- Magic big man Jonathan Isaac missed his third straight game on Wednesday night with a right hamstring/adductor strain, but he did rejoin the team in Milwaukee and was able to go through parts of Tuesday’s practice, according to Khobi Price of The Orlando Sentinel (subscriber link). Price reports that the Magic are “operating with an abundance of caution” due to the amount of time Isaac has missed the past few years. The 25-year-old has played 11 games thus far in ’22/23.
The Magic have signed free agent guard Michael Carter-Williams, the team announced (via Twitter).
Shams Charania of The Athletic was the first to report the deal, tweeting that it’s a two-year contract with a team option for 2023/24.
Carter-Williams, 31, was the No. 11 pick of the 2013 draft out of Syracuse, winning Rookie of the Year with the Sixers in the ’13/14 season. He has bounced around a good amount since, having also played for Milwaukee, Chicago, Charlotte, Houston and Orlando.
The veteran guard, who is known for his defense, originally caught on with the Magic at the end of the 2018/19 season, signing a couple of 10-day contracts and then a rest-of-season deal. He signed a one-year, minimum-salary deal to remain with Orlando that summer, then re-signed with the Magic in the 2020 offseason on a two-year, $6MM contract that ran through the end of 2022.
Carter-Williams’ last NBA appearance came in April 2021 during the ’20/21 season, as he had offseason ankle surgery in August 2021 that kept him sidelined in ’21/22 until he was waived as part of a multiplayer trade. He has been a free agent since he was cut last February.
In 391 games, including 217 starts (25.3 MPG), Carter-Williams holds career averages of 10.3 PPG, 4.4 RPG, 4.4 APG and 1.3 SPG on .402/.255/.706 shooting splits. The Magic have an opening on their standard roster, so a corresponding move is not necessary.
Coming into the 2022/23 season, there was some concern that the presence of Scoot Henderson and (especially) Victor Wembanyama at the top of the 2023 draft class could result in some pretty aggressive tanking from the bottom third of the NBA’s teams.
It hasn’t played out that way so far though, due to a competitive race for the top 10 spots in each conference. In the West, the top 13 teams all either hold a playoff or play-in spot or are no more than 1.5 games back of the No. 10 seed. It’s not quite as congested in the East, but the conference’s 13th team is only four games out of a play-in spot.
As a result, there have been only four teams in full-on “race for Wembanyama” mode, and one of those four clubs hasn’t exactly been in tanking mode as of late, winning its last four games. Here’s what the bottom of the NBA’s standings look like as of Sunday morning:
- Houston Rockets (13-46)
- San Antonio Spurs (14-47)
- Detroit Pistons (15-46)
- Charlotte Hornets (19-43)
- Orlando Magic (25-36)
- Indiana Pacers (27-35)
- Chicago Bulls (27-33)
- Los Angeles Lakers (28-32)
- (tie) Portland Trail Blazers / Oklahoma City Thunder / Washington Wizards (28-31)
Given that the odds for the No. 1 pick are the same for each of the NBA’s three worst teams, it seemed as if we’d get a four-team race for those three spots at the bottom of the standings. But the Hornets have won their last four games and appear far better positioned to continue getting victories than the Rockets (losers of eight in a row and 23 of their last 26), the Spurs (losers of 15 in a row and 21 of 22), and the Pistons (losers of four in a row and seven of their last eight).
Of course, if the Hornets were to play .500 ball the rest of the way, they’d still end up with just 29 wins, so they may end up with the NBA’s fourth-worst record even if they finish strong. After all, the Bulls, Lakers, Trail Blazers, and Wizards all seem motivated to make the play-in.
The Magic, Pacers, and Thunder are perhaps candidates for stealth end-of-season tanks in order to secure top-five lottery odds, since none of those clubs expected to be a playoff team this season. But they’ve been competitive all season and would probably have to start ruling out some of their top players due to injuries if they want to start winning less often (similar to what Portland did last year).
As for the race to the bottom among the NBA’s three worst teams, it’s hard to bet against the Rockets, who also finished with the league’s worst record in 2021 and 2022. But the Spurs are giving them a run for their money with their recent stretch of futility, posting an abysmal -15.8 net rating during their 15-game current losing streak. And the Pistons seem happy to experiment with new lineups while incorporating recently added players.
We want to know what you think. How will the race for lottery positioning play out the rest of the way? Which team will finish as the NBA’s worst? Has the Hornets’ recent success locked them into the fourth spot in the lottery standings? Are there any teams with 25 or more wins that you expect to go into full-on tank mode in the coming days or weeks?
Head to the comment section below to weigh in!
- Admiral Schofield‘s new contract with the Magic is a two-year, minimum-salary deal, Hoops Rumors has learned. Schofield will earn $506,508 for the rest of this season and Orlando will hold a $1,997,238 team option on the forward for 2023/24.
2:12pm: The Magic have officially waived Hampton, the team confirmed in a press release.
1:55pm: The Magic are waiving former first-round pick R.J. Hampton, according to Khobi Price of The Orlando Sentinel (Twitter link).
The No. 24 pick in the 2020 draft, Hampton was part of Orlando’s return in the 2021 trade that sent Aaron Gordon to Denver. He had a rotation role in his first season-and-a-half with the Magic, but has seen his playing time decline precipitously in 2022/23 after the team declined the ’23/24 team option on his rookie scale contract.
Hampton, who turned 22 earlier this month, appeared in just 26 contests for the Magic this season, averaging 5.7 points, 1.5 rebounds, and 1.3 assists on .439/.340/.838 shooting in 13.9 minutes per game. He wasn’t a regular contributor in a crowded backcourt that features Markelle Fultz, Cole Anthony, Jalen Suggs, and Gary Harris.
