The jury is still out. If within the next nine months some of those contracts are actually traded for good assets, then I guess he was a good GM.
I think the blame rests solely on expectation. I agree with @riverman that Olshey didn't out last year's roster together to make the playoffs, but to start over with a new core, and develop players, to in several years become a contender. Last year though the team fought hard and overachrived, making the second round of the playoffs, so this year our expectations were up when maybe they shouldn't have been to begin with. Thinking they'd win 10 extra games this year and be a lock in for home court advantage come playoffs was naieve. And, I admit I fell for it being the die hard fan I am. But, how angry should we be that the Blazers aren't living up to those expectations, that are in a sense more bloated then the salary of our roster?
Frustrating, yes! Offense great enough to fire someone? No. Who's fault? Paul Allen (nothing gets done or not done without his approval) We the fans of the Blazers must hope that somehow our assets other than Dame or CJ can be turned into another impactful player. I think its very possible.
To be a little fair about the finish of last season, yes we pushed to make the playoffs, but a couple teams took serious nose dives to boost us.
I don't agree with this perspective too much. For instance, it continues the narrative that the space was "use it or lose it," especially the space between the cap and the luxury tax, since you can't use that space for anything but re-signing your own free agents. However, last off-season didn't signal the permanent end of having free agents to re-sign. This coming off-season Plumlee will be expiring and unless Allen wants to go deep into the luxury tax to re-sign him (meaning he could end up effectively paying between $30-40 million per year for Plumlee), then signing Crabbe and Leonard to those deals effectively meant losing Plumlee. And Plumlee is a much better player than either of those two. Also, I don't believe we preserved tradeable assets. Players stop being assets the moment you overpay them, especially when you overpay them massively as I believe Olshey did with Turner, Crabbe and Leonard. People are starting to fetishize shooting on this forum to unreasonable extents. Yes, we're playing in the pace-and-space era, but defense is still a big, big deal. Crabbe and Leonard can shoot (giving Leonard the benefit of the doubt on his weak numbers this year) but neither can play a lick of defense--they're not just below average, the numbers suggest that they're absolutely atrocious defenders. Shooting skill on a player with borderline-unplayable defense is not that valuable. What is gold these days are "three-and-D" players. Missing either the "three" (Turner) or the "D" (Crabbe, Leonard) deeply undermines the value. Cap space doesn't become useless just because stars won't sign. Yes, Portland will never lure stars here, but a merely decent (at the time) Warriors team lured Andre Iguodala to Oakland (Oakland is not a glamorous city). In a past era, the Blazers signed Andre Miller, a legitimately good player at the time. You can still work in the middle class/upper middle class of free agency to find good players using cap space. Even this past off-season, Hassan Whiteside seriously considered Portland. Yes, close doesn't count, but it shows that free agents aren't completely allergic to Portland. Put together a young, lean, rising team and, with a good vision to present, you can find some solid players in free agency, even if not a franchise-changing star. Instead, Portland has a young, middling and extremely expensive team with virtually no flexibility. Of course, this is obviously an issue of some contention: I see a lot of the players on this team as possessing little to no to negative trade value. From what I've seen, a lot of people disagree with me and see lots of valued trade assets scattered across the roster. We'll see. Hopefully, I'm wrong.
Well Olshey has A LOT to work with and this years draft is deep. Two first round picks and a lot of assets, make some fucking moves and surround CJ and Dame with better players. I will give Olshey that chance but if the draft and offseason goes by and we have nothing to show for it, get rid of him
Ross used his wet-on-wet oil painting technique to create works of art. Perhaps Olshey needs to channel Bob Ross and do the same with the Blazers roster!
Additionally, if he noticed there was an object looking similar to a "turd" he would just paint over it and give you something spectacular!
I think it's false to say he didn't screw up. However, I also think it's false to say he screwed up enough to get fired. What he has done is keep us in purgatory. Maybe the worst offense a GM can commit. He let all those contracts expire 2 years ago, and got NOTHING. That, along with drafting and re-signing the pale one set this franchise back. He did enough not to suck enough to have the opportunity to get good again. Signing Turner and Ezeli was asinine, but who's coming here? Ezeli most likely will never play a minute for us, and he brought Turner in to compete with Golden State, which is putting the cart WAY before the horse. It's like he is a blind fan watching last years team. We weren't ready for that step. I firmly believe he foolishly expedited the process to appease PA. Bad move. Enough to piss me off, but not enough to lose his job over.
#3. Turner did not prove himself in the playoffs, especially games 3 and 4. He was punked. He lost the ball too much. He looked like a high school freshman. I wouldn't necessarily call him a core piece but for what he was paid there was some obligation to put him in the rotation.. IMO
