I've been saying all year that waiting this summer will be the best approach. Fill out the roster with cheap filler and use the Tax-MLE but not the Full-MLE. In 2013 the Blazers got Mo Williams cheap with this strategy.
The only issue I have with that is, if they have someone in mind they want they think they can get they should go after them. There is no guarantee the "filler" they wait for will be guys they want. If the idea is to just fill out the roster with bodies, then sure I guess.
I agree with both of you guys. However, it depends on the plan our team has in place. I am waiting to see how it plays out. Olshey might have to wait it out as well unless he has a trade or two in mind.
Well yeah, if we have a chance to sign a guy to a good deal right away of course you take it. Most players who think they deserve more wait though. Lets say Hood and Kanter sign elsewhere in the first couple days then we should definitely go hard after the best possible player for the Tax-MLE.
Realistically, we're looking at these additions to be the 9th/10th men. I'm not expecting our TP-MLE to be help us find a difference maker-- think we gotta get that via trade. How do you rank our guys now? Here's my estimation: Tier 1: 1. Dame 2. CJ 3. Nurk Tier 2: 4. Collins Tier 3: 5. Bazemore 6. Harkless Tier 4: 7. Simons 8. Leonard 9. Little Tier 5: 10. Skal 11. Trent I think we bring back Layman since his addition won't eat up our MLE and we can simply sign him with his bird rights ( believe this is the case, someone correct me if I'm wrong). Just gotta make sure no other team messes with us to overpay him. Layman prolly can climb to Tier 3 with regular rotation minutes, so that leaves us with 2-3 roster spots left to fill out the roster. Gotta go BPA, but I'd love another vet PG and a C. Edit: And by extension, we're losing three tier 3 guys in Aminu/Hood/Kanter. Unless Collins takes the expected leap, and Simons shows why everyone his so hyped about him, or if Little pops and gets regular minutes, I think this roster will be effectively worse on paper than last year (especially with Nurk out).
I think Layman ends up taking his QO. I don’t think there will be a new deal, not from Portland at least. If someone else signs him to an offer sheet, I think we’ll let him go. Stotts doesn’t really seem to trust him.
From someone other than Portland? Maybe. I just don’t think the blazers will be giving him a multi year deal.
If they can keep him multi-year on a cheap deal ($8M/3yrs?), they should. Always important to have inexpensive role-players.
Who's paying him that much? Everyone is talking about how much money is out there but literally 40% of the league is a free agent. Once the big names get their max deals there really won't be that much money out there to pay some of these tier 3 and tier 4 guys "fair" value.
I dunno, that's a really small number. I can't understand why Stotts doesn't trust him-- dude can play. I feel like his inconsistency stems from his lack of regular PT/ role.
Yeah I like Layman but it always felt like Stotts was just counting down the days until he cooled off so he could justify benching him.
I'm not saying he can't play. I'm saying I just don't see anyone offering him a decent contract because of these inconsistencies. Connaughton got a vet min deal after being a rotation player for one year. I think Layman is better than Connaughton, but I don't think he's necessarily shown that much more. There is gonna be a lot of proven guys on the market that are taking below fair value deals so a team would really have to buy into Layman's upside to offer him more than like 3M (especially since he is restricted). If Layman wants to bet on himself, I can see him just taking the QO and playing out the year.
Based on how I think Olshey and Stotts value them: Tier 1: 1. Dame 2. Nurk 3. CJ Tier 2: 4. Collins 5. Simons 6. Bazemore Tier 3: 7. Little Tier 4: 8. Trent 9. Harkless 10. Leonard 11. Skal
The obvious flaw in Olshey's claim is that they "moved on" from Davis while keeping Aminu, Harkless, and ET - 3 guys equally guilty of cluttering up the offense who played more minutes than Davis. Wouldn't you think a wing who can't shoot is a slightly bigger problem then a back-up center who can't? You can see why people think there had to be more to it.
Well, Davis was a free agent, and those 3 were not, so I don't really understand your point. It was easy to move on from Davis, he walked. ET a bit more difficult to just move on from. Although, he just did.
