Zombie Neil Deserves Respect

As one of his biggest critics over the years — he clearly learned his lesson from the horrendous 2016 summer and has put together the most balanced roster in years.

Kudos to Neil

Who are you and what have you done with Fez?

I can't say what I want on Olshey because people will be like "How can you defend him and criticize him" but I expected a strong off-season out of him. This was the best position he was in headed into an off-season. Good off-season, I wouldn't say great, but it was definitely good. But that's what I expected so it's kinda just par for the course. I like every move except for the DJJ signing but I honestly thought he was a poor defender before researching him more after the signing.

Either way, this was the first off-season he didn't have those 2016 contracts on the books. I don't think it's a surprise that he was able to do more without those contracts weighing him down.

I like that he’s swinging for extra base hits rather than singles, but no back up pg yet needs to be addressed

Yeah, Olshey deserves a ton of credit because he put together an amazing team around Dame and CJ. He prioritized defense which was astonishing. I assume him and Stotts talked about the guys we got so I imagine that there will be more player and ball movement on offense. Obviously RoCo is great for us, we know Enes can play with our guys and I really like DJJ, so athletic, aggressive, can put the ball on the floor and has a high BBIQ on both ends. Keeping Hood and Melo seems smart too. I give him credit for all of that. I'm hoping all of this points towards him wanting real change and that something will wake him up and get the best value for CJ possible but these moves are about as good as he could do keeping Dame and CJ together.

Mediocre Man said:

I like that he’s swinging for extra base hits rather than singles, but no back up pg yet needs to be addressed

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Yep, solid signings like Roco/Kanter/Hood/Melo and then an upside younger guy like DJJ and taking what is in IMO a great risk/reward chance on Giles. nice mix of talent/age/experience at key positions of need, be interesting if we add a PG

I really like that he didn't give out any bad contracts. If some of it doesn't work he could package a couple guys with a pick for an upgrade. That wasn't the case in 2016.

Guys like Bertans signing for 80 mil I don't get, hes basically Ryan Anderson, possibly unplayable on a contender.

It seems like most Neil detractors are complainng about the lack of an upgraded third string PG behind Dame and CJ... Typical Blazers fan excessively overthinking the 14th man and shows what a great job Neil did.

SharpesTriumph said:

It seems like most Neil detractors are complainng about the lack of an upgraded third string PG behind Dame and CJ... Typical Blazers fan excessively overthinking the 14th man and shows what a great job Neil did.

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I think it is a valid nit to pick. Most years we have a guy like Napier or Curry who can handle the ball a little and run a play if Dame or CJ are missing a game. I assume either Simons has made significant improvements or we've got a couple ideas we're still kicking around.

But yeah, this has been a fantastic off season for Olshey. A nice collection of talent that seems to fit together and isn't really that expensive.

SharpesTriumph said:

It seems like most Neil detractors are complainng about the lack of an upgraded third string PG behind Dame and CJ... Typical Blazers fan excessively overthinking the 14th man and shows what a great job Neil did.

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To be fair, I think most who clamored fire a backup PG wanted that player to be 2nd string instead of CJ rather than 3rd string behind him.

Solid moves. Some on here had mentioned the idea/possibility of getting Kanter. RoCo was a surprise and re-signing Hood/Melo was fairly expected. DJJ seemed a bit of a reach for the MLE and Giles is a no-lose contract.

Still looking for who that other playmaker is outside of Dame come Playoff time though. Biggest issues wasn't resolved IMO.

TBpup said:

Still looking for who that other playmaker is outside of Dame come Playoff time though. Biggest issues wasn't resolved IMO.

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Our biggest issue was a lack of defense on the wings, which was addressed, and a lack of overall depth, which was addressed.

I don't worry that much about an added playmaker. With what little money we had to spend, it would have meant acquiring someone with poor defense (ugh).

There were so many things wrong with our roster beyond Dame/CJ/Nurk/Trent that it's amazing we did as well as we did in the playoffs.

We ran Dame ragged trying to scrape our way into the playoffs last year. Whiteside was terrible at facilitating our offense. Our 7th man were guys like Simons, Hezonja or Gabriel, which meant we effectively had no 7th man. We were asking Melo to try to defend at a high level.

