I know that i'm not part of this conversation, but I would say where Portland is at now, they should be all in on youth and picks. Flipping everything they have searching for that superstar or two. Portland will only get that through the draft. Portland does not need to be identifying their sixth man at this point. If they are five years out from contending as many here say, Ant will be in his 12th season if he is still in the league. Injuries happen and what not. His roster spot and salary can be used finding that star. Once they have draft success they can find their sixth man. A sixth man is a luxury Portland can not afford at this time.
It’s all one big convo. that all makes sense. Just hard not to think about it given the situation, and that Ant is an ideal 6th man. Come off the bench and spark the offense, etc. Jamal Crawford 2.0
That could very well work out that way. But does Portland need that? They need ping pong balls. I bet Ant could come off the bench and shoot them into a few meaningless wins. But they don't need a ton of meaningless wins. Situation sucks.
I get that you're trying to be logical about this and maybe, I'm being too emotional. But, I think my perspective about what Portland has done over the last decade as a predictor of what they will do in the next couple of years is logical as well but sure, I may be operating from a little too emotional perspective. For instance, from game 1 of the Dame/CJ era I hated that the Blazers were starting an undersized, no-defense, high-usage SG. My perspective has always been that a contender needs to have wings with 2-way and/or 3&D skills. To slot the starting SG position to an undersized SG with no wing, 2-way, or 3&D ability is a big mistake. Doomed to fail....and it did fail, season after season after season. CJ was the worst kind of SG to have next to Dame. With rare exceptions, he and Simons are the worst kind of SG's to slot next to most PG's so, what I'm looking at is the Blazers will be doing the same damn thing at SG for the 10th straight season. It's objectively stupid, IMO. Simons is CJ 2.0...or 10.0 if you gauge by seasons. And I've been seeing Simons fans over the last few months, knowing that they can't justify him as a long-term starter anymore, make the argument for Simons as 6th man on a 15-17M salary. But that glosses over the fact that he's making 27M/year for the next 2 years, not 17M.
Ill fully admit i fall in the glass half full of optimism. I see balancing the roster just as important as nailing a superstar via the draft. I think we have done that for the most part. We have a number 3,7, 1, 9, 7 in lotto picks on this team, all of which are 25 or under and still have expected growth potential(some more than others) im one of the few that feels balancing the roster aNd staying healthy will increase our wins by 10 gMes. then If sharpe, Deni, Ayton, Scoot and Klingon have the improvement we expect, we are a play in team as is. And that is with scoot/Sharpe and Klingon still having growth potential next year as well. Make the trade for Grant, RWIIi aNd picks to find that missing pc to make us a contender and not a playin. Now i know that is only if everything happens, but when making moves you, dont make them with the expectations they will fail. You make them expecting improvement, so id like to see them see what we have before offloading grant and others. Picks in 2030 wont help the current squad unless they fail. But if they succeed the. We need the trade return for grant, etc to be for now, not the future. Thats why im fine having one more year. To see where our youth is at and then make a trade where the return benefits them the most.
sorry i just reread this and im laughing at myself. I actually implied this team could stay healthy….
Agree with this post... Yes I'm a much bigger Ant fan than many and have defended him constantly the last few years. If he is here I'll root for him, and I think all the talk of him hurting the team is delusional. However where the Blazers are at right now they don't need to hold onto any vets like Ant/Grant/Ayton/Timelord/Thybulle. The Blazers are so far from fielding a contending roster, they need to do everything they can to get some pieces that will be around when the Blazers contend. Will any of Scoot, Sharpe, Klingon, Deni be useful starters when the Blazers contend? Sure its possible - but its also very possible none of them are. With either outcome we need to add starting level players to this squad. We shouldn't hang onto any of those overpaid vets if we can get back even a mediocre FRP for them.
