Orlando, FL - The most exciting time of the NBA season is almost here. 

The 2023 NBA Trade Deadline is quickly approaching, meaning that trades across the league are imminent. We’re almost certain to see teams scramble to make deals to improve their rosters before the clock strikes 3:00 on Thursday afternoon. We’ve seen a few happen already, such as the Kyrie Irving trade on Sunday. But we’re bound to get more. As trade deadlines of the past have told us, many clubs are going to look drastically different in the next two days. 

But what about the Orlando Magic? How much will our roster change between now and Thursday? The short answer is: probably not that much. We should be in the market for an additional player or two, but don’t expect some insane roster upheaval or a blockbuster move. We did that two years ago when we shipped off Magic mainstays Nikola Vucevic, Evan Fournier, and Aaron Gordon and created an entirely brand new roster. Jeff Weltman and company more or less have the roster they want to build around going forward.

If we are to make a significant move this deadline, it’s probably going to be a smaller move to make the team better long-term, or to set up for improvements in the offseason (such as to free up roster space). It probably won’t have much of an impact for this season.

By that same token, we’re not going to tank either. I doubt that our front office has any interest in intentionally making the team worse just to increase our odds at selecting Victor “glorified Bol Bol” (as some idiot once poorly described) Wembanyama, even though Wembanyama will absolutely break the NBA once he’s drafted. We have our future stars already in Paolo Banchero and Franz Wagner. All we need now is to complete the roster. Any move we make is going to be for the betterment of this team, not for its detriment. 

The Orlando Magic are open for business during this year’s NBA trade deadline. We have assets that many teams covet, and I don’t see why we couldn’t deal them for players that fit our team better. But what would those possible trades look like? I asked the rest of the team at Orlando Magic HQ for their answers to that question, and we came up with quite a few. Here are some realistic trades we came up with that you could expect to see happen before Thursday’s deadline.

*Key:

FRP = first round pick

SRP = second round pick

(own) = our own draft pick; not one that was given to us by another team

Trade Idea 1 (Suggested by Kieran): 

NYK receives: Mo Bamba, RJ Hampton, 2025 SRP (own), 2026 SRP (own)

ORL receives: Isaiah Hartenstein, Cam Reddish

New York’s misuse of Isaiah Hartenstein is a tragedy on par with Shakespeare. Hartenstein is one of the game’s most gifted playmaking bigs, not unlike a Domantas Sabonis or Nikola Jokic (albeit on a much lesser scale), but the Knicks don’t particularly seem to care. They’re more fond of using him as a roll man than playing into his strengths as a playmaker. Per Cleaning The Glass, Hartenstein has an assist-to-usage ratio of just 5.9% this season (a stat that measures how often a player gets an assist when he gets the ball compared to when he shoots it), a harsh drop-off from the 18.9% he had last season as a Clipper. That’s why he’s underperforming in New York. He’s not a bad player; he’s just being played the wrong way.

The Magic were reportedly in on Hartenstein over the summer before he signed with New York. This week could be our second chance to get him, and we could even pry Cam Reddish away from them too. Reddish, a high school superstar, hasn’t yet found his footing in the Association yet. That’s not entirely the fault of New York, or even Atlanta who drafted him, since a lot of his struggles are due to minutes and his apparent desire for a bigger role than what he’s being given. In addition to adding Hartenstein, we can give Reddish a meaningful role on this team as a creator off the bench. If that experiment doesn’t work, we can let to re-sign the soon-to-be restricted free agent walk in the summer. The price? New York’s own Mo Bamba (who I’ll talk deeper about in a following section), change-of-scenery candidate RJ Hampton, and two second-round-picks just to sweeten the pot. The Knicks get off of Hartenstein’s contract and replace him with a big that’s actually good at rolling to the rim and protecting it, and the Magic get that playmaking big off the bench they wanted in June, while adding a talented shot creator. That’s a win-win if I’ve ever seen one.

Trade Idea 2 (Suggested by Al):

LAC receives: Mo Bamba

ORL receives: Luke Kennard

Orlando needs shooting. The Clippers need rim protection off the bench. Both of these can be fixed in one trade.

I do believe this is the year we say goodbye to Mo Bamba. He doesn’t fit our team’s timeline or roster construction, he seems unengaged on defense frequently, and despite the massive opportunity head coach Jamahl Mosley has given him all season, he’s shown little more than flashes of promise. I know. We here at Orlando Magic HQ, we have long been believers in Bamba. But now that Jonathan Isaac is returning to play, we just don’t see a role for him on this team going forward. He does have value however, as a very productive rim protector with solid spacing and a frame that any NBA coach would love to work with. Teams are calling about him, and the Magic are reportedly listening.