We're just not going to have those problems this year. We've got a quality roster that goes 9 or 10 guys deep.

Not.

Swayed.

(FAMS.)

Of all his moves, I liked Covington best, easily. But I will bet good money that when it emerges in a couple of years that a very good player was taken on or after where we pick in 20 and 21, we'll be moaning about this trade.

I'm not worried about the backup PG spot. I think Simons will be fine as a backup PG in spot minutes. Also, I think the teams biggest issue last year was their atrocious defense, esp at the SF/PF spot.

They've improved it.

And really not at the cost of the teams offense.

Now while the additions this year (healthy Hood, Covington, Jones Jr, Kanter and re-signed Melo) are an unknown for how well they will jell together, they collectively have potential to be significantly better than last years support (hurt Hood, Melo, Mario, Ariza, Tolliver, Bazemore, Swanigan, Skal, Whiteside).

Especially Mario, Tolliver and Bazemore. Good lord those guys were bad, especially Tolliver.

Combined those bums got the team 17 points between them, but I would bet they gave up more than they scored.

Even if the only changes they did was replacing Mario and Tolliver with Covington and Melo, you've improved the team a significant amount. Throw in Kanter and a (albeit probably rust) returning Hood and that's probably 5-10 more wins easily. Add to that a full year of Nurk (hopefully) and Trent progressing consistently, and it's probably another 3-4 more wins. So anywhere from 44-28 to 49/50-22.

Clearly, there are unknowns, but I think the holes fixed more than make up for the perceived hole at the backup PG spot. Before, SF, PF and C were their weak spots. Each one, at best, had 1 spot and no backup. And in the case of the SF, they really didn't have anything outside of Ariza, and while he was a blessing, he wasn't exactly consistent.

Given the tools available and being in a smaller market, he did a solid job adding depth to the squad. I still think that he has another move in him at the deadline depending where were are in the playoff seeding. The nice thing is we have a few of those $10 million size contracts to use to get deals done.

PtldPlatypus said:

To be fair, I think most who clamored fire a backup PG wanted that player to be 2nd string instead of CJ rather than 3rd string behind him.

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If CJ doesn't play in the backup PG role, especially now that the roster is 10, maybe even 11 deep not even including Simons and Little then that doesn't leave enough minutes for everyone else to play. It especially hurts Gary Trent Jr's minutes and I think we can all agree that would be a mistake right?

With the two-way rules this year I think one of the two-way spots should go to a PG that can just remain inactive unless there's an emergency. As for if there's an injury then I think we'd have the pieces to trade for someone to fill in better than the two-way guy.

Hear Hear!!!

Get a 3rd string backup PG with that 15th spot and its a an A+ offseason to me(I know, different thread)

I still think Olshey is a bad GM; too many ego-driven decisions and too much time drafting off of Dame's greatness

but this is probably his best off-season since he's been the Portland GM. The only other off-season that comes close is when he added Robin Lopez, Mo Williams, & Dorell Wright after drafting CJ and Crabbe

what this off-season appeared to have, finally, is a sense of urgency. And one thing the off-season didn't have, league-wide, was a lot of cap-space that competed with and overwhelmed MLE offers. And what Olshey didn't have himself is a lot of cap-space. That's his kryptonite. What we've seen is when Olshey has cap-space himself he makes max offers to guys like Roy Hibbert, Chandler Parsons, Turner (big not max), & Whiteside. But when the league has little cap-space to compete with him, Olshey can sign a player like Nurkic to the contract he has. Olshey seems best at operating in the bargain bins and in the margins

I think that appearance of urgency is probably real. I suspect Olshey's seat was getting hot and the flames were coming from both Dame and Seattle. And it just illustrates what past off-seasons should have looked like. I'd agree with the assessment that Olshey has been hamstrung with the salary cap poison of his 2016 off-season. He still is a little in that it appears the BAE is butting up against the tax threshold and the threshold is winning because Portland spent the last two seasons in the tax

I'd also agree with those who are thinking he might be shooting for a consolidation trade. It will be a tough needle to thread though, but if he can pull it off that would be great, assuming he can actually bring in another all-star talent

so, on paper, this looks like Portland's deepest team. Now comes the hard part and that's converting that paper depth to wins, including in the playoffs. That's when the full grades can be posted

