https://awfulannouncing.com/ringer/ryen-russillo-dan-le-batard-damian-lillard-trade.html "On Wednesday, Le Batard Show executive producer Mike Ryan Ruiz accused ESPN and The Ringer for using their platforms to keep Lillard out of Miami, his preferred destination. During a monologue breaking down the trade Wednesday afternoon, Russillo responded. Only instead of retorting directly back to what Ryan said or anything from the Miami staff at Le Batard’s Meadowlark Media in the aftermath of the Lillard trade, Russillo went back further. Russillo explained that in July, Le Batard showed himself by saying Lillard to Miami was a done deal and that Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN, who was claiming otherwise, was “bought and paid for” by the Trail Blazers’ side. “I’m sorry I have to do it because I didn’t believe it when it happened,” Russillo said. “But Woj came on and said very simply Portland doesn’t like the offers and they’re going to see what happens.” Of course, what Wojnarowski reported ultimately came to pass, even if details were sparse overall in the media throughout this saga. “I’m like man, if you’re going to pick a fight, pick a fight with someone who gets **** wrong, not Woj,” Russillo explained. “And here we are weeks, months later, and it wasn’t Miami.” After Russillo’s episode posted, Ryan took to X, formerly known as Twitter, to keep the war of words going, mockingly praising Russillo for having the “balls” to “finally name check” Le Batard."
If you see a blazer fan in Miami YouTube comments sucking up to Heat fans, lavishly describing Lillard while getting their hopes up about a championship dynasty... that was me. I wasn't trying to break anyone's heart, I just wanted Damian to go to a contender.
This might be the best one https://twitter.com/damanr/status/1707190917076230390?s=46&t=rA0Yh0DD0zQbNMNFNeCnQw
I believe ( yeah, without ironclad proof) that right from the start Goodwin and Riley worked together and convinced Dame that the scorched-earth-miami-or-bust strategy was going to work; that Cronin would cave under the pressure right from the start, it was bad faith. And, right from the start, Riley made a shitty low-ball offer to Portland and never backed off of his take-it-or-leave-it-fuck-you-blazers stance and because of all that, I'm convinced that by mid-July the Blazer front office had decided they would never trade Dame to Miami....never; no way; not a chance in hell and not only am I fine with that, I'm so fine with that I'm enthusiastically singing in the 'Go-Fuck-Yourselves-Miami' choir
Which to me it would be hilarious if we turned around and said that we have a consolation prize and you can have Jrue for all that shit you wanted to send us for Dame.
OH MY FUCKING GOD! This is worth multiple FRP's right here. This is triple distilled Schadenfreude so pure, so delicious!
They are for a lot of us. I don't give a fuck that we didn't trade Dame there, it made the trade a little sweeter but I would have easily taken the best offer from Miami if that is where it came from. You are way overboard with this idea that if Dame would have gone there it would have ruined the league for small markets. So I guess that shitty redditor was right about some Blazers fans but not all of us.
The most hilarious trade would be Jrue going to another team not named Miami in the Eastern Conference.
