The Orlando Magic fired general manager Rob Hennigan on Thursday.
Now the hits keep coming.
According to ESPN’s Marc Spears and USA Today‘s Sam Amick, the Magic coaching staff and others wanted to make a trade for DeMarcus Cousins, but Hennigan balked at the idea:
As @MarcJSpearsESPN noted, Magic would have had DeMarcus if not for Hennigan's concerns. Scott wanted him, was confident he could connect.
— Sam Amick (@sam_amick) April 13, 2017
Ouch.
As most know by now, Cousins landed with the New Orleans Pelicans and forms the nastiest frontcourt in the league alongside Anthony Davis.
Folks will probably split into two camps on this one. On one side, some would suggest trading for a problem player like Cousins would be a bad move given the Dwight Howard situation that engulfed the franchise. Others would counter by simply saying talent is talent.
Regardless, as Josh Robbins of the Orlando Sentinel wrote in a report detailing Hennigan’s firing, the rebuild had zero direction whatsoever:
Even worse, the rebuilding plan that Hennigan shepherded — a plan that CEO Alex Martins and the DeVos family implicitly endorsed when Hennigan was hired — appears to have lost all traction, with no light at the end of the tunnel and no clear pathway back to relevance.
This is merely the latest example. The Magic had made odd moves such as trading for Serge Ibaka, only to dish him away after half a year, yet turned around and didn’t pull the trigger on a trade for a player like Cousins.
The Magic won’t have another shot at a player like Cousins for a long time, which might be for the best. Formulating a plan and actually sticking to it would be a step in the right direction.
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