Here's Magic General Manager Otis Smith's dream, which initially sounds like a nightmare:
Smith hopes Gilbert Arenas causes a major controversy.
That's right.
Gilbert's no stranger to dark headlines, of course, but Smith is talking about him stirring things up on the court, not the gun range.
Smith wants to see Arenas create waves in Orlando by challenging Jameer Nelson for the starting point-guard job next season — or even seizing it from Nelson.
This scenario sounds far-fetched now, given Gilbert's struggles since arriving in a mid-December trade.
"I'm OK with having a controversy with players fighting for a job,"
Smith said. "That's a good problem to have. I'll deal with that issue."
Smith's response came when I asked him about the clouds hovering over Arenas' future with the Magic.
He hasn't been healthy, bothered by a troublesome left leg. And — as a career starter — Arenas is not happy as Nelson's back-up, even though he's showed little progress with his downsized minutes.
So how does the view change for Arenas and the Magic over the next three seasons, with Gil making $20 million per?
Arenas can't challenge Nelson until he's right physically. "I mean, I don't know,"
Arenas told me. "All I can do is get the leg back to beef-cake."
In Gil-speak, "back to beef-cake"
means a leg that proudly could be displayed in a muscle magazine – and is basketball functional.
When I asked Arenas if he could see himself continuing as Nelson's valet, he said, "Next season I got to earn my minutes in training camp."
"I came into this situation….Look, Turk (Hedo Turkoglu) comes in here when there was no 3 (small forward), so there you go. J-Rich (shooting guard Jason Richardson) came in, taking Vince's (Vince Carter) spot. There's you're starting 2."
"I came in…there was a guy already there (Nelson)."
Added Arenas, "When people look at the production and then they look at my salary, they're like, 'He's not producing.' This team is not built for me to come in and dominate. It's built for me to come in and co-exist with everybody else."
"I got traded for Rashard, (but) he was a starting 4 (power forward), playing 30-40 minutes. I'm a back-up point guard, playing 15, 16 minutes (a game). It's two different people."
I doubt Arenas ever will embrace coming off the bench, much less his freelance personality fitting into Stan Van Gundy's structured style. Smith disagrees, throwing in a caveat.
"Can Gil embrace it? Yeah. Can he embrace it on the fly? I'm not necessarily sure,"
Smith said.
Smith feels Arenas needs more time, especially with Van Gundy. But at some point, as his mentor/father figure since their Golden State days 10 years ago, Smith needs Arenas to justify why he risked making the deal.
"I think it puts more pressure on Otis, yeah,"
Arenas said. "I want to do well, period."
Said Smith, "Gilbert doesn't need to be concerned about disappointing me."
Smith concedes, "I took a chance"
on Arenas, but he said the bigger picture in dealing Lewis was providing youngsters Brandon Bass and Ryan Anderson with playing time.
Smith might be close to Arenas – oddly, he's just as close to Nelson --- but he's dishing some tough love. He says Arenas hasn't played well enough to "make a case"
to complain about playing time.
Arenas has come up with excuses --- his latest: the Magic are short on trainers --- and Smith says, "Sometimes, you got to look at the guy in the mirror."
Smith said he's still in a "wait-and-see situation"
with the Arenas trade, admitting, "Gilbert is still adjusting. We might not see the fruits of this one this season….hopefully, in the postseason."
If not, Smith will be rooting for an Arenas controversy. Imagine that.
bschmitz@tribune.com. Read Magic Insider Brian Schmitz's Q&A and his blog at OrlandoSentinel.com/magic, and listen to Brian every Wednesday at 9:30 a.m. on ESPN 1080.
