Mornings are best for the NBA builder and survivor from Hanover.

He takes his medicine, then meditates and prays. He does push-ups, sit-ups and some dumbbell exercises on the floor.

He waits for his legs to settle down, as he says.

John Gabriel was once one of the top general managers in the NBA. He built the Orlando Magic from an expansion idea into a championship finals team with Shaquille O'Neal and Penny Hardaway.

Then, after those stars left, he hired a new coach, restructured the team and was named NBA Executive of the Year.

That seems like a lifetime ago.

Since, he's lost his dream job, nearly died from anaphylactic shock and was blindsided by an incurable disease.

At 62, Gabriel now considers his daily struggles a responsibility and a life opportunity rather than a curse.

For the past eight years, he's pushed through Parkinson's disease the same way he helped win an unlikely state title at Delone Catholic and then willed himself into pro sports.

"Let me tell you, he was relentless at everything he did," said wife, Dorothy Gabriel.

And he's continued to work in the NBA through it all.

Parkinson's disease has only driven NBA man harder

Gabriel has learned to accept the ramifications of his disease. He sometimes has trouble buttoning his shirt because of the tremors in his hands. He's always prepared to steady himself when walking. He requires frequent naps to re-charge.

Fortunately, the worst affects have heightened only gradually.

He is thankful his mind is still sharp. Especially when it comes to evaluating pro basketball talent and working the nuances of the NBA Draft and free agency.

He may be the most valuable executive advisor in the league — and back with the Magic, once again.

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He works each day as the one before it. After his morning calisthenics he often walks and runs in "three inches of water at low tide" near the family cottage along Daytona Beach.

"If I fall it's not bad, I'm just going to get a little wet," he deadpanned.

"It's part of your life and you can’t change it. Things are the way they are. You sort of have to embrace it."

He sees this as a mission. He is a board member and well-known face of the Parkinson's Association of Central Florida, which gave a $250,000 donation last year to medical facilities in the Orlando area.

He feels destined, in a sense, to take on this incurable disease. He's reminded of that often.

Like when a woman he did not know recently approached he and his wife as they waited at a store counter.

She teared up as she reached out and grabbed Gabriel's hand.

"I know what you have. I have the same thing, and I feel for you," she told him.

Gabriel didn't hesitate.

"I'm here for you, and you’re going to be OK."

From Delone Catholic to the Philadelphia 76ers

His basketball life began on the outside courts in Hanover, and then in high school.

At Delone, he received sermons from coach Jim Livelsberger on how success depends on "doing the dirty work, doing the little things." It was all about outworking opponents and team unity.

Gabriel and his buddies parlayed those lessons into an unlikely Pennsylvania Catholic Interscholastic Athletic Association title in 1974.

His determination only grew as a player at Kutztown University. The art student knew he wanted a career in pro sports and was willing to take on any kind of job to get it.

That meant starting his own landscaping business at 23. In the evenings he worked as an official at the Atlantic City Race Course, watching for jockey fouls as horses sprinted around the pole.

When finished, he went inside to write commercials for the race track and wash the jockeys' silks.

If he didn't make it out before the gates closed, he stayed and slept on a cot.

Meanwhile, he pestered 76ers assistant general manager John Nash with regular phone calls, eventually earning a spot in group sales. His video skills and gift of being able to make everyone around him better led to a promotion to assistant coach.

"We landed Moses Malone and John Gabriel around the same time," Nash once told ESPN.com. "Productive summer."

The Sixers won an NBA title the following year — Gabriel missing the celebratory team parties because he was still cutting lawns and working the race track.

His payoff would come in a life-changing opportunity a few years later. When general manager Pat Williams left to run the expansion Orlando Magic, Gabriel was his first hire.

In just six years, he led the Magic to the verge of an NBA title. He became known as not only a master of evaluating players but also devising the creative deals to acquire them.

He would prosper with the Magic longer than most anyone leading a pro sports team.

But even he couldn't survive a landslide of losses that potholed the 2003-04 season and began his toughest runs of fortune.

A few months after being fired he was hospitalized and on a ventilator after becoming deathly allergic to wasp stings.

He recovered to work scouting positions with the Portland Trailblazers and New York Knicks. He never made it back to the top of the NBA.

Brian Hill coached the Magic under Gabriel but also worked for six other NBA teams.

"One thing that always baffled me is why he never was a GM for another team. In 27 years in the NBA I would put John in the top two or three of anyone," Hill said.

Gabriel surrounded himself with trusted workers. He gave first-chance NBA jobs to Delone friends Tom Sterner and Tom Conrad, who both went on to long pro careers.

Conrad is still a scout for the Washington Wizards. Sterner was an assistant with the Magic, Sixers, Golden State Warriors, Dallas Mavericks and Toronto Raptors.

"Gabe thinks differently," Sterner said. "He had the ability to look at personnel and characteristics of players and feel them out. Not only their ability to play the game but how their personalities would interact with one another. The chemistry side of things is overlooked in professional sports. Gabe has that."

Those who knew him at Delone say they are not surprised how he's handling Parkinson's. They saw the makings of that 50 years ago.

"He always was the guy who was doing extra," Conrad said. "If we had to shoot 25 free throws he would shoot 50. He always had to do more, that’s just who he is.

"He is still so sharp. If Orlando didn’t have him I think there would be other teams that would let him stay in Florida to use him, like how to fit trades into the salary cap. He's been there since day one. He was a GM at beginning of the salary cap."

Gabriel said he now finally has time to study trends and analytics in the league the way he wants. If he's having a bad day, he can rest or get away.

He still evaluates players regularly but not with the travel grind of a scout. Last year, for example, the Magic worked out 67 players for their two picks in the draft, and Gabriel said he studied each one and made recommendations.

In some ways, he's as busy as ever — from his daily regimen for Parkinson's to his basketball work, to fundraising, to taking time to help most anyone who has the disease.

"You can't even imagine how many people reach out to him ...," his wife said. "And he calls them that day."

He still works the way he was taught growing up in Hanover. He's simply more aware of what he must do to keep going.

How much money and awareness can he raise to beat Parkinson's? Where could a stem cell breakthrough take him for treatment or even a cure?

Gabriel doesn't get too far ahead. There's too much to do each day.

"He chooses a different path," his wife said. "You can feel sorry for yourself. He chooses to live in that precious present.

"We've got the right here and now, and that is good."