Magic? No, just work of Twardzik

On Sports

By kerry eggers

The Portland Tribune, Jun 10, 2009, Updated Oct 30, 2009

Mickael Pietrus, making a gesture during Game 6 of Orlando’s series with Cleveland, is one of several players added to the Magic mix by General Manager Otis Smith and assistant GM Dave Twardzik, a standout guard on the Trail Blazers’ 1977 NBA championship team.

ELSA / GETTY IMAGES

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He turns 59 in September, and at some point not too many years down the road, Dave Twardzik and his bride of 37 years, Kathe, will retire to their chosen spot in Aubrey Butte in Central Oregon.

“The house design is almost finished,” Twardzik says. “We’re going to start on it next spring.”

For now, though, Twardzik is having too much fun — and being too darn successful — as assistant general manager of the Orlando Magic to retire.

The point guard of the 1977 Trail Blazers’ championship team, who was in Portland’s front office for five years and was the best sidekick that broadcaster Bill Schonely ever had, has been instrumental in putting together the Orlando team that will open NBA finals play tonight against the Los Angeles Lakers.

Could he stomach another championship ring?

“I’m not a jewelry guy,” Twardzik wisecracks, “but I’d take it.”

Since 2003, Twardzik has been a member of the front office that has constructed a team that ought to give the Lakers all they can handle.

Twardzik started as director of player personnel in Orlando. For the last three years, he has been GM Otis Smith’s right-hand man — and the front man in terms of personnel and the draft — for the Magic.

“We’ve put together a pretty good team,” Twardzik says.

It started when the Magic took Dwight Howard with the No. 1 pick in the 2004 draft. Today, that may seem elementary. Then, Emeka Okafor of Connecticut — the college player of the year — was the popular choice. Howard was an 18-year-old high-school phenom from Atlanta.

“Probably 75 percent of the (league’s personnel chiefs) thought we screwed up by passing on Okafor,” says Twardzik, formerly the GM at Golden State and director of player personnel at Charlotte. “But we’d scouted Dwight, and we liked him when we brought him in for an interview. There was debate, but it was clear we were going to go with Dwight.”

Nearly as important, Orlando took undersized point guard Jameer Nelson of St. Joseph’s with the 20th pick in the first round, giving up a future first-round pick to Denver for the choice.

“Our draft room was almost as excited to get Jameer as when we drafted Dwight,” Twardzik says. “We had Jameer ranked eighth on our board.”

Orlando also signed free-agent forward Hedo Turkoglu to the midlevel exception that season.

In 2005, Twardzik pushed hard for a project — 6-11 Marcin Gortat of Poland — with the 57th pick (second round) of the draft. Gortat apprenticed two years in Germany before arriving in Orlando in 2007.

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