Zombie Fire Olshey

$120m and this looks like a treadmill team at best.

His plan was to lock up young talent on "favorable deals" - clearly he overvalued their talent/upside. With Billy King out of the league who in their right mind will take on the contracts of Crabbe and Leonard?

The best way to build a team, ESPECIALLY when top FA wont sign here, is through the draft and for whatever reason this is when Neil is the least aggressive during the off season. He's quick to package first rounders for immediate/moderate upgrades -- Mo Williams (Clippers) and Aaron Afflalo.

He'd look worse if some of his main targets actually signed here -- Parsons, Monroe, Hibbert, etc.

You pay for the entirety of the contract not just 31 games into it. Sure they are sucking now but we have a team full of young players and to bail on 24-25 year olds who aren't near the peak of their careers because we have a crappy start is a little short sited. This league has tons of examples of "overpaying" someone in year one to have that contract look favorable in the later years of it, not saying that is definitely what is going to happen now but to just discount any potential improvement in play or just reverting back to how we played last year is in the same boat as overreacting to the start of this season.
If we had championship aspirations then yea it would be panic mode but we are not in the same mold as GS/Spurs/Clippers/Memphis who in the majority have small windows to go for it before their talent drops off due to age or FA.
These guys are not playing like they want to win, they don't want to put the effort into the nit and grit that it takes to pull out some of these wins. Add that into the fact we are fouling almost 24 times a game and only getting around 20 calls a game (https://www.teamrankings.com/nba/stat/opponent-personal-fouls-per-game), there is a lot to dislike and this is not fun basketball to watch but we wiffed on FA and its been shown that we cannot get top teir or even second tier FA to come to us and it would be insane to try and salvage this season by overpaying in a trade so we are in for a rough season.
edit- had a little to mcuh to drink and forgot to add in my whole point. If you want to fire NO what would you have done differently, seems like his hands were tied since FA gave us the cold shoulder. If you want to tank then your pretty much having to get rid of both CJ and Dame and as for packing picks for middle tear FA, when we traded for Affalo we were a damn good team and looking for a Ring, who knew LA would get banged up affalo woudl be playing with one arm and Wesley would tear his achillies.

His FA targets and acquisitions so far have been terrible. His trading has been average at best. He landed a few nice players but the Afflalo for Barton and a 1st was horrible. And he seems to have no concept of what a player is worth. 18 mil for Crabbe and Turner?

The only good thing you can say for him, is that he's been a fair drafter, getting Lillard and CJ. Barton and Crabbe were good selections for where they were picked.

But yeah, 20 mil in luxury tax payments for a team that probably won't even make the playoffs. He's brought this team to the same financial ruin that Whitsett did, but at least Bob brought us close to a championship.

Olshey's gotta go. He's a soap opera star and a smooth talker, but his track record sucks.

Also, Paul Allen deserves this for being such a moron. He watches every game, so he should have known that the Leonard and Crabbe deals were ridiculous at the very least.

See if we can get Cho back. He seems to be doing all right.

Sinobas said:

His FA targets and acquisitions so far have been terrible. His trading has been average at best. He landed a few nice players but the Afflalo for Barton and a 1st was horrible. And he seems to have no concept of what a player is worth. 18 mil for Crabbe and Turner?

The only good thing you can say for him, is that he's been a fair drafter, getting Lillard and CJ. Barton and Crabbe were good selections for where they were picked.

But yeah, 20 mil in luxury tax payments for a team that probably won't even make the playoffs. He's brought this team to the same financial ruin that Whitsett did, but at least Bob brought us close to a championship.

Olshey's gotta go. He's a soap opera star and a smooth talker, but his track record sucks.

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In hindsight the Afflalo deal is bad, but at the time it was the right trade and a good one. Don't be captain hindsight.

He didn't course to sign Crabbe for $18M, the Nets did. And if we were already going to be over the cap for the next few years, what's the difference between paying Crabbe and Turner $18M per year instead of $10M?

And how does the difference of being $20M over the salary cap put us in financial ruin compared to being $2M over?

Last year, nobody said we were in "financial paradise". How are we in financial ruin? How exactly do the salaries put us in "ruin"?

Rastapopoulos said:

See if we can get Cho back. He seems to be doing all right.