I'm very happy with the franchise and really stoked with the new additions...no complaints from me period. Neil did a bang up job upgrading our defense across the board...what's not to like? Ant is being groomed to become our 3rd string pt guard...he's not a natural 2 guard at the NBA level..he has the speed...he's our project for now....I can live with that as the 14th option on the bench....no problem...I expect him to make a leap this season or he'll be playing in Beijing next year

BonesJones said:

I can't say what I want on Olshey because people will be like "How can you defend him and criticize him" but I expected a strong off-season out of him. This was the best position he was in headed into an off-season. Good off-season, I wouldn't say great, but it was definitely good. But that's what I expected so it's kinda just par for the course. I like every move except for the DJJ signing but I honestly thought he was a poor defender before researching him more after the signing.

Either way, this was the first off-season he didn't have those 2016 contracts on the books. I don't think it's a surprise that he was able to do more without those contracts weighing him down.

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Very well said!

I honestly think Jones will quickly win over the naysayers with his high energy game, passion (wanting the guard the other team's best player), and skill. If there is frustration with Jones, it will likely be directed at Stotts.

Rastapopoulos said:

Of all his moves, I liked Covington best, easily. But I will bet good money that when it emerges in a couple of years that a very good player was taken on or after where we pick in 20 and 21, we'll be moaning about this trade.

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just remember. We wouldn't have drafted that player had we kept the pick. LoL. Then you will feel better.

Wizard Mentor said:

I honestly think Jones will quickly win over the naysayers with his high energy game, passion (wanting the guard the other team's best player), and skill. If there is frustration with Jones, it will likely be directed at Stotts.

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Watching some video of him he looked like he had the talent and skills to sort of be a Ruben Patterson type player. Will be interesting to see what kind of player we see on the court when the season starts.

Rastapopoulos said:

Of all his moves, I liked Covington best, easily. But I will bet good money that when it emerges in a couple of years that a very good player was taken on or after where we pick in 20 and 21, we'll be moaning about this trade.

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Yes but Dame needs help now

Sedatedfork said:

Watching some video of him he looked like he had the talent and skills to sort of be a Ruben Patterson type player. Will be interesting to see what kind of player we see on the court when the season starts.

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I was thinking more along the lines of TRob

but maybe Patterson is a good comp too although I think Patterson had better handles. The problem with the Patterson comp is that his ceiling was 15-20 years ago and the NBA has changed dramatically since then. Patterson would be a square peg in a round hole for most teams in the league right now

it's been mentioned many times but it's still a big worry that Jones minute average dropped from 23.3 in the regular season to 6.5 in the playoffs. Miami went for floor spacing, benched Jones, and it got them to the finals

wizenheimer said:

but maybe Patterson is a good comp too although I think Patterson had better handles. The problem with the Patterson comp is that his ceiling was 15-20 years ago and the NBA has changed dramatically since then. Patterson would be a square peg in a round hole for most teams in the league right now

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Yeah, I was thinking the same thing tbh. Maybe T Rob is a better comparison. Just hope he has more motor and drive than T Rob. And more brains than Rube. That's probably his ceiling right there.

wizenheimer said:

I was thinking more along the lines of TRob

but maybe Patterson is a good comp too although I think Patterson had better handles. The problem with the Patterson comp is that his ceiling was 15-20 years ago and the NBA has changed dramatically since then. Patterson would be a square peg in a round hole for most teams in the league right now

it's been mentioned many times but it's still a big worry that Jones minute average dropped from 23.3 in the regular season to 6.5 in the playoffs. Miami went for floor spacing, benched Jones, and it got them to the finals

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Miami also benched Meyers shooting 41% from three in the bubble and got to the finals, so it wasn't just that they added floor spacing.

On second units or lineups with a shooting big Jones role may be fine. If Jones was a good 3pt shooter he'd probably be a max player.

I agree its a concern.... luckily Terry doesn't have to rely on him to start, and can just use him situationally.

Other than getting Covington what have we done ?

AldoTrapani said:

Other than getting Covington what have we done ?

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If you don't see trading Mario for Enes Kanter as a masterstroke....I don't know what to tell you