NBA Trade Rumors: Orlando Magic Must Not Be Hasty with Trade of Dwight Howard

With the NBA lockout over, the Orlando Magic are shopping Dwight Howard, but they cannot be giving away post-Black Friday deals. The Magic must be patient and wait for the right offer to come their way.

If the Magic trade Howard to the first team to put together a decent package they will lose out on talent, which is something they cannot afford.

With roughly 20 teams willing to offer a trade for Howard the Magic are going to get some serious talent if they wait for the right bidder.

While some teams, like the Chicago Bulls and Miami Heat don't need Howard, there are many teams that do. Some of the most likely teams to go after Howard are the Los Angeles Lakers, Washington Wizards and Los Angeles Clippers.

The Magic are going to get some very good offers, and they need to let things play out.

We saw just how much waiting can pay off when the Denver Nuggets traded Carmelo Anthony to the New York Knicks for a king's ransom. The Magic should get just as much if not more than what Denver received, as Howard is a better player than Anthony.

The best plan of action for Orlando is to start the season with Howard and see what happens. If they jump out to an early start they can keep him and be a playoff contender. If they are slow out of the gate, they know they need to trade him. If other teams realize they need a big man due to injury or because they are doing poorly, they will have bigger offers for the Magic.

The Magic should not be thinking of trading Superman before the season begins. While there is always the chance that he is injured during the season, the more likely scenario involves him dominating and increasing his stock.

If the Magic stick to simple economic principles, we should not see a trade of Howard until the season.

Those principles are the limited supply of current elite big men and the high demand. The high supply of future big men coming in from college (Jared Sullinger, Parry Jones, Quincy Miller, Andre Drummond, etc.) and the demand lowering if they trade Howard. And last but not least the low-risk high-reward of waiting to trade Howard that every economist dreams of.

The NBA is a business, and we learned that over the summer and until Saturday morning. The Magic need to treat it as one and hold off on any Howard trades for now.