Zombie Damian Lillard to request trade in coming days (nope, he's not.)

From our guy Jake Fischer: https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2947348-new-details-emerge-on-ben-simmons-trade-talks

But that Lillard request may not be coming anytime soon.

There's certainly a possibility Lillard arrives at training camp, looks around Portland's locker room and determines the Trail Blazers roster has not been upgraded to his satisfaction. Yet there's a stronger belief in league circles that Lillard will at least venture into the regular season under new head coach Chauncey Billups, allowing him to revisit moving elsewhere before the trade deadline.

Also:

And rumors that a three-team swap between Philadelphia, Golden State and Portland was gaining legitimate traction were categorically denied by Warriors and Blazers personnel. Golden State brass are considered to be quite high on the team's recent lottery picks Jonathan Kuminga and Moses Moody.

 

lol...geeeezuz

I know it's a radical idea, but Dame may actually have thoughts and ideas and perspectives that are not welded to his NBA career

 

Rite. Especially this one about decisions

 

What do you mean, Rice? Everyone is stoked to see us with an arguably less talented roster and a different coach. Dame surely is happy with the changes and is all in.

 

Nat'l TV berating Dame as usual. Trying to force his hand to some other locale. They show other Superstars in their small markets.

 

Looks like a great day for Football & Naps. Maybe an old movie . Or a NEW ONE, " Talk to me Goose".

 

Or it’s because all the speculation has caused them to wonder what the team may look like around then.

Jesus mike

 

Dame has played in only one Christmas Day game in his career. I really doubt he cares.

 

For reals. He can be home with his Family and watching the joy in his beautiful children's eyes. Priceless!

 

Work and money isn't everything for some people.

 

i think he cares a lot more about playing in late may/june instead.

 

It's really troubling to me the absolute lack of urgency shown in this off season. We've actually shown less urgency to improve this roster than we ever have before, after our franchise player demanded urgent improvement. SMH. No one can be mad at Dame if he demands a trade at some point and the guy obviously doesn't want to have to do that.

 

Given that a major trade is the ONLY option available to make the kind of improvement that would constitute an appropriately “urgent” response, I don’t think you can fairly state how hard the Blazers are trying to make that happen. It takes at least two teams to make a trade. The Blazers’ sense of urgency doesn’t necessarily equate to a similar urgency on the other team’s part. Lots of folks have spent a ton of time around here pointing out how “flawed” CJ is as a player, but somehow expect Olshey to spin the CJ straw into “urgent” gold and do it like yesterday.

 

From the Neil and Jody thread...

Sigh...

The offseason isn't over...

The Trade Deadline is soooo far away...

There have only been 2 trades involving players we don't care about and can't stand...

The player we want to trade CJ for has yet to be moved...

Take a deep breath people...

 

I'm not saying there hasn't been effort or that I know anything. It's just alarming that we've seemingly done nothing to meet Dame's demands... if it's impossible to meet them, that's still pretty damn disconcerting.

 

You realize by the time the trade deadline comes, it might already be too late, right?

The # of trades in the league doesn't matter because there are a ton of teams who were either already better than us, did well in the draft, or have done well in free agency. What matters is if we're staying the same, getting marginally better, or significantly better.

 

You could've kept all of this to yourself completely because it still doesn't change anything I said. The offseason still isn't over.

 

I'm 100% with you that trying to measure how "hard" Portland is trying is meaningless. I don't care how hard they try, I just care what they get done. If we get way better w/out trying, great! If we try really hard and accomplish nothing, that's a failure.

In regards to CJ, what I find odd is anyone who had the stance that he was basically an all-star level player, but now want to claim how hard it is to make a trade where we get someone good back in return. It's not hard to trade away an all-star level player in his prime for someone good; teams would line up for that. The reality is that maybe he was never an all-star level player (as his all-star appearance would suggest) and we've been overachieving more often than not.