<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post"> ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) -- First-round draft pick Fran Vazquez has decided to remain in Europe instead of joining the Orlando Magic this season. The 6-foot-10 power forward from Spain was the 11th pick in the June draft and the first European player selected. He was expected to play right away for the Magic, but surprised the team and his agent with his decision Thursday. </div> Yahoo! News
well, that's the risk of taking a forgien player. you dont know and you cant control if they will go back overseas or not.
So they get nothing to compensate? I think there should be a rule for players that get drafted in the first round, if they dont sign they cant never play in the NBA. ever.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Bahir:</div><div class="quote_post">So they get nothing to compensate? I think there should be a rule for players that get drafted in the first round, if they dont sign they cant never play in the NBA. ever.</div> yeah, it'd be fair punnishment but than the magic would be more screwed than they are now. This offseason for the magic was disgusting, the only move i liked was drafting diener and even that had negative implications. I.E. sending a warning to Jameer Nelson that despite being an excellent player he;s worthless and should just kill himself because we'lll never take a chance on a short guy unless we have another shjort guy to back him up, and forget andre barrett, he;s to short and not white enough.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Bahir:</div><div class="quote_post">So they get nothing to compensate? I think there should be a rule for players that get drafted in the first round, if they dont sign they cant never play in the NBA. ever.</div> for them to never play in the NBA again EVER is a bit drastic...but I do believe the Magic should be compensated in some fashion, although with as much scouting and inside research they do for draft picks, they shouldve atleast seen that this could've been a possibility for vasquez...
No I think its fair. Entering the draft should be a commitment to play for the team you are drafted by (in the first round). If you dont like the team you are drafted by, tough luck. Steve Francis, or whoever it was, would not be playing in the league today if I was the comissioner (or, well, perhaps he would, because he would have know the rules from the beginning... )
This was a very poor job on the part of the Magic scouts. They should have at least had a verbal agreement in place with Fran Vazquez before he was drafted. Whoever had the final say in picking Vazquez over Sean May, who is tearing up the Summer Leagues, should be fired. As for Fran Vazquez, everyone is saying bad things about him, but I don't necessarily blame him for wanting to stay in Spain. If he could make decent money playing basketball in his home country and that's what he truly enjoys, then he should be able to do that. He was automatically eligible for the draft, so it's not like he entered early and just now changed his mind. I'm sure if the Magic talked to him prior to the draft, he probably would have told them his intentions. Andrew Gaze, Arvidis Sabonis, and many other great foreign basketball players have had great careers playing basketball in their home countries. NBA fans need to realize that there's more option out there for these players than just American basketball, and sometimes the players are uncomfortable working in another country when they can stay at home. I really think that in the end this will change the way that international players are scouted. You have to think that teams will be much more cautious before drafting them and may ask for commitments before the draft, if such a thing is allowed. Who knows, this could really hurt the stock a player like Tiago Splitter, who already has a tough contract situation to negotiate. I never expected to see this happen. It's truly a sign that our game has gone global.
Very well said Voodoo Child and I agree with you on nearly every part except maybe that Fran is to blame partly as well. I think he used the draft to increase his value in Spain so that he gets the contract he wants. But as you said, it's mainly the fault of the management or to be more precise Twardzik in this case as he had the final say in this (Otis Smith prefered Granger). But as a whole they did a very poor scouting job and as far as I know never really talked with him prior to the draft and afterwards, mostly with this US agent, I'm also hearing bad things about his Spanish agent. For more opinions, have a look into the Orlando Magic Forum (link in my sig). There are some good posts about this topic.