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Strange how things work out over time. I also recall how fans and media seemed more concerned over his lack of charisma, than ability. Well thank goodness we got the silver-tongued huckster Neil to win the PR war.

BonesJones said:

In hindsight the Afflalo deal is bad, but at the time it was the right trade and a good one. Don't be captain hindsight.

He didn't course to sign Crabbe for $18M, the Nets did. And if we were already going to be over the cap for the next few years, what's the difference between paying Crabbe and Turner $18M per year instead of $10M?

And how does the difference of being $20M over the salary cap put us in financial ruin compared to being $2M over?

Last year, nobody said we were in "financial paradise". How are we in financial ruin? How exactly do the salaries put us in "ruin"?

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Huge, underperforming contracts reduce flexibility. When your team is as mediocre as this one and your options are limited that's a bad place to be -- Harder to make trades. Harder to move players. Harder to make mid-level signings that might improve your team.

The era of SPAM (spending Paul Allen's Money) was supposed to be over. It had huge consequences before and with a more punitive repeat offender luxury tax it could mean losing productive players like Plumlee for nothing (for example).

BonesJones said:

In hindsight the Afflalo deal is bad, but at the time it was the right trade and a good one. Don't be captain hindsight.

He didn't course to sign Crabbe for $18M, the Nets did. And if we were already going to be over the cap for the next few years, what's the difference between paying Crabbe and Turner $18M per year instead of $10M?

And how does the difference of being $20M over the salary cap put us in financial ruin compared to being $2M over?

Last year, nobody said we were in "financial paradise". How are we in financial ruin? How exactly do the salaries put us in "ruin"?

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It's the GMs job to evaluate talent and predict the outcome of trades and picks. A GM can't draft multiple busts and fuck up trades then hide behind the skirt of "hindsight is 20/20", because it's their JOB to predict. You can only not penalize them for things that are tottally unforseeable, like a freak injury like Matthews sustained for example.

As for the downside of being 40 million over the came as opposed to 4, I'll tell you why: let's say for example, that we'd like to retain Mason Plumlee for 10 million a year. Because we're going to be deep into the luxury tax next year, that 10 million dollar will cost Paul Allen 45 million per year. I know Paul is rich, but don't think he won't balk and spending 45 mil for Mason Plumlee.

Another downside is that it makes that player almost impossible to trade. If Crabbe were making 5-6 million per year, he'd be an attractive trade piece to include with a player like CJ, but at 18 mil, nobody will want him.

There are not many teams that lose an All-Star in his prime in free agency and then get to the second round of the playoffs the next year. Remember, we are making this push without a complete rebuild.

There are restrictions on the trading of contracts. Getting a new GM is not going to change that. Until that time we will have an unbalanced roster and it will not be pretty at times.

I am encouraged that we held the third highest scoring team in the league to 95 points in the first game of this year without two point guards in our starting lineup. Just think what we could do with our All-Star replacing CJ in the starting lineup and getting major help in return for CJ via trade.

Sinobas said:

It's the GMs job to evaluate talent and predict the outcome of trades and picks. A GM can't draft multiple busts and fuck up trades then hide behind the skirt of "hindsight is 20/20", because it's their JOB to predict. You can only not penalize them for things that are tottally unforseeable, like a freak injury like Matthews sustained for example.

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So, you just supported Bones' point, because the freak injury Matthews sustained is the reason the Afflalo trade didn't work out. Had he remained healthy, the Afflalo deal had appeared to make the Blazers a legit title contender before Matthews went down.

SlyPokerDog said:

Bring Back Trader Bob!

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Trader Bob? Those initials are TB.....I LIKE IT!!!

Nikolokolus said:

Huge, underperforming contracts reduce flexibility. When your team is as mediocre as this one and your options are limited that's a bad place to be -- Harder to make trades. Harder to move players. Harder to make mid-level signings that might improve your team.

The era of SPAM (spending Paul Allen's Money) was supposed to be over. It had huge consequences before and with a more punitive repeat offender luxury tax it could mean losing productive players like Plumlee for nothing (for example).

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Yeah, we are now in a position where we probably have to dump Plumlee for a draft pick or something or we will be losing him for nothing this summer. Not a lot of bargaining power though, which is true almost across the board now with our "assets".

