It doesn’t really matter who the GM is. Everyone knows that Damian Lillard & Chauncey Billups are the ones recruiting and calling the shots.
If Chaucey's the fucking GM then say it... that would give him the clout to tell the Griffins and Franks of the world to give us a better deal or respectfully go fuck themselves. If Dame is then we've got really really bad problems. Players are too damn close to the situation and don't have enough time devoted to scouting, injury background, finances, etc. to be playing GM. Sure ask your star what he needs but that's as far as it can go. You can also make him feel included by giving him a heads up and explaining why deals are going down but in no way should a player be a shot caller.
Im just saying so many people act like they know what happened in those conversations or what directives upper management gave him. People talk about what we got back in return... CJ didn't work we tried for 8 years... Roco obviously didn't want to be here and played like it, Norm was not as good as advertised bringing their values down. Other GM's know this and they know the Blazers needed to break it up bringing down additional value those players might have. It's not like we traded 3 starters that were lighting the world on fire, We traded 3 starters who all would be coming off the bench for a contender (CJ arguable depending on his role). The team was not built to compete to win and sometimes you need to take a step back to a leap forward and sometimes that means taking some gambles... The trade didn't work out as good as we wanted to with the Pels but would you gamble at the possibility of a lottery pick or trade CJ for a late first rounder? Because he's simply not worth a guaranteed lottery pick. People are overvaluing what these players were worth, IMO. Doesn't help that those rumors about Dame wanting out last off season which also could have effected the values of players on the team.
I'm actually kind of enjoying the people going ballistic about Cronin. why? because in 2015 when I started saying that the Blazers should fire Olshey because he was going to be the prince of mediocrity by going all-in on a Dame/CJ back court while wasting cap-space, I was the lone voice in the wilderness...the only passenger on the fire-olshey train. And I got shit-tons of abuse for that advocacy after the 2016 spending spree a few more passengers boarded the train but there were still a bunch of olshey-does-no-wrong people pushing back hard on any suggestion that Olshey's ass should be sent packing. By the time that Olshey was finally shit-canned, the fire-olshey train was SRO so yeah, after more than 6 years of being angry about the Blazer GM, it amuses me that people are going kind of bat-shit about Cronin after a trade deadline & 11 hours as GM. Now, I've wanted CJ out of town almost as long as I've wanted Olshey gone. And I wanted this latest dumb-ass reboot of olshey-vision dismantled. So maybe the fact that Cronin did the absolutely needed tear-down makes me cut him more slack than I should
How often is the "face of the franchise" a teams 3rd best player with the least amount of tenure? If CJ ends up being the best player on a championship contending NOP team I'll be eating lots of crow.
So basically what you're saying is that you were a lot like the people calling for Cronin's head way earlier than most?
he was hired in 2012....I didn't really start my anti-olshey crusade till 3 years later. The Cronin hate started 3 months ago
I'm with you... I wasn't thrilled with the CJ trade nor would I claim it is unequivocally the best deal we could've got because I have zero clue what was on the table. The flip side continues to be that a lot of people act as if they know NOP was willing to give up the better of the LAL or NOP, or we could've got a better young player, or the Clippers were willing to give us a 1st round pick. I have seen no concrete evidence of this being true. When people were pissing and moaning that we had this amazingly deep and talented roster, I expressed the opinion that people we really over-valuing the talents of guys like Aminu, Harkless, Hood, Whiteside, Kanter, Turner, Meyers, Crabbe, Plumbee, etc. only to find out that those guys could never duplicate the amount of success they had in Portland after leaving. The fact of the matter is <insert whoever you want> got a lot out of the marginal talent Olshey put around Dame. Even CJ showed to have below average playoff production compared to what he did in Portland.
I've been right there with you on both Olshey and CJ... the whole time. As soon as I heard that CJ was going to be starting with Dame after Neil let LaMarcus walk without compensation I knew we were fucked. CJ was supposed to be Dame's backup and Neil had just shit the bed. CJ was better than I thought but Neil definitely overpaid him and he was never a fit next to Dame. I just don't think, as you know, that Cronin got everything out of the four guys he traded that he could have but that's pure conjecture on my part... wasn't thrilled about those trades, obviously. So when we promote Cronin and basically keep the entire Olshey apparatus in place just without Neil at its head, I'm sorry but it is a huge disappointment for me. The vast majority of our front office including the guy we just gave a four year deal to lead it, are responsible right alongside Neil for our decade of water treading and bullshit. I hope I'm just jaded by the decade of Olshey's half ass moves and condescension. I hope Cronin can do a lot better now that he's "cleaned up the books" and no longer has the interim tag hurting his credibility. I'm looking forward to that being the case but I was hoping for bigger change to our front office and turning the page completely on the Olshey era of management.
So why did we not interview any other candidates for GM? Is it maybe Cronin lack of experience is cheaper than going for an experience candidate? Just asking for a friend
I think all of us were giving him those first three years and maybe those of us who aren't should be doing the same for Cronin but it's hard to extricate Cronin from the last decade that he was for the majority, the right hand man of the guy so many of us wanted gone so badly. It doesn't matter now though because he's the guy and we've got to root for him. He doesn't come off like an asshole whereas his predecessor did, so that's a plus. I'll just try to check my negativity and give the guy a chance because there will be plenty of time for belly aching if my negative inclinations end up being correct and I'd much rather those of you who are happy today are right and I'm wrong.
Honestly I think it's both money and apathy from our ownership group. They might have tricked themselves into being enamored with Joe but really it was a whole lot easier than turning over almost the entire front office. Our ownership looks like they're into cutting costs and putting the team on cruise control right now and it fucking sucks.
You know, it may be time to just table this until draft day and free agent signings. I have every confidence that Cronin will be as bad as his former boss at roster building, and that we will soon have clear evidence that this hire was a mistake...and that there is no hope until Jody and the jerk-offs are sent packing. I think that is the part that most frustrates me - pretty much nobody here thinks Olshey did a good job or that Jody is a good owner, but some people are happy that we hired their bastard child as the new GM.
"For the Blazers to make this decision without measuring Cronin’s plan against those of other sharp candidates is more than concerning. It’s borderline malpractice." something about this doesn't add up. The guy did a horrible job and was just handed the job without even interviewing other people? Even the most pronounced Cronin fans can agree that we at least should of interviewed other candidates to see their potential plans. I saw this coming but was still extremely disappointed. Jody has no idea what she is soon we are in purgatory until the sale happens. when it rains for blazer fans it pours.
We'll never know what potential better offers there were, and neither will Cronin since he did the trade a week before the deadline.
Please stop saying we don't know if there were better offers. Cronin himself literally said they took less value to appease both Norm and CJ. Both LAC and NO are on record as saying they didn't envision a scenario where they got the players they did for so little. Multiple writers are saying other front office executives couldn't believe how little the Blazers got in return for trading those players. If you say we don't know if there were better offers, you're calling the GM who you're trying to support a liar.
Inevitably multiple posters will go on about how we are contenders, and we will end up playing in the play-in and somehow they will point to that as a success. Rinse, repeat. Rinse, repeat.