Michael Jordan Nixes Jose Calderon For Boris Diaw And Tyson Chandler Swap

Well, Bryan Colangelo's impressive fast-tracking of the rebuilding job in Toronto just took a hit. A day after apparently finding a taker for José Calderon's slightly onerous contract in the Bobcats -- as well as getting two useful players in Boris Diaw and Tyson Chandler in return -- the deal is reportedly off. According to Doug Smith of the Toronto Star, Bobcats owner Michael Jordan has nixed the deal between Charlotte and Toronto, meaning Calderon (and Reggie Evans) will have to awkwardly return to the Raptors after bidding their farewells, with Diaw and Chandler doing the same in Charlotte. The trade between the Raptors and Suns of Hedo Turkoglu for Leandro Barbosa, which was part of a three-team deal with the Raptors-Bobcats trade, is unaffected, however.

Jordan was reportedly hesitant to trade Chandler, who when healthy is a defensive fixture for Charlotte, per Yahoo!'s Adrian Wojnarowski. Chandler's contract also expires after this coming season, making him quite a valuable commodity to cost-cutting GMs around the league, which was half of his appeal to Colangelo and the Raptors, who are looking for the financial flexibility to remake their team after making a series of ill-advised signings the past few years.

With former Bobcat point guard Raymond Felton now a New York Knick, expect Charlotte to look for other alternatives to fill their hole at point guard, assuming coach Larry Brown still disfavors incumbent D.J. Augustin, a former lottery pick. As for the Raptors, expect them to creatively look for ways to move Calderon's long-term salary in a bid to get substantial cap room two summers from now. And at the very least, they've still managed to unload Hedo Turkoglu's seemingly untradeable contract.

For more on the Raptors and Bobcats, check out Raptors HQ and Rufus On Fire.

Bryan Colangelo has officially hit the reset button for the Toronto Raptors. A year after boasting one of the most prolific offenses in the league in conjunction with one of the most abysmal defenses, Colangelo has effectively blown up the roster, unloading a hefty amount of salary in the process.

The previously reported Hedo Turkoglu-for-Leandro Barbosa trade has apparently been expanded to a three-team deal, with the Raptors reportedly shipping José Calderon and Reggie Evans to the Charlotte Bobcats in return for Boris Diaw and Tyson Chandler, according to Rick Bonnell of the Charlotte Observer and Yahoo!'s Marc Spears.

For Toronto, these moves are simply about erasing a series of bad contracts on an ill-conceived team that figured to "suck" after Chris Bosh took his talents to South Beach, as sage NBA analyst Charles Barkley so eloquently put it recently. Moving Turkoglu, Calderon and Evans offloads about $78.1 million in long-term salary from the Raptors (with $54.3 million of that coming after the 2010-11 season), with only $45.3 million coming back -- and all of it in the next two seasons.

So Colangelo managed to rid Toronto of a pair of onerous long-term commitments on a team going nowhere, in return for generating a ton of cap space two seasons from now, when the Raptors will only have Andrea Bargnani, Demar Derozan, Jarret Jack, Amir Johnson, Linas Kleiza and Ed Davis under contract. And on the non-financial side of the ledger, Chandler is a more than useful defensive center when healthy, something that the Raptors have been in desperate need of the past few seasons, while Barbosa should be an adequate replacement for Calderon. In short, this convoluted three-team deal is a coup for the rebuilding Raptors, who suddenly have some hope of being something other than bad-to-mediocre over the medium-term.

As for the Bobcats, Calderon gives them, an admittedly pricey, alternative to the recently departed Raymond Felton, who just signed a two-year deal with the Knicks. Diaw and Chandler were more or less expendable for Charlotte with the re-signing of Tyrus Thomas to a five-year deal, making this a decent move for the Bobcats.

For more on the Raptors and Bobcats, check out Raptors HQ and Rufus On Fire.

According to Paul Coro of The Arizona Republic, the Suns are about to complement their acquisition of Josh Childress with Hedo Turkoglu. The Suns will send guard Leandro Barbosa to Toronto for Turkoglu.

Coro says Hedo could make a sudden impact for a rapidly-changing Suns squad.

Turkoglu could become the Suns’ starting power forward in place of Stoudemire, allowing new acquisition Hakim Warrick to come off the bench with Childress, Channing Frye, Jared Dudley and Goran Dragic.

Wojnarowski is confirming the report, no word on when it will be official.

Keep an eye on SBNation Arizona and Bright Side of the Sun for updates and opinion.