Time to light the fuse and blow this sucker up?

My thoughts exactly. Rudy is having another flaky year, mills is #2 on the PG depth chart, Batum is putting okay stats, and Johnson is a rookie. I think we should trade Rudy or Johnson.

 

That will net us.....Luther Head? I mean c'mon seriously we need impact players at this point.

 

Who cares? It's time to head for the draft.

For the record, LMA can play center if we can land a PF like Landry that actually bangs in the paint.

 

What about cap room?

I'm curious to know your plan, if you can be more specific. I think you have the general premise, though.

 

Honestly, outside of the Lakers and Miami, I've really never seen a team use cap room to build a championship-caliber team. Those two teams made the two big hauls of the decade (Shaq for LA, James and Bosh for Miami), but outside of that, the idea of clearing cap room to make big free agent strikes is generally a losing proposition. Even the Knicks, who did land a star, came up way short of creating a championship nucleus. One of the main reasons for that is that stars can generally get the most money to stay home, which creates massive inertia against switching teams.

I don't have a brand new blueprint...from what I've seen, you need a little luck to land your franchise player or players, either from the draft or from trades. But tanking for a top pick also doesn't tend to work because very few top prospects actually end up franchise players.

The post-Shaq Lakers are a good example of why you don't blow it up. That team was good but not great. They were good enough to make the playoffs and challenge to win a series. One could have argued, "Is that the kind of okay-ness you want? Trade Kobe for top draft picks, maybe a good young player, dump big contracts and start over." Instead, they built based on what they had and were ready to take advantage of the opportunity that presented itself in Pau Gasol.

Of course, that's a best-case...but my main conclusion is this: teams almost never go from terrible/bad to great in one or two off-seasons due to a top draft pick or a major free agent acquisition. Teams much more commonly move from bad to mediocre to good to great. There are exceptions, but generally you're closer to title-caliber when you're mediocre or good than you are when you're bad, even if bad comes with cap space or a top pick. So moving down that scale is rarely, if ever, productive. Most teams who end up bad stay there for quite a while.

I want the Blazers to operate as they have the past few years: if a trade emerges that creates more value (net present value, to steal a concept from Ed O), do it. Never make a trade with the intention of getting worse in the short-term. Weighting that net present value towards more of it being in the future is fine, but it should only be a mild lean...not a "destroy all present value in the hopes of landing a lot of value down the line."

 

That's a great explanation, I can't disagree there. I think teams need to do whatever they can to get a real superstar, not just Melo level but a little higher than that (luck plays a factor). Someone at least like a healthy Brandon Roy or Dwight Howard, whatever, then suffer a few years maybe but build around them.

The Celtics this past season didn't have a superstar at all, but they lucked into Rondo through the draft and traded for their other guys. So the trend you mention still stands.

 

They had Pierce, who was their franchise guy. Not that that disputes much, but it does support what he is saying in that, Boston could have held on to Jefferson and rondo, and built around the two of them. And Green, Telfair, etc. And they could have dumped Pierce. Maybe that situation nets them a title, if somehow without playing around superstars, Rondo becomes the same player that he is, and the trade of Pierce nets another stud, but what they did got them a title. I prefer hanging on to that than thinking blow it all up,a nd have Wesley Matthews and Batum be the only ones left. Sorry, that's a damn ugly team.

 

I agree; Batum, Aldridge and Matthews should all have 6 or 7 good years in them; why start tanking to try to find different young players?

 

Miller is one of the few bright spots of this year.

 

"Blowing it up" to me means figuring out the guys you want to keep and then moving anyone else you can to build for the next several years. As much as I like Camby and Miller this means moving them as they are not part of the future. Of course I'm not suggesting moving them at any cost, but if you can do solid trades you do them and don't worry about this season, you look to the future.

 

We don't have any M80's. We have a bunch of "Black Cat Firecrackers". You know, the ones that you light, and you don't know if they are going to go off?

 

Losing with those players gives you the same record as losing without them. The only way I see out for Portland with Roy's contract in tow, I hate to say this, is the draft. As long as Roy's contract is one the books the Blazers will be hamstrung for deals. That means the only way to get new players is by stinking it up and drafting good. Now since we know that the only way out is the draft, and since Miller, Camby, and Joel will most likely not be with us for some future playoff run, we might as well get rid of them in order to try to rebuild faster.