Just wondering if its ever been thrown around in here.. wonder if he would still be available come draft time, as a 13 mpg guy behind LMA. any thoughts?
hasn't been tossed around a lot....he kind of falls into the "Probably won't be around at 24th pick" for me. He's a bit Barkley-esque. Somehow I think that there's not going to be a lot of "restocking" in this year's draft. I think it'll be some Euro guys (Beaubois? De Colo?) with the late-first/early-seconds, if we don't trade it outright for a vet. Freeland comes over next year, since our bigs will be 1) LMA, 2) Oden, and 3) Joel. Shav may be re-signed, but I think Ruffin, Frye and Raef being gone will open up a hole or two at PF/3C.
Agree he wont be around at 24.. I explained it bad too.. but we have a 1st round pick already.. and a trade exception. Can use that to get a contract and a pick (a la James Jones and Rudy pick) and maybe package those 2 first rounders to get Blair a little higher? the 2nd rounders are for the Euros IMO.
http://insider.espn.go.com/nbadraft/draft/tracker/rank?draftyear=2009 http://www.draftexpress.com/ It's hard to say where he'll go exactly, but he's almost certainly not going to be available in the late first round. I'd be cool with KP trading up I guess.
I would absolutely love to get Blair as our backup banger/defender PF. He is a little uindersized but doesn't matter when you play like he does. I would think he would go anywhere from 10-20 and it should be easy for us to move up to get him with all our 2nd round picks plus other assets.
Yeah he is undersized.. but then I was reading something about his wingspan is like 7' 2'' which helps him .
If you look into the Hansbrough thread, I was pimping Blair and have been on his bandwagon prolly since the new year. I'd love to trade up to get him..Lord knows we have the assets to trade up.
My recollection of Ike Diogu at ASU is a little hazy, but for some reason I keep thinking of him when I look at Blair. Anyone else?
Diogu seems like a decent comparison. Diogu hasn't panned out as the undersized-but-effective power forward that he seemed he could be. I'd be wary of undersized power players, in general, because they need a lot of other things to work in their favour to be successful. That said, if he's being drafted as a back-up, I'd take the risk.
i'd rather bring in a proven FA power forward in the turiaf/nene/scola (maybe a bit cheaper than that) mold. but if we spend all our FA dollars on a PG, i'd be OK with trading up a bit and getting him.
I think with Blair, a lot of people are thinking Paul Millsap with him, and trying to find the next one. I am thinking he is probably more comparable to Craig Smith in Minnesota over Millsap, personally. I suppose that isn't abad thing, but the problenm with having a backup who is strictly a backup of one position is it doesn't allow you to easily shorten your rotation down to 9, or even 8. Having a backup PF who is ONLY a backup PF, and a backup C who is ONLY a backup C puts 4 right there. It also takes away Outlaw's backing up the 4, and puts you at 6 with a starter and backup SF. the only option available, then, is to have a 3 guard rotation. Ultimately, I can see us having that, with Roy, Rudy, and Bayless. But it likely will not be next year. Which leaves us, again, with a 10 man rotation, something alot of people complain about Nate doing.
I actually think Portland will still have an ability to do that. Next year, they could run a regular season rotation of: PG: Blake / Bayless / Rodriguez SG: Roy / Fernandez SF: Batum / Outlaw / Webster PF: Aldridge / Blair C: Oden / Przybilla In the playoffs, you can tighten the rotation: PG: Blake / Bayless SG: Roy / Fernandez SF: Batum / Outlaw C/PF: Oden / Aldridge / Przybilla In the future (beyond next season), I see an even tighter potential rotation: PG/SG: Roy / Bayless / Fernandez SF: Batum / Outlaw C/PF: Oden / Aldridge / Przybilla Players like Blair and Webster will deepen the rotation when needed, but can be removed when it needs to be tightened.
Turiaf is cheap enough at something like 4 million per year that I would trade for him in a heartbeat. Perhaps the Warriors would be keen on a low cost gunner like Outlaw who can play either forward spot, shoots a very respectable percentage from distance and wouldn't need to be counted on to play defense since that's not in Golden State's DNA anyway. Sign me up.
Outlaw has his problems - but he is much more valuable than Turiaf, imho - so I would hate to do an Outlaw for Turiaf swap. Webster on the other hand...
I wanna see Webster and Rudy again before I make that decision. They seemed to have an instant chemistry. (although it was against the Kings)
Minstrel, the dificulty with that rotation is, neither Greg or Joel is a PF,and neither should really play that position for any length of time. Yes, they did it briefly this year, somewaht successfully. I can now not remember who that was against, possibly Milwaukee? And it was mentioned afterwards that they only reason Nate was able to get away with that was the two big men on the court for the opponent were pretty slow afoot, so weren't a risk to drag our bigs out and go around them. In the playoffs, that sort of rotation would get abused, as it doesn't really leave you the ability to go small if needed. The only option in there is eliminating Webster from the rotation, and having Outlaw play his customary role as backup to both SF and PF.
Yes, but I'm not convinced of that. Oden's pre-draft athleticism rivaled Aldridge's. He's still working his way back to that kind of athleticism, but long-term, I don't see why he couldn't guard anyone that Aldridge can guard. As long as one of Aldridge or Oden is on the court, Portland will have a quick, athletic, explosive defender to put on a top, quick offensive big man. Two such players might cause a problem, but I can't think of any team that has that sort of combination.
Yeah, I think trading a player on a cheap contract, our TE, our 2nd rounders and our first to move up and get Blair would be good. But I would also love a package centered around Turiaf/Ellis from GS.