Again well said. The Blazers don't need the benefits that guys like Ant/Grant/Ayton provide. There are some contenders that can use those contributions though. What has Grant or Ant helped the Blazers accomplish on the court the last three years here? All we ultimately wanted to do each season was get picks that netted Sharpe/Scoot/Klingan. Whatever scoring or wins that Grant/Ant got us were of zero benefit to this franchise. That will be the same this season and next season - so better to flip these guys for whatever we can. If they can't be flipped for anything then that means it was a stupid decision to resign them to contracts that had zero value. Only way this can look good for Cronin is if the Blazers start contending soon or Grant/Ant are traded away for some massive trade haul. Thats just beyond unlikely. I'd like to see my favorite team managed in a way based on logic, reason, strategy, and good future planning. Unfortunately that hasn't happened in a long time, which is why our roster is in such shitty condition. That some fans look at a jar of piss and see lemonade - well I guess I hope you enjoy the season. I prefer to be realistic with my assessments.
He's not good? In what ways is he so much worse than Lillard at age 24? He's a better shooter and finisher than Damian was. The biggest gap now is Dame is better at getting to the FT line, but I think that will come with time with Simons. But they are both good scorers, bad defenders, medicore passers. Is Dame a super star and Simons "not good"? Doesn't make sense by any metric.
I can sort of give Cronin a pass on holding onto Grant/Ant up to last summer as there was a legit two timeline thing going on at that time. If we had traded any of Sharpe/#3(Scoot)/etc and got some vets maybe we would've made a run with Dame. But the day we agreed to the Dame trade was the day Cronin should have flipped gears to full on aggressive 100% long term rebuild. That means exploring trades of all of our vets. Instead we hear all these reports last year at training camp that the Blazers are legit trying to make the playoffs with Brogdon/Timelord/Ayton additions etc. Now we are sitting over a year later with 5 vets still on our roster clogging up the cap, while their useful play on the court provides zero benefit to our team. We somehow actually have ended up with less draft picks than the day we traded Dame away. That just shows me the GM and ownership have a blend of delusion and incompetence going on. The reports that Cronin is holding firm on some two FRP demand with trading Grant to the Lakers is just another indicator. Could Cronin pull off a bunch of miracle moves and miraculously turn this roster into a contender? Well I guess maybe anything is possible... but that is beyond a pipe dream.
No thanks. I'll take draft capital. We aren't in a situation to take advantages of his skillset or to require him to improve on his weaknesses. If he accepted that contract and that role I would trade him the first chance I was able to get a good return.
I don't think the combination Simons' age, skillset, and weaknesses fit the future of this team unless we are gunning to be a play-in team for the next decade.
We can get a player like that once the rest of the team is built out. Keeping Ant for that situation right now is putting the cart before the horse, IMO.
that's a good point right now, Portland has no core players. Obviously, the hope is that 2 or 3 of Sharpe-Scoot-Clingan will become core players. But they are miles away from that right now. It makes little sense to spend big bucks on supporting players like Ant-Ayton-Grant before the core is in place. There's no way to know if those supporting players will actually complement the core, or be bad fits. There should not be as much resistance to trading those supportering players as there is around here. Of course, almost all of the friction revolves around Simons
I think the odds are pretty good that we're going to find a guy who fills that role just by drafting the guys we want to be stars. One of them isn't going to quite pan out to be a star, but will probably wind up being a pretty good guy off the bench.
That's exactly what we were with Lillard. A first round bounce team, with the exception of one year where Olshey managed to put a pretty good supporting cast around him. Until the Blazers find a real superstar, they'll have to reply on being good at multiple positions. This year, Cronin went out and got 2 defensive specialists. Would they be better paired with a guard who is an elite level scorer, or a guard that has so far been a 6-3 Damon Stoudamire.
Ugh. This is all so far from what we should be doing that it's almost disgusting... Completely the wrong mindset.
Of course everyone WANTS a super star, but there are usually only 2-3 true superstars in the league at a given time. So you may as well try and collect as many good players as you can. It is possible for a team full of good players to defeat a team with a "superstar' if the refs allow it.