PtldPlatypus said:

So, you just supported Bones' point, because the freak injury Matthews sustained is the reason the Afflalo trade didn't work out. Had he remained healthy, the Afflalo deal had appeared to make the Blazers a legit title contender before Matthews went down.

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IMO the sample size was too small to evaluate how everything was really working, and it was still a poor trade in hindsight even taking the Matthews injury into account. Afflalo has been mediocre to bad everywhere he's played since he left Orlando. And giving up Barton and a draft pick for a rental wasn't great value for that. Especially with CJ stuck to the bench at the time. Remember that Matthews had to go down for CJ to finally even get serious minutes from Stotts. Hindsight being what it is, we can see that CJ is a way better player than Afflalo and it was seemingly true even in 2014-15.

PtldPlatypus said:

So, you just supported Bones' point, because the freak injury Matthews sustained is the reason the Afflalo trade didn't work out. Had he remained healthy, the Afflalo deal had appeared to make the Blazers a legit title contender before Matthews went down.

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Absolutely wrong. The Afflalo trade was a failure on it's own, for reasons that should be obvious. Afflalo is a worse player than Barton and we lost a 1st round draft pick to boot. Aaron didn't play well enough to warrant re-signing even though we had just lost Matthews, which should tell you something.

SlyPokerDog said:

Bring Back Trader Bob!

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Please activate @jlprk's infinite like button.

El oh el.

Sinobas said:

Absolutely wrong. The Afflalo trade was a failure on it's own, for reasons that should be obvious. Afflalo is a worse player than Barton and we lost a 1st round draft pick to boot. Aaron didn't play well enough to warrant re-signing even though we had just lost Matthews, which should tell you something.

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I think we didn't re-sign him cause we were going younger. And had two young SG's in Crabbe and CJ.

Five Second Violation said:

IMO the sample size was too small to evaluate how everything was really working, and it was still a poor trade in hindsight even taking the Matthews injury into account. Afflalo has been mediocre to bad everywhere he's played since he left Orlando. And giving up Barton and a draft pick for a rental wasn't great value for that. Especially with CJ stuck to the bench at the time. Remember that Matthews had to go down for CJ to finally even get serious minutes from Stotts. Hindsight being what it is, we can see that CJ is a way better player than Afflalo and it was seemingly true even in 2014-15.

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So really it's Stotts fault, that we ever had to make that trade. Because of his refusal to play CJ. A lot of people on here were calling CJ a bust that year.

Sinobas said:

It's the GMs job to evaluate talent and predict the outcome of trades and picks. A GM can't draft multiple busts and fuck up trades then hide behind the skirt of "hindsight is 20/20", because it's their JOB to predict. You can only not penalize them for things that are tottally unforseeable, like a freak injury like Matthews sustained for example.

As for the downside of being 40 million over the came as opposed to 4, I'll tell you why: let's say for example, that we'd like to retain Mason Plumlee for 10 million a year. Because we're going to be deep into the luxury tax next year, that 10 million dollar will cost Paul Allen 45 million per year. I know Paul is rich, but don't think he won't balk and spending 45 mil for Mason Plumlee.

Another downside is that it makes that player almost impossible to trade. If Crabbe were making 5-6 million per year, he'd be an attractive trade piece to include with a player like CJ, but at 18 mil, nobody will want him.

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I want someone to tell me what moves they would have done differently this summer.

We had cap space. It was use it or lose it. Nobody would sign with us. Whiteside returned to Miami. Chandler Parsons spurned us for Memphis. Who was Neil supposed to go out and get?

People are so concerned about how much we spent. The money was gone. One way or another. Dame's new contract kicked in. CJ's new contract was coming up. So it was either re-sign Crabbe/Harkless/Leonard or let them walk for nothing. It was either sign Turner or lose our money. Unless there's another free agent out there that wanted to come here. Was there?

Natebishop3 said:

I want someone to tell me what moves they would have done differently this summer.

We had cap space. It was use it or lose it. Nobody would sign with us. Whiteside returned to Miami. Chandler Parsons spurned us for Memphis. Who was Neil supposed to go out and get?

People are so concerned about how much we spent. The money was gone. One way or another. Dame's new contract kicked in. CJ's new contract was coming up. So it was either re-sign Crabbe/Harkless/Leonard or let them walk for nothing. It was either sign Turner or lose our money. Unless there's another free agent out there that wanted to come here. Was there?

