECF is better than losing in the first round to a team you dominated with the old core

Bottom line is that they wouldn't have made the ECF regardless. Might as well take a big risk instead of playing it safe.

[hpantazo]

I see the criticism of Otis Smith and it's fair.  However, I felt even before the trade that ORL was a flawed team.  This goes back at least two years.  You can't just line up 3-point shooters around the perimeter with Howard down low.  That's a lousy offensive approach.  And despite Howard winning DPY in multiple years, I've always felt the ORL is really not a great defensive team.

That said, the fall guy will be Stan Van Gundy.  The coach has to take the blame for a 1st round exit vs. a mediocre team like Atlanta.  He lost his players a long time ago; you could see it in timeouts where they basically tune him out.

can't blame them, just like I tune out his brother when watching the games he does commentary on.