Via Marc J Spears of Yahoo! Sports:
Celtics trading F Glen Davis in sign and trade to Magic for F Brandon Bass, source tells [Yahoo! Sports].
UPDATE: At Bob Vander Weide’s press conference on Wednesday, in which he formally stepped down as CEO of the Orlando Magic, general manager Otis Smith was peppered with questions pertaining to Dwight Howard’s future with the franchise. This is what Smith said:
“We’re gonna continue to put the best team on the floor to win an NBA title. That doesn’t necessarily mean that we’re going to listen to everything Dwight has to say and placate to that. That doesn’t necessarily mean how our organization is ran. Our organization is ran… we want him here as long as we can have him here, and our organization is ran to win a title. We built a culture here for a reason.”
Here lies the problem. According to a report, Glen Davis is one of the players that Howard wanted the Magic to acquire. Howard and Davis have a friendship that dates back to their time in AAU. The issue is that, after Smith said that he wasn’t going to placate to Howard, he does just that.
Exacerbating the problem is that, on top of trying to appease Howard (which is the same cosmic mistake that the Cleveland Cavaliers made with LeBron James), Orlando — talent-wise — just got worse by trading away Bass and acquiring Davis in return.
For all of Bass’ shortcomings, which primarily was due to the fact that he wasn’t a great fit with the Magic in the first place because of his inability to spread the floor like Rashard Lewis and Ryan Anderson, he struggled with team concepts defensively even though he’s a good individual defender, and his skill-set was better suited as a top-flight reserve than as an average starter, it doesn’t change that he’s a good player with a fair contract ($4 million per year). Bass was one of the last good assets Orlando had left. And now it’s gone. Better yet, the Magic just improved the Boston Celtics’ roster — a team they’re directly competing with in the Eastern Conference.
Let’s address Davis.
Is Davis an NBA-caliber player? Yes. Is Davis a good player? No. Aside from being a decent defender (mostly because of his ability to draw charges, which is a redeeming defensive quality), Davis is extremely inefficient on offense, a below-average jumpshooter, and a below-average rebounder (for his position) that constantly has to battle with his weight. Cumulatively, Davis is a worse player than Bass and it’s not even close. Oh, and with a 4-year, $26 million contract, Davis is overpaid. As if Orlando doesn’t already have enough players being paid more than they’re worth.
How does Davis fit in with the Magic? Who knows.
What we do know is that Smith placated Howard, weakened Orlando as a team, wasted an asset, improved a conference rival, and gave away a good player on a fair contract for a bad one that’s overpaid.