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I'm still bitter about the Whiteside.

Did we ever actually try to sign him? Cause his comments make it seem like we didn't.

Nate said:

I'm still bitter about the Whiteside.

Did we ever actually try to sign him? Cause his comments make it seem like we didn't.

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Yes, Olshey made Whiteside his first target in free agency. Did it ever get to a written offer? Maybe not if Whiteside told them he was signing with the Heat, but Whiteside made it clear that he was ready to come here if it hadn't worked out with Miami.

http://www.blazersedge.com/2016/12/...eside-free-agency-trail-blazers-second-option

Five Second Violation said:

IMO the sample size was too small to evaluate how everything was really working, and it was still a poor trade in hindsight even taking the Matthews injury into account. Afflalo has been mediocre to bad everywhere he's played since he left Orlando. And giving up Barton and a draft pick for a rental wasn't great value for that. Especially with CJ stuck to the bench at the time. Remember that Matthews had to go down for CJ to finally even get serious minutes from Stotts. Hindsight being what it is, we can see that CJ is a way better player than Afflalo and it was seemingly true even in 2014-15.

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Yeah, even when the trade was just a rumor I was not enthralled with the idea of getting Afflalo. The rumor also had Chandler as a possibility, whom I also wasn't excited about but would have preferred. Not sure whether it was us or DEN that made the Afflalo call, but it was not the right call for us, IMO. We had several SGs, but I believe we only had Nic and Dorrel (?) at SF...so basically just Nic.

If you sat down with Olshey over a beer, I'd bet he'd tell you that the roster we have today is not the roster he sees the Blazers having when they get to the point of contending. What we have now is a collection of young guys with signed contracts that can be used in making the trades that are going to be needed to get the team to the point of contention.

Natebishop3 said:

I want someone to tell me what moves they would have done differently this summer.

We had cap space. It was use it or lose it. Nobody would sign with us. Whiteside returned to Miami. Chandler Parsons spurned us for Memphis. Who was Neil supposed to go out and get?

People are so concerned about how much we spent. The money was gone. One way or another. Dame's new contract kicked in. CJ's new contract was coming up. So it was either re-sign Crabbe/Harkless/Leonard or let them walk for nothing. It was either sign Turner or lose our money. Unless there's another free agent out there that wanted to come here. Was there?

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Precisely. I do fault Neil for past FA targets, but I can't really fault him with what he did this summer. The money was gone, and it's better to have Crabbe/Meyers than to not have them and also not have money to play with. Crabbe/Meyers will be trade assets - maybe not this season, but at some point. And Harkless is an amazing asset - very valuable to us both as a contributor and as a bargain contract for a starting SF helping to offset the money being used on Dame/CJ/Crabbe/Turner.

e_blazer said:

What we have now is a collection of young guys with signed contracts that can be used in making the trades that are going to be needed to get the team to the point of contention.

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This is the biggest point of contention on this forum and therefore, I'd guess, amounts to the split between people who think Olshey is doing a good job and those who think he's not. Those who think he's doing a good job believe that the players on the roster (outside of Lillard, McCollum and Harkless) are good trade assets. Those who don't think he's doing a good job think players like Turner, Crabbe and Leonard are negative trade value based on their contracts.

So it'll be interesting to see whether Olshey really can parlay "the young guys with signed contracts," that people are split on, into players that will drive the next contention cycle.

The success of the team last year threw everything out of whack.

The Batum trade, the signings, letting Wes/Rolo walk.... it was all with an eye to the future. I imagine if Olshey had known we would be that good last year, he wouldn't have traded Batum.

Minstrel said:

This is the biggest point of contention on this forum and therefore, I'd guess, amounts to the split between people who think Olshey is doing a good job and those who think he's not. Those who think he's doing a good job believe that the players on the roster (outside of Lillard, McCollum and Harkless) are good trade assets. Those who don't think he's doing a good job think players like Turner, Crabbe and Leonard are negative trade value based on their contracts.

So it'll be interesting to see whether Olshey really can parlay "the young guys with signed contracts," that people are split on, into players that will drive the next contention cycle.

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I agree. January 15th is when Olshey gets the chance to prove his worth or take a step towards the John Nash hall of infamy in the annals of Blazers GMs.