My friend told me that he heard on Blazers Roundtable that, had Martell not got injured, Batum may very well not have made the team...................got sent back to Europe, or such. Would you agree with that notion?
That's flat out false, Batum was signed shortly after the Summer league finished whereas Martell was injured during training camp. They're completely unrelated. If you're talking D-League then it's possible, but I don't think KP sees the D-League as a good place for players to develop. If he did, Bayless would've been in Idaho at least once this season.
I believe he said that, yes, he'd be a Blazer, but it my be a Freeland type of situation. I can't remember what had transpired at the time Martell got hurt. Are additional roaster changes allowed in preseason?
No. Batum was signed earlier in the summer, Martell went down in the pre-season. Batum would have had his ass glued to the bench, but he'd be with the team. Whoever you heard from spoke wrong.
I thought he'd be in D-League for sure after watching him in summer league, but he made enough of a good impression during the pre-season for Nate to consider him a starter on opening night. So I'd have to say no to that.
Right now? Gotta go with Batum....at least to start the season. At some point, though, I would imagine a decision would have to be made in regards to trading one of those guys. That would be a tough decision. Very tough. Of course, though, it would depend on the team dynamic at that time....which will naturally be different than it is now.
Until Webster proves, in meaningful NBA games, that he's become a much better player than his first several seasons, I would say Batum is the starter. In other words, Batum is the default starter until Webster, or anyone else, proves they are better than him.
It's pretty clear that Batum is the long term answer and Martell is mystery meat with his lost season so it's impossible to say what he'll look like next season, but I'm guessing he'd be pretty ideal as big minute backup who defends, rebounds and shoots reasonably well. All I know is clearly there are not going to be enough minutes for Nic, Travis, and Martell to all coexist on the roster.
I definitely wouldn't be opposed to seeing Webster and Rudy rolling together on the second unit given how they played together in that preseason game.
If they could convince Travis to (strictly) backup LMA, while Martell backed up Batum, I could see that working in the short-term. Hard to really say at this point, though. The significant x-factor, though, is Rudy. If he weren't here, then Martell could get plenty of run backing up Brandon. Obviously, Rudy's here to stay. Fortunately.
Travis is a tough one for me. Clearly he is great at creating his own shot, and his 3-point shooting % (and number of attempts) has made him really valuable spacing the floor, but his tweener status and defensive deficiencies make me wonder if he's really all that ideal as a backup 4 in the long run ... not to say that he doesn't have value and some talent scoring (which has) I'm just wondering if it wouldn't be more useful to have a more rebound/defense oriented backup 4 to play behind LaMarcus for 12-15 minutes a game. KP is going to have some hard choices to make this summer.
We lucked the fuck out. Blessing in disguise indeed. With this injury, we found out SF of the future and present.
Your friend is wrong, and I remember more than a few of us were surprised when it became apparent that Batum was going to be signed to the roster after his Summer League performance.
Bottom line. They both have to improve over the summer for either one of them to start. The word was that Martel had worked hard and had indeed improved. Then he got hurt, so we will not know until next September. Batum needs to work on a few things as well. Personally I think they both will and the Blazers will be much better because of it. This year is not even over and I can't wait until October 1st. Bayless, Rudy, Oden, Batum, and Martel will all most likely be better. That is very exciting.