The Clippers are around the middle-of-the-pack in rim protection, and Bamba would only help. He’s only 24 years old and still has a lot to give to a contending team, especially in a role as a paint protector and occasional shooting threat off the bench. In his place, we get Luke Kennard, one of basketball’s most deadly shooters. One of the few aspects of basketball that we’re clearly missing is a knockdown shooting threat, and Kennard’s 44.7% shooting from deep (per Basketball Reference) this season provides exactly that. This move would free up minutes for our bigs, and it would add the elite shooter that we’ve been missing since JJ Redick. The contracts are similar, so the two players can be traded for each other. I’m not sure how the Clippers would feel about this trade, but I do believe that they are better with Bamba than with Kennard.

Trade Idea 3 (Suggested by Kieran and Al):

LAL receives: Terrence Ross

ORL receives: Patrick Beverley, 2025 SRP

Talk about players that don’t fit our timeline. If Bamba’s days in Orlando are numbered, then Ross’s are fractions. The organization’s longest-tenured player has given just about everything he has to the organization he’s been with since 2017. He’s no longer the microwave scorer he used to be, he doesn’t provide much else anymore, and he takes away minutes from our other, younger guards. Losing Ross will hurt. He’s a strong veteran presence and the sole surviving Magic man from the Hennigan era. But his age and skillset are both best suited for a team that wants to win now, as opposed to a team with plenty of time on their hands like us. He’s already requested a trade before. It’s in the interest of all parties involved to give it to him.

In this scenario, Ross goes to the Los Angeles Lakers another team that doesn’t have much time left to win. They have one of the two greatest players of all time in LeBron James, and his championship window is rapidly closing. His team doesn’t have the scoring or spacing necessary to go far, and their depth chart at guard is questionable at best. Ross gives them a stable scorer and fits nicely into their starting SG spot. He could be one of the pieces that the Lakers need to give James his fifth ring. In return, we would get a second round pick as well as Patrick Beverley, who we could either waive or keep him around. If we choose to award him a roster spot, he provides a solid 3-and-D presence at guard and strong leadership to replace Ross’s. If we cut him, then he can contribute on a team in the middle of a playoff push, like he did last year in Minnesota. Either way, this is a fitting sendoff for one of the most beloved Magic players of the last decade. If this is the end for Terrence Ross in pinstripes, I hope he makes just as much of an impact on his team and its fans as much as he did ours.

Trade Idea 4 (suggested by Kieran, Al and Jay):

BKN receives: Mo Bamba, RJ Hampton

ORL receives: Seth Curry, Edmond Sumner

We used a package of Mo Bamba and RJ Hampton in our fake trade with the other team in New York, but we could also give it to Brooklyn for a completely different type of player than Hartenstein. Like I said for Trade Idea 2, the Magic need shooting. Badly. Our only great shooter in a purely-shooting role is Gary Harris, and we still need more so we can hit shots when he’s off the floor. Brooklyn has the opposite problem: they have too many guys who do nothing but shoot. We all like a trade with the Nets for that very reason, and we have assets that they could use as well. Nic Claxton has been an outstanding defender for Brooklyn this season, but it’s hard to play him when the clock winds down because he’s one of basketball’s worst free-throw shooters. Bamba, while not the same type of defender that Claxton is, isn’t the type of big you’d be deliberately seeking out to foul late in the game. The Nets need a backup center anyway; why not acquire someone with untapped potential like Bamba? I’m sure the Nets could turn him into a capable bench defender with a change of scenery, and at the very least he provides solid center depth and someone you can rely on for a free-throw or two.

In return for Bamba, we would get Seth Curry. The Curry name is synonymous with three-point shooting, as both brothers have garnered well-deserved reputations as two of the greatest shooters in the sport’s history. The biggest thing we need right now is spacing and off-ball shooting to complement Paolo Banchero, and I don’t think there’s a better person in the league to do that right now than the younger Curry brother. Curry, like Kennard, provides Orlando with the elite shooting the team has needed for years. I can see him receiving so many kick-outs from Banchero. He’s a perfect fit. If Brooklyn sees that as somewhat of an underpay, we can offer RJ Hampton as a future replacement for Brooklyn off the bench for Patty Mills. We could make contracts work if they give us someone like Edmond Sumner.

There’s also a shot that Brooklyn will not be Spencer Dinwiddie’s permanent home, as Jay pointed out. We could look into him as a scoring threat off the bench, whether trying to get him, Curry, or potentially both. But no matter what, we should be calling Brooklyn to see what they want from us, because they have just about everything we need.

Of course, there’s no guarantee that any of these trades will happen, or even any of these players will be traded. It’s also possible that nothing happens, and the Magic finish the season with their current roster. But there are improvements we can make to this roster, and trades such as these can certainly do so.