Game Thread 2024-25 GAME #6 - BLAZERS VS THUNDER - NOVEMBER 1, 2024 - 7:00 PM - KATU 2.2, BLAZERVISION

Ant is fine

 

Tough lost. I thought our guys were going to pull off another upset, but the Thunder changed gear in the second half and our guys just couldn't keep up. Very impressed with Rupert. I'd like to see him play more.

 

I’d rather Simons be traded.

 

yes, he's exactly what was expected; exactly the player Phoenix was desperate to dump. He's exactly the player I expected when I railed against the notion of trading for him. Knowing what he was, and the rebuild the Blazers were obviously headed for, it's a giant black mark against Cronin's judgement

so yeah, I'm not surprised at all he wasn't different in his 6th season from his first 5 seasons. And he's the same in his 7th season. I know he doesn't bother you but he bugs me

 

What is going on with his shooting this year.

 

Why do you care? We need salary. We got Toumani. We dumped Nurk, who was also overpaid. And Little. And Keon. We gave up a bunch of nothing and we got two starters right now. Ayton isn't a star, but he's a starting center. Who cares if he's overpaid right now? Were we going to use that money for something else?

 

I dunno. But if he’s not hitting shots he’s worthless.

I think your printer ran out of ink, btw

 

wut?

"gave up a bunch of nothing"? other than that guard from Weber St.

as far as the notion of "you have to spend it on somebody"....no you don't. The salary floor is 127M. Portland is 38M above that. They don't need to be spending it on an empty stat player like Ayton. Blazers have been dancing around the tax line for years now and the Vulcans will limit any options that threaten the tax payments. Maybe that's why the Blazers have allowed three 9M (approx.) TPE's for Hart, Payton, and Dame to expire. And will almost certainly let the 7M TPE from Brogdon expire

and by the way, LOL at that tepid defense of Ayton..."hey, you've got to waste 35M on somebody; why not Ayton!"

 

Can’t trade Simons because nobody wants him.

 

Come on man...... come on....

Yeah, Dame was for Ayton.

 

I'm fine getting him because I thought Nurk was much worse on a worse contract.

But it was stupid to try and keep him and these other vets the day after we traded Dame. It's even dumber that over a year later 5 of the 6 are still here. The one we traded away since was primarily a luxury tax salary dump where we gave up two picks.

This franchise needs to commit to rebuilding with our youth. We have exciting young players and finally with wing length but have annoying mediocre vets in their way that provide virtually zero benefit.

 

Fair enough. Yeah not totally disagree with a lot of what you are saying just small parts.

I think our talent is so low those poor performances you list are inevitable with this roster. With a truly bad coach it would be much worse.

Even if Billups is a bad coach I don't see why it matters with this roster and our tanking. The players give effort and stay engaged more than is typical for a franchise with so much losing and tanking. I think he has a good track record developing youth.

What good players have excelled on other team but not under Billups?

 

Good post

 

Baby might be keeping him up a lot of the night so he's adjusting to that. I seem to remember dame struggling for a bit when his first kid was born.

 

Would have been better to not have been over the luxury tax and had to give up picks to Washington. Spurs used cap space to get picks back.

Maybe that wasn't possible as we got out of Nurk bad contract that Cronin handed out a year prior.

As you say Ayton deal expires next year so it's not a big problem but it still would be better to have got more value from that max salary slot

 

He's like a smaller version of Camara.

Both Camara and Rupert are good defenders who are shooting the 3-pointer very well so far.

Camara is 10/19 , 52.6% on three-pointers.

Rupert is 5/9 , 55.5 % on three-pointers this season.

It's kind of asinine that Billups does not set up more catch-and-shoot 3-pointers for both of them.

And if you're playing good defense and shooting 55% on three-pointers, you should be getting more than 23 minutes for a team that lost by 23 points.

Especially if you're the youngest player on the roster.

 

Ayton isn't ranked as a top100 player by ESPN but is in a max contract. Not saying ESPN's is perfect but it's still a decent gauge. Cronin has somehow brought all these vets together the last 3 years and ALL of them have lost major value.

 

Does the baby even live with him? Mom has kids with Ingram too.

 

Seems like the correct thread;

 

Come on now..

This is an NBA player. His window for sleeping while at home is huge.

He’s just an awful #1 option. Should be a prized bench player. But I’ve been saying this going on 4 years now