But not in combination with other things to raise the salary of the player coming back. It could have been used in trade for someone making $3.3 million or less. While there are plenty of players on rookie contracts in that window, it's not a given that you can make such a deal make sense for the other team. Very few teams want to dump players making that little to save salary...and anyone who's actually worth the salary, either in terms of potential or current value, that team would probably prefer to keep.
You always frame a trade/signing/drafting not going the way you wanted as lack of interest/effort/caring. I find that to be a pretty silly stance. I think Cho cares more than any of us, it being his livelihood while it is just our entertainment/hobby. I don't have any reason to believe that he's not putting effort in. This is your version of fans claiming that Rasheed Wallace or LaMarcus Aldridge must be slackers because they aren't/weren't as good as people wanted them to be. Sometimes people aren't as great as we'd like, or the opportunities aren't as great as we'd like...it doesn't mean the people in question are mailing it in, as you generally suggest when it comes to front office people. True. And with no information, you can always claim perfidy where none exists. Maybe there really isn't anyone useful. What then?
I think Minstrel is right on target here. It's unfortunate that more of you weren't able to attend the meet and greet at the Blazers practice facility last fall. If you'd met Cho, seen his office and how detailed he is about tracking every player in the league, and heard him talk, you'd know this cat is dedicated to making the Blazers better. I have absolutely no doubt that it's not a matter of him not trying to make deals happen, but rather a case of being patient enough to wait for the right deal.
It's absurd to posit that there is no player in the league available for trade that an average GM could not have used this nearly $4mil + some scrubs to get, while noticeably improving our team. Other GM's are flabbergasted that The Choad never called.
I think he's just really inept at evaluating basketball talent. I've never read anything to suggest he has even personally spoken to an actual NBA player before, other than the ones on his team. Nice that he does the usual nerd-tracking of stats, but that leaves him a step behind most of us in the GM qualifications department. Nothing in his bio or his few statements to the press indicates any past accomplishments of note or even a deep knowledge of the game. He appears to be nothing more than an affirmative action hire.
The exception could have been used to 1) pick up a D-Leaguer and waive a player already here, 2) combine the exception into a player trade, or 3) trade it straight up for a mere pick. I think Cho isn't a powerful independent operator like a Whitsitt. He's doing what he's told. He solicits opinions from Larry Miller, McMillan, Vulcans, and Paul Allen and makes it a group decision. I think the organization likes the attitudes of Marks and Mills, and doesn't want to chance replacing either. I think that last year's 10 days with Anthony Tolliver turned Nate against D-League recruits. Tolliver can score and rebound, but Nate wanted a defender first. Tolliver then caught on with Golden State and Minnesota. Picky Nate fits players to his system, not vica versa. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe it's truly this hard to use the exception, given the 3 weeks Cho had. If so, the league's policy of granting the exception to replace a missing player is a sham, since that exception will usually turn out worthless. Have most teams who have gotten this exception succeeded in using it, or failed like us?
I remember that another team got one the same day we did, about 3 weeks ago. I posted at the time that we'd have to hurry. Did the other team use theirs? If not, that backs up the theory that this league "gift" is a sham. If they did, that backs up the theory that our management was either incompetent or (my theory stated above) just didn't want to use it.
That's it in a nutshell. If the exception had been 8+ million dollars in value then I think the market of available players would have expanded considerably. As it stands not a lot of teams are scrambling to dump cheap or cheap and productive talent.
During the draft, which is a day for deal making. Mid to late December? Teams usually aren't quite geared up for cost cutting mode, that comes in February.
Here's the answer. We'll see in 5 days whether this "disabled player exception" stuff is an unachievable sham, with the league allowing way too little time. http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=5907147
I wouldn't say that it's a sham. The exception is there as a desperation measure in case the player a team loses leaves the team dangerously thin at a position. I doubt it was ever meant to enable the team to sign a really good or valuable player. It's meant to give the team some flexibility to get a warm body as a replacement. Cho could have signed a warm body. But Portland's position isn't so tenuous that it needs a warm body to stay viable to play NBA games. Another Sean Marks wouldn't change the team's outlook one way or the other. Maybe some would have liked to see Cho sign a random guy out of the D-league, just to prove his phone works. I can't say I care...I think it's likely that his phone works and I can't get worked up over not signing a scrub out of the NBADL.
I call it a sham because I suspect--but I haven't compiled a list--that most teams awarded a "disabled player exception" don't use it for lack of time. We won it Dec. 10, and were given only 20 days till the Dec. 30 deadline. The Marc Stein article I cited explains the deadline as I'm guessing the league later decided we had considered it for about 15 days before we applied, and the league considered our application about 10 days. Add the 20 days they gave us and you have 45 days. There just isn't time to start negotiating a new trade. All you can do is 1) sign a D-Leaguer, or 2) complete a trade already in the works, accelerated with your new advantage of taking in $3M more in salary than you send out. That's why I posted in this thread, "This certifies that Sean Marks is better than every player in the D-League."