Considered a trade candidate for much of this season, Hampton remained in Orlando through the February 9 deadline. A report surfaced shortly after the deadline suggesting that his days with the Magic were numbered.
Hampton has a $2,412,840 cap hit for 2022/23, so a team with cap room or a trade exception big enough to absorb that amount could place a waiver claim. The more likely scenario is that he’ll go unclaimed and seek out a new home as an unrestricted free agent.
The Magic are also promoting two-way player Admiral Schofield to a standard contract, so once officially they complete both transactions, they’ll have two spots available on their 17-man roster — one standard and one two-way.
2:11pm: The move is official, the Magic announced in a press release.
1:22pm: The Magic are signing forward Admiral Schofield to a new two-year standard contract, agents Mark Bartelstein and George Roussakis tell Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN (Twitter link).
Schofield had been on a two-way deal since re-signing with Orlando last July. The new agreement will promote him to the 15-man roster with no corresponding move necessary, since the Magic are currently carrying only 14 players on standard contracts.
A second-round pick in 2019 out of Tennessee, Schofield began his professional career with the Wizards but has spent most of the last two seasons with the Magic, providing depth in Orlando’s frontcourt. In 2022/23, he has averaged 4.6 PPG and 1.9 RPG in 27 appearances (13.0 MPG), while posting career-best shooting marks (.478/.333/.895).
The exact terms of Schofield’s new deal aren’t known, but it’s unlikely to include much – if any – guaranteed money beyond this season. A minimum-salary contract seems probable, but the Magic do have an unused portion of their mid-level exception available if they want to give the 25-year-old more than the minimum.
Magic forward Paolo Banchero, the No. 1 overall pick of last June’s draft, is looking like a strong favorite to win the Rookie of the Year award, according to Kelly Iko, Eric Nehm and Josh Robbins of The Athletic. The three beat writers for The Athletic all had votes for the award last season.
Robbins points out that Banchero ranks first among rookies in points per game (19.9), fourth in rebounds (6.6) and third in assists (3.6), a sign of his all-around game. The 20-year-old has been in a major shooting slump in February, going 1-of-27 from 3-point range, but many of his rookie peers have gone through peaks and valleys as well.
The three writers would have Indiana’s Bennedict Mathurin second and Utah’s Walker Kessler third on their ballots at the All-Star break.
Here’s more from the Southeast:
- Mike Bianchi of The Orlando Sentinel (subscriber link) believes the Magic and Terrence Ross did right by each other. Instead of trading him to a random team for a second-round pick, the Magic bought Ross out and waived him to let him pick his next destination (Phoenix). As Bianchi writes, when the team started rebuilding a couple years ago, Ross was one of the few veterans left on the roster, but instead of publicly complaining or being a distraction he served as a positive mentor for the younger players. Bianchi believes players and agents around the NBA will notice that Orlando treated Ross well after a seven-year stint with the team.
- Both Kyle Kuzma and Kristaps Porzingis are having career years in 2022/23 and both players can enter free agency in the summer if they decline their player options (Kuzma has already publicly said he’s going to). What does that mean for the Wizards going forward? Chase Hughes explores that topic for NBC Sports Washington.
- The Heat intend to bolster their frontcourt depth by signing Kevin Love and Cody Zeller. Anthony Chiang of The Miami Herald reports that Love is expected to receive part of the Heat’s mid-level exception, while Zeller will likely receive a minimum-salary deal for the rest of the season, though the details were still being finalized as of Sunday afternoon.
It was quite a Valentine’s Day for Mac McClung. He was signed to a two-way contract by the Sixers and, hours later, was named as one of the four participants in this year’s Slam Dunk competition during All-Star weekend, according to an NBA press release.
He’ll be joined by the Rockets’ Kenyon Martin Jr., the Pelicans’ Trey Murphy III and the Knicks’ Jericho Sims.
The Skills Challenge will feature a brother act. Team Antetokounmpo, predictably, will include Giannis Antetokounmpo and Thanasis Antetokounmpo of the Bucks and Alex Antetokounmpo of the G League’s Wisconsin Herd.
Team Jazz will include Jordan Clarkson, Walker Kessler and Collin Sexton, while Team Rookies will feature top pick Paolo Banchero of the Magic, as well as the Pistons’ Jaden Ivey and the Rockets’ Jabari Smith Jr.
The participants in this year’s 3-point contest can be found here.
- Patrick Beverley will give some money back to the Magic if he signs with another team, according to ESPN’s Bobby Marks (Insider link). Beverley was waived on Saturday after reaching a buyout with the Magic. Beverley had a $13MM contract and will receive that full amount from Orlando if he remains a free agent. The Magic’s obligation to him would be reduced by $918,516 if he were to sign with a team on Tuesday, says Marks.
7:41pm: Bitadze received a two-year deal with a team option for next season, Michael Scotto of HoopsHype tweets.
6:26pm: The Magic have signed former Pacers center Goga Bitadze, according to a team press release.
Bitadze was waived when Indiana needed to create roster space in the four-team blockbuster trade that sent Kevin Durant to Phoenix. The Pacers acquired Jordan Nwora, George Hill, Serge Ibaka in the deal, though Ibaka was later waived.
Bitadze played in 21 games this season with Indiana, averaging 3.3 points and 2.3 rebounds in 9.6 minutes. He was in the final season of his rookie scale contract when Indiana let him go.
The 18th overall pick of the 2019 draft, Bitadze has played in 170 career games (21 starts), averaging 4.8 points and 2.8 rebounds in 11.5 minutes.
Orlando had some open roster spots after waiving Terrence Ross and recently acquired Patrick Beverley. The Magic also traded a big man, Mohamed Bamba, to the Lakers, so that may open up some playing time for Bitadze.