Posted by Rich:

It also depends on how quickly Howard develops.

and if francis is the best guy to help him develop. if he didn't want to play with yao, will he be that much happier with howard? or will he dominate the ball and be selfish with his shots? that's a big question mark for the team.

I guess this will be two years in a row that Orlando was the biggest surprise in the NBA

Orlando? LOL!

I also think that the magic will be better than most people think, but as mentioned they have a lot of questions.... As far as mobley, this guy is a big time chucker who IMO does not make this team better, I remember when francis got hurt the rockets lost something like 17 out of 20 games with mobley leading that team... I do think Orlando came out pretty good in that deal though..

I think the biggest surprise in the NBA will be the Knicks.

-Houston coming back from surgery>Hill coming back from surgery (I'm talking in terms of likelihood).
-Sweetney will be more ready to contribute than Howard, who had zero offensive moves and struggled to score in the SL. It's basically 4 on 5 when the Magic play offense.
-Adding Crawford is huge, taking pressure off of Marbury.
-The influence of Isiah on Marbury is huge. We saw this in the Olympics, when Marbury was struggled and called Isiah, he responded by being the best player on the floor two games in a row. We will see this even more this year.
-They have an entire training camp to work with Lenny Wilkens.

I think all of those factors outweigh the Magic. In 3 years when Howard is putting up 25/12/3 I'll give them the nod, but right now the Knicks look like they're in better shape.

I dont expect Dwight to be consistent on the o--he will have his games where he gets a great deal of high % shots and others he will struggle. But where i like him in year 1, will be his ability to really become a dominant type rebounder/shot blocker right away. he's to big athletic and skilled not to have immediate impact. I think he is mentally stronger with a much better supporting cast then a guy like kwame brown. This is a guy coming into the league who is 6-11 with a wingspan of 7-5 and can jump over 3 feet in the air and has tremendous basketball IQ with skills for his age. He's going to have his 20 point games and hes going to have 6 point games, but if he gets 30+ minutes --hes going to average 13 points 11 rebounds 3 blocks 4 assits and be a real disruptive force on the D if you add in Garrity for the other 15-18 minutes as aback up--you are likely looking at 18-19 points 15 rebounds 5 assits coming out of that 4 spot
shooting close to 50%. Lat year really that had no c they had PFs playing C--now they dont have a supertsra for sure, but they have 2 athletci shot blockers who can also rebound. So their interior D will be RADICALLY improved from last year--night and day IMHO.


Arguably they have a top 3 PG who in any give season can be ranked 1-2-3. hes just as good as Marbury--sometimes better sometimes worse but right on par with Marbury which says a lot. Mobley is very under rated---a chaucker? well 2Gs are supposed to score and he does so at 43% in this offense I see him going back to 20 points 4 reb 3 assits with solid D.

Last year who played 1-2 if we count Tmac as 3? Gordon gircek+stevenson bogans +jaques vaughn now they have Steve Francis Cutino Mobley Bogans and Jameer Nelson

Grant hill in his prime was a better player than Mcgrady and if he is healthy and at 75% of his old self, he will be a tremendous complimentary player at SF--remember he has been 1st and 2nd team all defensive as well with hedo backing him up OR starting if grant cant go.

They lost a lot of ME type players who wrent good two way players. there will be NO team in the league who will have improved as much in the defensive+rebounding dept+ they have done a marvelous job of diversyfing the O and adding the depth they just didnt have last year. they spent the money--they made some smart trades and they got 1-2 what I would call lock franchise type players along the frontline in the draft--in addition to the player of the year in Nelson who reminds me a lot of tim hardaway without the hops


I agree with Nalod-there are a lot of ifs and it is going to take some time when you change over the roster, but i think they can get things going after the intial 10 games--in the eastthat doesnt mean much--just like the knicks--even if we do suffer in the first ten--its not a big deal.

Posted by tkf:

Grant hill in his prime was better than Mcgrady?

ooohh, I dunno about that....

I take Hill. Better mentally if nothing else. More fundamentals, more of a leader. I'm not sure Tmac is a top 5 player where Hill easily was.

Getting Francis is almost enough for McGrady. Nope not a chance, the deal is alright for the Magic, they gave away two solid starter Howard and McGrady...

They should have done the deal with the Suns but didn't, and they should have tried a deal with the Clippers for Q, and a pick, but they didn't.

Howard is going to make a tough first year transition, but works hard, so they got one great building block, and another that slipped under the radar...Jameer Nelson, thank the Miami Heat.

But the Magic are no underated at all they are going to be playing for a spot in the 7-10 range...

Posted by Andrew:

...and countless others in 04-05.

Sorry...I meant 03-04.