In a move that has many Magic supporters scratching their heads, the Orlando Magic waived veteran forward Horace Grant late Wednesday night.

Grant sat out Orlando's 107-87 loss at Chicago on Tuesday with what was reported as 'soreness in his left knee and back spasms'.

Tim Povtak of the Orlando Sentinel reports that the Magic were seriously considering putting him on the injured list, a suggestion that Grant's waiver was a spur-of-the-moment decision. It was also revealed that Grant was scheduled to meet with team doctors yesterday (Wednesday) to get magnetic resonance imaging on his knee and sore back, another obscure fact that has many scratching their heads. Grant was quoted as saying: "This is crazy. The knee, the back, everything is falling apart".  

Grant, who helped lead the Orlando Magic to their only NBA Finals appearance back in 1995, has not parted Orlando on good terms and Povtak hints that his waiver is not just a result of his body breaking down.  Disagreements between Grant, the organization, and Head Coach Doc Rivers are believed to have factored on the decision.

Before the season started the Magic quietly tried to buyout Grant's contract to create some wiggle room between their payroll and the luxury and that angered Grant because at the same time, in a PR move the Magic were publicly lobbying for him to return for one final season.

The buyout talks ended when Grant wouldn't take anything less than his $2.6 million salary.

General Manager John Gabriel said little about the details of the plan.

"It just didn't work out," Gabriel said. "We had a variety of options to try to create room under the [luxury] tax. Some, we were successful with; some, we weren't. I'm going to leave it at that."

While John Gabriel was the person who broke the news to Grant that he had been waived, the following comments by Head Coach Doc Rivers make this interesting.

"Gabe has a better relationship with Horace than I do," Rivers said. "They've been together for so many years."

Asked whether he had trouble communicating with an accomplished veteran such as Grant, Rivers said, "Sometimes, that didn't go the way I'd like it to go."

"He's part of some wonderful memories we've had here -- recently and in the past," Gabriel said. "We won't forget it. We won't forget him and what it brought for us."

Brian Schmitz, also of the Orlando Sentinel, has another angle on the saga.  Schmitz writes that this was Rivers' call, not Gabriel's. Rivers had grown tired of Grant using his summer surgery as an excuse to not practice and only made cameo appearances. Rivers was also worried that Grant was pushing Steven Hunter to come back too soon from ACL surgery.