I agree on developing Bayless. but Blake is Odd man out IMO. Love the guy, but Blake is a backup, and Bayless isnt ready to start. 2 backups is not a good thing.
Do you trust Nate to develop Bayless if we bring in a FA or pull off a trade for a PG? I don't. If we don't move Outlaw or Webster - Batum will see no minutes next year either. Unacceptable.
Ideally Blake and Outlaw would be gone in the PG scenarios. a PG that is good for 30 MPG leaving 18 minutes for Bayless. Which is what he is ready for IMO.
That's a plan that condemns us to not contending for a title next year. I don't know why anyone would sign on to that. Any team that just won 54 games with such enormous holes at SF and PG would be foolish not to try to upgrade those spots and push for a championship.
Contend for a title next year? unless Oden takes a trip to Oz and the Wizard gives him a new heart - it aint gonna happen. Develop the talent we have.
I agree on Batum, but not sure on Bayless. Both players are about the same age, so you can compare them. Batum seems to always know where he should be. Bayless often gets lost on team defense, and often struggles when trying to run the offense. If his first option doesn't work out he starts channeling Damon. Contrast Batum to Outlaw. Batum just knows where to be, Outlaw has improved, but still struggles with this. Will Bayless struggle with this for a long time as well? I love Bayless' attitude and body, I would just hate to pour three more years into him just to figure out that he never gets it. He seems to be intelligent, but I would like to see what he does this summer, and hopefully next year, before I give up on him. The one way I would consider it is if you had a shot at a solid junior or senior PG in the draft who seems to naturally understand how to run the offense, penetrate, and play team D. Then I might be willing to punt on Bayless (who may never get those things). Jarrett Jack on steroids is still Jarrett Jack . . . right? The extra hops and beef aren't what was holding Jarret back.
Eeeewwww! No! Living down in SoCal, I've watched enough of Collison. I would rather trade the pick away.
That's just absurdly narrow-minded. Over the past three seasons we added 11 wins, 9 wins and 13 wins. We've got the 6th or 7th best player in the league who has made major strides every season. We've got an 18/8 power forward, who is entering his 4th season (typically a breakout year for many young big men). We're probably the only team in the league with two start-quality centers. We won 54 games with our star center recovering from microfracture in his rookie year, a PG who has no business starting on a 50+ win team, and a rookie small forward who just turned 20. And we've got Rudy Fernandez, a guy who just set the rookie record for three pointers, coming off the bench. And a lot of potential production out of Webster and Bayless. I don't see how Pritchard approaches this fall without trying to position us for a championship run this year. Portland did so well last year while working with so many sub-optimal issues, they'd be nuts not to try to patch many of those issues up in the offseason and see how far we can get.
No Bayless doesn't get lost on defense, that is complete BS. In fact I would go so far as to say, he is hands down the Blazers beset defender at PG even in his first year. Bayless struggles have always been not being at "Game speed" during his first few minutes of play each time he does get minutes, and spacing on the offensive end. Not the defensive end. I do not know what the hell you have been watching, but his problems are definitly not defensive.
honestly I agree with you we werent this year.. but we also were tied for the #2 seed this year. And there is a good chance thatwitha a couple luckier bounces we are # 2 or #3 seed that we are still playing and gearing up for the Lakers right now.
Denver has lost in the first round 5 straight years but all of a sudden is in the WCF. Why can't we do the same?
And even with our inexperienced talent, and the Nuggets with that very same Chauncey Billups, they only had the same record as us. I agree on your developing point Hank, but these playoffs to me showed who will/should be around when we are playing big games deeper into the playoffs in the future. Outlaw wont/shouldnt be here, and Blake wont be the starter on a deep running playoff team.
Frankly I think we got as many "lucky bounces" as a team can get last year. We came back from double digits deficits in 18 games, that's not exactly a bankable, repeatable feat. If anything I think the team vastly overachieved, and unless some moves are made I'm not sure you can even count on getting back to that 54 win level -- even with organic growth of certain players like Batum, Bayless, Oden, et al.
