Sigh. I hate to break it to you but Dame is no KD. Never was, and they appear to be heading in different directions right now. Adding KD instantly makes you a contender. If adding Dame made you a contender, then we would've been a contender for the past decade.
We are not Boston in this analogy. We are Minnesota. KG was loyal to Minny for years, they tried to build around him... they failed. Then they traded him to a contender and he won a title. Do Dame the same service. (Also: Boston already had Paul Pierce and I believe they had already acquired Ray Allen. If you think we're Boston, then presumably Dame is Paul Pierce. So who're we trading to get KG?)
Hate to break it to you but if Dame bailed on OKC and joined Curry on the Warriors then Harden and a bunch of allstars on the Nets...he'd have a ring already....Dame is injured...KD came back from a big injury too...sorry...not buying the Dame buzzkill.....I won't kick him while he's down...he's got a lot of beasting left in his career...I hope he ends it in Portland
Mavs kept overhauling their roster until they found the right combo of Chandler, Kidd, and Marion around him. Dirk was 33.
OK, suppose he comes back strong. You think he's going to be better than he was? Better enough to drag the Blazers further? We tried building round Dame. Olshey actually acquired some pretty good pieces in recent trades: RoCo and Nance. They're great! But they cost us three first round picks and we're already looking to dump RoCo. The RoCo picks could've landed us: Tyrese Maxey, Saddiq Bey, Desmond Bane. Too soon to judge the Nance pick, but we could've got Herb Jones at least.
Neil Olshey is gone....I trust Cronin to usher in the new look Blazers and hope they don't blow it up and yes....Dame will be back strong again...Chris Paul still ring hunting at 38.....Dame has plenty of time to get to the next level....I must be less impressed with Roco than you are....
They'd already been to the finals so they had a better roster to start with. Also Dirk had been MVP OF THE ENTIRE FUCKING NBA. Love Dame, but the only reason he's ever made first team All-NBA is because of injury to other players. He's never touched the level of Curry or Chris Paul and Russell Westbrook had such a statistically amazing year one year they had to change some advanced stats because he registered the highest score in the history of the NBA. Dame is a great small-market hero. He's almost our Reggie Miller, except Miller made it to the Finals (and might've again if not for the Malice in the Palace). Miller's the guy y'all should be touting - Indiana (Blazers East) actually did rebuild around him by incredibly canny trades and taking chances on guys like Jermaine O'Neal (what sucker franchise gave them that guy?) Artest and Captain Jack. It worked great - until predictably they went crazy.
Chris Paul was ADDED TO A TEAM THAT HAD ALREADY BEEN BUILT, and that had been in the lottery for years. Nobody built the team ROUND him! That's why I suggested adding Chris Paul to OUR team, when he was still affordable, as Mr. Nas Album nicely reminded us.
So your goal is to be Minnesota a perennial loser? No thanks. I would rather have Dame and being in the Play offs every year rather then trading Dame and being in the lottery every year hoping to find another Dame.
Neil Olshey actually built a team around CP3 with the Clippers....didn't translate to championships...just like us. I said at 38 he's still ring chasing....not that the Suns are building around him
He means that the Lakers traded Kwame Brown and Marc Gasol to get Pau Gasol (and Marc Gasol was the important piece to make that work). So does Portland have a Marc Gasol to trade for a top-end player?
B contradicts A. A has merit since we have been known as the team who cant sign quality fas for how long now?
