Orlando Magic Trade Grades: Nikola Vucevic, Evan Fournier and Aaron Gordon deadline deals

The Orlando Magic’s brain trust has fulfilled the request fans have been clamoring for.

After two seasons barely qualifying for the playoffs and 40-plus games of below-average play in 2021, president of basketball operations Jeff Weltman made the decision to trade away Nikola Vucevic, Evan Fournier, and Aaron Gordon for young players and draft assets.

The Orlando Magic chose to hit reset on the franchise at this year’s trade deadline, sending out the three pillars of the franchise for a clean slate. Our grades from a busy Thursday.

Some of these moves were expected.

Gordon was considered to be the surest availability on the open market after his trade request to management went public earlier this week. Fournier’s expiring contract also put him squarely on the block as the Magic seemed unlikely to retain him.

Vucevic, on the other hand, was unexpected. The team seemed poise to keep the All-Star around to help next year’s young team remain competitive.

But Credit to Weltman and his staff, who made the difficult decision to act on a spontaneous offer they felt was too valuable to pass up. And they decided it was better to his reset now than wait or string this thing out any longer.

Orlando chose to clear its cap sheet and bank wholly on its high draft pick, adding to its draft capital in the process.

But, this does not mean these three decisions were all necessarily instrumental in increasing the Magic’s future chances of success. Did Weltman and his staff make the right moves at the deadline?

Here are our grades.

Trade Grade: B

The Nikola Vucevic-to-Chicago deal was the first big news of the morning and began the quick series of moves from the Orlando Magic leading to the exchange of their veteran core for young talent and draft assets.

The Magic received a fairly good haul for their All-Star, even if more than two years remain on his team-friendly four-year, $100-million contract.

The return from the Chicago Bulls largely comes in the form of 21-year-old Wendell Carter, who has shown stretches of superb play, particularly on the defensive end of the floor, in his three seasons with the Bulls.

Carter Jr. is averaging 10.9 points and 7.8 rebounds in 24.7 minutes of action per game.

However, he has dealt with injuries throughout his young career, which makes him a slightly risky proposition to fill Vucevic’s shoes as the team’s starting center going forward.

Otto Porter was included in the deal for salary purposes, given he is owed $28 million in the final year of his backloaded contract. The expectation is that Porter Jr. will remain with the team until he enters unrestricted free agency this summer.

The big draw for the Magic in this deal is the two lightly-protected first-round picks from Chicago, scheduled for 2021 and 2023. Both picks are top-four protected.

Chicago is currently in 10th place in the East, with the 19th-best record in the NBA, which nearly guarantees the 2021 pick will convey under these terms to Orlando.

The trade also provides the Magic with substantial cap flexibility in 2022 and 2023, with an estimated $96 million in obligated salary remaining for next season. This leaves the Magic with around $16 million in room to fill out their roster around their young core of Jonathan Isaac, Markelle Fultz, and Chuma Okeke.

While sentimental, the loss of Vucevic cannot be understated. As Orlando’s biggest star since Dwight Howard, Nikola Vucevic became one of the franchise’s greatest players during his nine-year carer with the Magic.

His current campaign is the finest of his career: 24.5 points-per-game on 40.6-percent shooting from outside. And more importantly, Vucevic would have proved valuable in mentoring Orlando’s young core going forward.

The Magic will certainly miss Vucevic, but the opportunity to reset is a nominally better course towards competing for the future, even if both seem out of reach today.

Trade Grade: B-

After Nikola Vucevic was sent to Chicago, the Orlando Magic made quick work to finalize the deal to send Evan Fournier on his expiring $17-million deal to the Boston Celtics for two second-round picks.

This is the NBA’s equivalent of a fire sale. The assumption is that there was muted interest for Fournier on the market and Orlando’s management felt that a small return would be better than simply losing Fournier outright in free agency this summer.

According to Adam Himmelsbach of the Boston Globe, the picks are Boston’s own 2027 second-rounder and the lesser of the Boston Celtics’ 2025 second-round pick or the 2025 second-round pick the team acquired from the Memphis Grizzlies.

Orlando did a good job in pushing these picks out as far in the future as possible, in hopes that either or both will fall closer to the beginning of the second round.

Jeff Teague also came to Orlando in the deal, but the Magic quickly released the veteran guard, affording him the opportunity to find a new home in the buyout market.

To make the trade work, Boston is sending Orlando a $17.15 million trade exception which can be used in a future trade. That may end up being the real prize of this deal if Orlando can acquire a player within this tool.

So perhaps judgment of this deal is a bit premature.

Fournier has been the Magic’s surest high-volume outside shooter this season. The 28-year-old shooting guard is shooting 38.8-percent on 7.2 3-point attempts per game.

While Orlando will certainly miss his floor spacing, Fournier provided little additional benefit to this Magic roster, particularly on the defensive end of the floor.

Trade Grade: C

Of the three moves the Magic made today, the return for Aaron Gordon seems the least substantial.

Maybe Gordon’s public request decreased his asking value because the rest of the league assumed Orlando had no choice in the matter. Some of these rumors are unsubstantiated, mere gambits by agents and teams.

Regardless, Gordon is more valuable than a package centered around a young development project and an overpaid shooting guard with an inefficient outside shot. If either R.J. Hampton develops or Gary Harris regains his shooting form, this trade becomes a solid piece of work on Orlando’s part.

After a slow start to the season and setbacks due to a couple of different injuries, Gordon has shown strong form through 25 games this season. He’s averaging 14.6 points, 6.6 rebounds, and 4.2 assists in his spot time at point forward, including 37.5-percent on 3-pointers.

His 43.7-percent overall field-goal percentage is less than stellar, but this should improve in a Denver system with a plethora of offensive creators.

Of course, Gordon’s greatest value comes from his defensive flexibility, one which will need to be filled by Gary Harris, R.J. Hampton and Jonathan Isaac next season.

With a year-and-a-half remaining on his deal, the Magic did not have to trade Gordon now, but they likely believed his play thus far in 20221 and the extra half-season on his contract afforded them the best possible opportunity to capitalize.

The 2025 first-round pick is top-five protected, meaning there is a high probability it conveys to Orlando if Denver continues to compete atop the Western Conference standings.

Where the franchise goes from here is largely dependent on their ability to pick well in the 2021 draft and beyond, and on the development of Hampton and Carter Jr. Additional production out of Porter Jr. or Harris is an added bonus.

Now we turn our attention to the remainder of the 2020-21 season and beyond. What will this iteration of the Orlando Magic look like?

We’ll start to receive some answers Friday night when the Orlando Magic host the Portland Trail Blazers at the Amway Center.