I think he would be a great pickup on a one year deal. This isn't some Derek Anderson or Ruben Patterson signing where we're stuck with an overpaid contract for 6 years. It's a one year deal on a reasonable contract for a player that we could easily move mid-season if need be. A player that may be our starting SG. We can remake the entire roster in the offseason with cap room and Crawford's contract will fit nicely into that plan. We will need scoring off the bench this year, Batum has dissappearing acts and our starting backcourt is not that strong if you compare it to the rest of the starters throughout the league. This is a lockout season with back to back to backs. Our guys will be dead tired and teams with a solid bench will win many extra games. This reminds me very much of the Jim Jackson addition in '99 that contributed to us ending up in the WCF!!!
Jason Quick @jwquick Jamal Crawford texts that he is still undecided. My sense is he is leaning toward Sacramento. Style of play is a big factor for him.
wow...I never knew about that scenario. But for me it was b/c he went to the L*kers to go ring-shopping, not b/c he ditched us to do so.
at least thats how I remember it. I was like 17 or so so I could have been dramatic and all that lol. But it was after his year with Miluakee with Sam Cassell and George Karl iirc. I vaguely remember Brent Barry being down to us and San Antonio around the same time as well, and him (rightfully for him) choosing SAS. I remember being on O-Live at work for the bad news anyone? Am I totally wrong on why Gary Payton became Gary Satan to me?
He was the 8th pick overall coming out after his freshman year. Those expectations (which I shared) were a bit optimistic but definitely realistic. He's a lousy defender and not a very good shooter. 15 PER is not impressive for a guy who is primarily a scorer. Ed O.
Yes I remember this, supposedly we were offering him 3 years $25 million or something and he said he wanted more money to come play in Portland. Then he said he would go to the Lakers for $4 million if we didn't pay him more. Eventually Paul Allen said fuck it, why should we have to pay him so much more money then LA? If he really wants to go there for far less money let him do it.
and Paul Allen made the right choice, since Gary Payton and Karl Malone helped crash that Lakers team.
You sound like you're sarcastically disagreeing with me, but your response pretty well agrees with mine...a 15 PER is, indeed, league average offensive performance. Combined, though, with his below average defense (which you neglected to mention), he's overall below average. As I said, he's not a bad player...just not one that is good enough that it's worth giving minutes to that could be given to Matthews and Batum.
It's very unlikely we don't have some injuries out of Wallace, Batum, Matthews. Crawford can get a few minutes at the 1. Wallace or Batum will slide over to the 4 for stretches. I think theres plenty of minutes to have 2 solid players on your bench. If we don't acquire someone like Crawford, all the sudden if a single starter misses a game our best bench player becomes Elliot Williams?
I'm not vehemently against Crawford on something like a one-year deal. I just wouldn't start him or give minutes to him over Matthews or Batum. So him signing with Portland is not a particularly high priority...there's no major upside to me, but it's not harmful either if it's only a one-year deal. It would be equivalent to the Kurt Thomas signing for me...it's part of the process of making sure the team has enough NBA-caliber players on the roster, but it shouldn't really change the team's fortunes much this season. (Granted, Crawford is better than Thomas at this point in Thomas' career.)
I think he's one of those players you have to take the bad with the good. When he's on, he's one of the most dynamic scorers in the league. If anything he's a big shot taker and we don't really have a guy that is proven to close games. Its not a long contract, if it doesn't work out, no big deal. I don't understand how people don't think he's an upgrade to our bench.
