What it will take to get Stotts fired?

What about McGowan has made you feel he bleeds black/red and dies with our success on the court? I've never got the feel. He strikes me as a business guy doing his job, to keep his boss happy by trying to stay out of the red.

 

We're not running Doug Collins' offense and I don't think the triangle is going to take this roster to the promise land.

 

McGowan doesn’t handle basketball operations. He is mainly responsible for business operations.

 

I don't they're mutually exclusive. I think every minute spent trying to improve the players on the roster is of greater value than a minute trying to improve a guy in a suit. Humans can't multi-task, so you need to decide which activity is of greater value.

 

You think teams fire coaches THEN think of replacements? I sure hope not.

 

We have to be honest with ourselves, though. As great as Dame is, his being on the roster hasn't attracted a heck of a lot of help toward winning a championship.

I've said elsewhere that I think a fair share of that failure falls on Olshey's shoulders, that he hasn't done a good job selling the chance to ride with Dame and the upsides to playing in Portland to free agents or players wanting to be traded.

But one could make the argument that trading Dame now could improve the overall talent of the team significantly over the course of the next 3-5 years. If you imagine what kind of a haul a trade for Dame would return, you're probably talking 5 first-round picks, a young lottery pick, maybe a couple of other decent role players and it would open a lot of cap space. I'd imagine any trade of Dame would also mean a move for CJ, who also probably would net at least one reasonably high draft pick and a young, unproven talent.

If the Knicks offer the Blazers Barrett, Mitchell Robinson, and Ntilikina and 5 first round picks, including both of this year's first rounders, and maybe the Sixers come in and offer Josh Richardson and a first rounder for CJ, would you think the Blazers were on their way to being a better overall team than they are now? Because I've been looking at our prospects for the offseason ... I don't see a guy we can pick in the draft making this team better next year, and, if we lose Melo and Whiteside and Hezonja, that makes an already depleted bench that much weaker and I don't know how we fill those spots; btw, I am not saying Hezonja is good, but he does have value as a ballhandler because I'm not comfortable with Trent, Ant, or any of our army of small forwards initiating the offense like he can.

 

It's iso ball. What's the difference?

 

That was my point. I said if they don’t COMMIT to firing Stotts then the process of identifying a coach won’t begin.

 

I remember a few years ago, the Miami Dolphins hired a Dallas Cowboys assistant named Tony Sparano. Turned the team around from 1-15 to 11-5 his first year. But the Dolphins made a couple of questionable personnel decisions the next two years and finished around .500.

Around that time, the owner, a Michigan guy, decided to approach Stanford coach Jim Harbaugh to see if he'd be interested in becoming the Dolphins head coach. Not only did Harbaugh not take the job, but word leaked out that Stephen Ross had offered it to him.

Ross, in a PR quagmire, signed Sparano to an extension, but the team suffered and Sparano was fired midway through the year. The interim coach did well and eventually got a head coaching job somewhere else, but not with the Dolphins. It was a fiasco.

 

If you think that all we run is ISO, then we're watching different games.

 

That's not the real reason Chicago fired Collins. He's mental. Seriously. Later, Washington fired him for going nuts, too.

 

No, McGowan is Olshey's equal. Olshey would be fired by the owner, the same as Pritchard and Buchanan and Whitsitt were. And that idiot what's his name who was Pritchard's best friend.

(I don't believe any fake organization chart you find.)

 

Were Kraft in the league on assists. Definitely near or at the top in terms of isolations.

90% of our offense is 1v1 or pick n roll (sometimes with some meaningless movement to make it look prettier).

 

After game 5, it is very likely Stotts' Playoff winning percentage will be....

....... .344

For the love of this franchise, Dame, and the fans, please don't let this continue to happen year after year after year.

 

It’s not that they’re losing, that was expected. It’s how they’re losing. With the exception of Game 1, they’re not even competitive - primarily because the offensive system they run is so primitive and easy to game plan against. Trap Dame, and you will beat this team, and rather easily. Oh, and they don’t play a lick of defense and that’s on the coach for not instilling that as a pillar of his coaching philosophy.

 

Dame getting injuries both to his finger and to his knee are heartbreaking.....but do NOT let that cloud the reality of what was happening on the court.

• When Dame's finger was dislocated, Portland was down by 30 in the 3rd quarter.
• When Dame went down with the knee injury, Portland was down by 29 points....again in the dreaded 3rd quarter.

This is to Javale McGee, KCP, Danny Green, Enrico Caruso, out of the league JR Smith, old shell Dwight Howard, roller coaster Kuzma, 1/2 the Morris troup to go with old LeBron and 4th quarter scared Davis.

Not to take away from how good those two players are, but the rest of that roster is a train wreck. And Dame, CJ, Melo, Whiteside and Nurk were down 30 points twice to that group.

 

All this is moot. This annual Fire Terry Stotts thread is such a waste of time (seriously, it's every freaking year at playoff time). He and Dame are tied at the hip-- if Terry is fired, you risk alienating Dame, which Neil won't do.

The only way Terry goes is if Neil goes, and we teardown the whole thing and hope and pray that Dame doesn't get disenfranchised. Having his supermax locked up is at least a bit comforting.

 

How do you know this? Has Dame ever said he wouldn’t play for another coach? Pure conjecture and nothing else.

Dame is a loyal guy. He’s loyal to the Blazer fans. He’s loyal to this organization. He’s loyal to his teammates. And he’s loyal to his coach. He’s loyal to a fault but that doesn’t mean he wouldn’t support a coaching change. One way to get him on board is to include him in the recruitment process (seek his feedback, etc).

 

This Laker team was vulnerable. I guess somebody else is going to have to step up and give them their stomping.

 

When was the last time you saw a top 10 player in the NBA so outwardly support his coach?

This was from last week:
https://theathletic.com/2005361/?source=twitterhq

It's not the first time. He has repeatedly backed Terry.

This was 2 yrs ago after the NO sweep:https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/25321406/zach-lowe-damian-lillard-portland-trail-blazers-nba

Just a couple examples, but I think it would go without saying that Dame would be upset with a Terry firing.