In the past there have been several PF's that were deemed too small, despite successful college careers, who have gone on to do well in the NBA after coming out of the second round. Landy, Bass, Powe, G.Davis, Milsap, C.Smith are all examples of this that easily come to mind. Sort of a trend that's been discovered. Blair was supposed to go in the mid-first round. He slid a quarter way into the 2nd round. At that point, if you want a player, all you have to do if offer a future 2nd and go get the guy you want. To be honest, I don't know why we didn't get him over Cunningham in particular. Low Risk, High Reward. The guy can play, is tough, and will work. People say Big Baby Davis couldn't play at the next level and look at how he did in the playoffs. Outside of that botched pick, and I really do think it was unless Cunningham is going out in a trade soon (I'm okay with Pendergraph, although would have preferred Blair I think). I'm okay with the draft. I'm okay with Claver, and think Mills was an absolutely great value pick. I would have prefered to get Calathes or Jonas Jepereko (sp) in addition to Pendergraph/Blair in the early first round, but oh well. Not as good as previous drafts, but until KP shows signs, I think he's doing a good job. I just think the rest of the league is catching up. Look at how teams are positioning themselves. OKC is young and on the rise with a fantastic core of players. Imagine if the Chandler trade had gone through last year. Minnesota has lots of good young pieces in Love/Jefferson/Rubio/Flynn. The Nets don't have too shabby of a core either, having a ton of capspace to add to their core of Harris/Lee/Williams/Yi/Lopez. Maybe I wasn't paying attention, but I don't remember a time ever where so many teams were aggressively on a youth movement..even if that means to acquire young cheap players and free up cap space (which is very smart). So I don't think KP is getting lax, it's just everyone else is playing catchup faster than KP can keep ahead of the ball.
When talking about 2-3 years in the future, there's no way to know. Batum may not have progressed. Batum may have been traded in a deal to net a top point guard. Batum may be injured. Portland may need more than one good small forward. Even if none of those things are true, a lottery-talent small forward can be a nice trade chip.
Barring a MAJOR injury, there's no way Batum is not a Blazer or still a major piece to our puzzle. Again, I'm doubtful on stashed Euro's trade value
Just asserting it as fact doesn't make it fact. If Pritchard could get Devin Harris or Rajon Rondo by giving up Batum and others (not Roy/Aldridge/Oden), I'm pretty sure Batum would be packing his bags. What about a "Euro" who's been brought to Portland and had a very successful rookie season as Batum's backup in 2012-13?
I think the problem is too many of us have forgotten what it's like to be a winning team. When you have a really good team you draft late and most of the picks will sit on the bench or hopefully be role players. If you get a decent role player out of your draft you've done well. Bad teams draft early and expect, and need, immediate results. They need impact players like Brandon Roy, LaMarcus Aldridge, Rudy Fernandez, Greg Oden. The Blazers were there. But they are no longer. And that's a good thing. Through most of the 90s, the Blazers drafted around 24 or so and if they were lucky got a guy who could plug a hole, or be traded for someone who could plug a hole - like trading Byron Irvin for Danny Ainge. That's what most good teams do, although sometimes they get lucky (example Tony Parker). We've just got short memories. The Blazers don't need another impact rookie. They need to plug a few holes. If any of the picks, even one, either fills a role or is traded for a player who fills a role, it's a good draft.
To get back to positives: * OKC whiffed on Rubio. They could've been amazing. * Minnesota either botched it completely or are putting Rubio up for sale. (Which leads to the question: why couldn't Washington do that?) * We're not Washington fans: we could've had Rubio but now have Mike Miller and Randy Foye. * Blair went to San Antonio rather than, say, the Lakers. * We could've drafted Austin Daye. (Actually, we couldn't, but in some parallel world, perhaps.) * We got one of my .sig requests. And three are available in free agency! * If you wanted Rubio because of how good he looked against the "Redeem Team", well... we got Patty Mills! USA v. Australia
I think the times of stashing dudes overseas is coming to an end. It seems to be getting harder and harder to get them over here after their first couple of years. Europeans teams are luring them into high buyout contracts, or offering them very good contracts after they develope, and you know, there is something to be said for staying some place that you have established as your home. A move is hard on anybody. It is one thing to draft a guy that says his dream is to play in the NBA and they are coming over no matter what. It is another thing to draft a guy who has no such known inclination. The only thing that happend that was postive from yesterday was Sergio was sent packing. That ought to be worth about 5 more wins alone.
Who specifically are you basing this on? If it's Freeland, it's premature to say that he's turned down the Blazers for a big contract in Europe. He's probably not ready to be in an NBA rotation, so his decision could easily be based on playing time and not money. Scola, for example, was drafted in 2002 when he was 22 and came over in 2007 as a 27 year old. If Freeland gets to that age and declines the NBA, then maybe you have a case. For now, it's too early to tell. As for Fran Vazquez... first off, he wasn't a typical Eurostash, he was a lottery pick, his situation is very unique. Secondly, he supposedly is now interested in playing for Orlando now that he's older (and maybe no longer confined to the rookie contract scale). Freeland could very well end up doing something similar.
The ESPN international basketball analyst said that Claver was a lottery talent, just 2-3 years away. Not a lottery talent today.
He looked very good, reportedly, before he hurt himself this past season, as well. I think that the Claver pick was pretty darn good. I'm not worried that he doesn't necessarily have a spot on the team right NOW. So much can happen in two or three years, both with his development and with the roster. I'm less happy about the second round senior pf mediocrity extravaganza, but I like the Claver pick although moving up to get him was weird. The main reason that I'm positive? Because even though draft day was not a successful/impressive one (IMO), we still have an excellent team, we have cap space, and overall things are looking great! Ed O.
I like the looks of this Claver guy. I am totally cool with stashing him for a year or two. Who cares.
