Not sure why PA would sell. Does he need the money? I do see the logic in him wanting the best deal for smaller markets in order to protect the franchise after dies. And lets face it, when you have already had cancer twice, the odds are high it comes back again. But I do not see a reason why he would sell now. He likes his toys, and the Blazers are his biggest toy.
As long as he keeps the team in the state and leaves the front office alone i don't have a problem with him owning the team even though i don't like him either.
Wojjie-boy always writes attack dog articles, but this was way more repetitive than usual. Allen has not reversed his spending philosophy overnight. The conservative spenders simply paraded the leading liberal spender to try to intimidate the union. The novel-length article describes a nonnewsworthy event.
Well,l according to This Thread and story, Woj was really full of crap and PA was not brought into make any statement. He was simply in attendance, but never said anything.
Even if Allen doesn't sell now, how much longer would people expect him to be kicking around? Two bouts with cancer, nearly 60 and not exactly the picture of health. At some point Daddy Warbucks is going to be gone and then what? His sister doesn't appear to be much interested in basketball, multi-millionaires or billionaires with Portland ties appear to be in short supply. Speculation that he's interested in selling now might be baseless, but an Allen-less Blazers organization is probably closer than many think.
It doesn't to me. Who is our GM? When KP was fired (good decision or not) the team went out and hired one of the most respected young execs in the league to replace him. Now Cho is gone....and the job sits vacant. Larry Miller may have sold a pair of shoes to Michael Jordan back in the day....but that doesn't make him a "basketball" man. Leaving him in charge is the act of an owner who has just given up. The fact that Allen is advocating a system where his deep pockets will no longer be an asset to the team also speaks volumes.
I'm not sure if we know what Allen is advocating. It could be that he wants something different than what the league is pushing, but got outvoted by the other owners. It's all just speculation. barfo
Yea it would be nice if he would step out of his comfort zone and speak up. But I get it, its a perfect negotiation tatic yada yada Nobody knows the truth, how close the Blazers are to contention or how long Allen will see the Blazers out. I was hopeful with the addition of Rich, but it seems Paul doesn't have the virtue of patience with people. how hard would it have been to simply put Cho in his place, tell him to get in line with the president's plan? Rich is a very respectful person, I find it hard to believe that he was challenging Allen hard enough to risk loosing his job over it. I've always thought of PA as a tough, resilient man, but his actions of late have spoken like a wuss.
Why Cho Was Fired According to this article it was because he dared to tell Allen the truth and not what Allen wanted to hear. And now, he fired his latest GM, Rich Cho, after just one season. Why? Those within the Blazers believe that it was simple: Cho told Allen the truth. The Blazers aren’t contenders, that they’ll have to take a step back, maybe two, before they can start going forward again. “He didn’t want to hear that,” one league official with knowledge of the dynamic said. “This disconnect with Rich? It was this: He told Paul the truth. And Allen has no interest in going sideways now. But now [Allen’s] realizing that if he can’t win big in the NBA, well, he doesn’t want to lose money. http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news?slug=aw-wojnarowski_nba_owners_paul_allen_lockout_102111
Re: Why Cho Was Fired I don't think this is news to anyone. I thought it was well known that Cho wanted to blow up the team, and Paul (and Nate) didn't want to. And to be honest, I would bet you most fans wouldn't want them to blow up the team either. I lived through one horrible era in my (adult) life, I don't want to live through another. Besides, and I'm not saying that the team is on par with them, no one thought Dallas stood a shot in hell at winning the title last year. Stranger things have happened.
He didn't say that. You're just assuming because they are super-rich that they have no business skills.
Why was a thread about Cho combined with a thread about Paul Allen being rumored to want to look into selling the team?
Re: Why Cho Was Fired What's left to blow up? Aldridge, Wallace, Nic and Wes and not much else worth noting. We don't even have 5 real starters let alone a full squad that can contend for anything.
I would be offended that you're implying I didn't read the article, but it would be funny for me to do that, because I don't actually read links.
Cho claims Paul Allen causes global warming Because the premise is silly. You can't get much $ for a mythical team in a league that really doesn't exist. Let's merge both threads with the global warming thread and add this further proof it is real. http://www.washingtonpost.com/opini...hange-debate/2011/03/01/gIQAd6QfDM_story.html
Re: Why Cho Was Fired Bingo. It is more a matter of taking a chainsaw to all the deadwood. Blazers have roughly $40 million in payroll tied up in players who are hurt, over the hill, or simply not very good. You could replace everybody but those 4 with NBDL players and the team would only be taking a small step back.
Paul Allen has always been extremely reticent. Truth is that he doesn't really strike me as a terribly smart manager. The GM revolving door here, the tone-deafness over Trader Bob, the willingness to write dubious checks to guys like Damon Stoudamire. The numerous lackluster businesses. He got lucky with Microsoft a while ago and has been riding that success ever since. He hates confrontation. He attended a meeting that's inherently confrontational as some kind of symbol, but I doubt he had any kind of plan to talk. The players could've offered him 90%, and I doubt he says a peep. Sometimes it pays to just shut the fuck up and let everybody squirm around you. My dad (an attorney) does it all the damned time. It's amazing to see how people just get verbal diarrhea around him, just to end the silence. I know he's doing it and it still works on me. There's nothing to read into here about Allen's long-term plans with the team.
