What's your goal going into this draft?

It needs to improve but I don't find it dysfunctional. Is it because of the vets mixed with the youngsters? Grant, Brogdon, and Thybulle might not fit well with the others, but that is an easy fix if you want them all gone. Teams will easily take them off our hands if we want to dump them. It's not like we are stuck with them.

In my mind, this young roster is not a fucking mess. Is it missing a star? Yes but these guys are all 25 and younger (except Ayton who will turn 26 in July)
It is not that bad of a foundation for the future. It just needs a young high-scoring forward.

PG: Scoot-Ant-Banton
SG- Sharpe- Ant-Rupert
SF- Murray- #7
PF- Walker-Camara
C- Ayton-#14

 

Blazers are in this stupid predicament from matching the worthless Thybulle contract, should have let him walk.

I guess we will see what happens. My concern is we get much less talent or assets back in a Grant/Brogdon/etc trade because Jody/Vulcan insist on cutting x million of dollars in the trade as well.

 

Add a young high scoring forward and this roster is still nowhere close to 10th seed playin level. We don't have one above average starting level NBA player on this roster. It's also in the luxury tax, it remarkable Cronin was able to assemble such a bad roster that is both last in the west with 21 wins as well as in the luxury tax, thats unheard of to be in both those positions at once.

Washington is the only worse roster in the NBA so I'm not sure how you could consider this anything but a mess.

OKC had two years where they had very poor rosters with a lot of losses - but they were EXTREMELY aggressive with their rebuild and trading every vet for a future asset/pick. This Blazers cautious approach of dipping a toe in ever little pool of win now with vets/rebuild/multiple timeline different directions has been a consistent failure since Cronin took over from Olshey 3 years ago.

 

So the young players won't ever improve? It's not like we are talking about next year. If so we need to dump Sharpe and Scoot now.

 

Sure they might improve, just like in 2006 Telfair and Webster might have improved. But those young guys might not improve and might just be career backups. Every team in the NBA has veterans that can win now or youth that has a chance of upside. Detroit/Spurs/Hornets/Rockets/Jazz/Raptors/Grizzlies/etc all have better young players with more upside than the Blazers. The teams in the playoffs/playin all have better vets to win now. Some teams have both of those. Many teams have better cap situations. Factor in all of those dynamics and this roster is behind 28 teams and ahead of one - the Wizards.

 

I’m hoping we can dump some guys to teams that have cap space.

 

dysfunctional might not have been the best label, although after a 21 win season, no labels are out of bounds

Blazers don't have any two-way players except for maybe Brogdon. All the rest are too imbalanced between offense/defense

Ant is decent-offense/no-defense; Grant is decent-offense/weak-defense; Ayton is one-dimensional-offense/average-defense. And those three players dominate the ball & usage while costing 90M/year; this at the same time Portland has youth that needs developing and usage

I wouldn't have mentioned it because trades can address the issue, but I have a major concern that Cronin isn't planning for any substantial trade.

 

Sure they might improve, and they might not. Just like every team above you just mentioned that you think has more upside. I see a lot of question marks. How many times have we anointed a young team in the past that never became contenders? The answer is ......a lot. The only team on your list I am envious of is SA.
At least as of today. That might change after the draft.

 

I don't think much of drafts until I see the players play. You never know how they're going to turn out.

 

I'd rather ride out the discomfort a little longer and get slightly more assets than just dump guys, even if it feels cleaner in the near term as a fan. extract as much value as you can--fan comfort level shouldn't be a priority for cronin. it's not like the repeater tax is going to be a thing anytime soon.

 

Word. And we let Josh Hart go because we "couldn't afford him". This is why I get irritated by folks who don't understand why bad contracts hurt the team.

 

I thought we let Hart go because he wasn't going to resign with Portland, nothing to do with them not being able to afford him.

 

You're correct. It's been mentioned many many times. Some people just choose to keep their head in the sand when it comes to that

 

Tidjane Salaun
Kel'el Ware
Jaylon Tyson

 

I don't know anything about Salaun or Tyson

but being a UofO alum and Duck fan I have seen Ware play. He sure looks a lot more like a 30min/game NBA C than Edey or Clingan...or Ayton for that matter. Enough mobility to defend on the perimeter; a good rebounder; a bit of three point shooting skill; gets to the FT line. If he was available at 14 I wouldn't object to Portland taking a flyer on him. I'm just not sure what his ceiling is

 

He reminds me a bit of Bam who was taken I believe at 14. I remember watching him work out for Portland and he was impressive.

 

Yeah, I agree. Salaun is hard for me to evaluate at this point, but if we go SF at #7 then I am leaning towards Ware at #14.

Right now Cody Williams would be my choice at #7. My guess/hope is that in 2-3 years, (22 years old) and an extra 20 lbs, he will be our SF of the future.
That is assuming Risacher will be off the board. So a Williams /Ware draft would not disappoint me at all.

 

Seems Ware is the most well-rounded of the big men. Mobile, agile, legit 7 ft, athletic and can even shoot the 3. I'd like to hear more about his defense.

 

Ayton reminds me of LMA, and I wonder if getting a Joel or Mason type center might let him play a bit more to his style.