Game Thread 2024-25 GAME #40 - BLAZERS VS CLIPPERS - JAN 16, 2025 - THURS - 7 PM - CHARGE - KUNP - BLAZERVISION

CJ was still here. So 5 year 90 million dollar Powell would have come off the bench. Hindsight is fun, but who's paying that much for a 6th man? And even if you trade CJ instead, what changes starting Powell alongside Dame versus CJ? You get a worse player? Neil sucked at team building, and building around Dame. Cronin was right to get rid of that contract when he did.

 

Yeah to get rid of Lillard and re-sign Grant was absurd. Cronin has been a head scratch his whole tenure. He holds onto players until they lose more value. He rolls out Simons next to Lillard in the backcourt which was obvious it was a redundancy almost clone of the Lillard/CJ experiment.

Powell is a way better defender than Simons. It’s not close. Powell was playing out of position in Portland made 7 mil less a season after we signed Norman to that 5 year deal.

I was super excited when Cronin was hired as I’m generally always optimistic. I was a little perturbed that we learned that there wasn’t even a GM search.

After the Powell deal I soured on him. I think he’s completely incompetent. His penchant for holding onto players until it’s too late to maximize value, along with this two timeline window is ridiculous.

When you have a draft that’s loaded, a team that is desperate to build through the draft because of the market and the team is paying what they’re paying for veterans who hinder the ability to tank is a disgrace.

The dude has been an awful GM. I don’t even criticize his drafting either because I feel he’s done a decent job of it.

 

Now that's not fair. He got rid of Powell as soon as he got here and got less than nothing for him. See, he can trade players on time and still get nothing in value for them.

 

Yeah, Powell at guard was where he belonged. But was that good enough to contend? Would a Dame, Powell, Hart trio have brought us a title? Or would we have just put off the rebuild another few years? Sharpe would not be here or Deni.

 

I was not somebody who hammered away at the Powell + RoCo trade. I thought it was an acceptable start at dismantling the Olshey roster, and I'm fairly well convinced the Vulcans were pushing Cronin to reduce payroll. The CJ + Nance trade was a decent trade in my view. It got nicked a bit because of of PG13 getting Covid. Otherwise, the Blazers would have had the 11th pick in the 2022 draft, as well as the 7th pick. But if that was the case, the question is would have Cronin traded the 11th pick for Grant?...rather than Milwaukee's 2025 first? I'd hope not. Coming out of that draft with Sharpe and Jalen Williams would have been awesome. But it would have probably been Duren. But if having Duren would have killed Cronin's desire for Ayton, that would have been a very good thing

I've never wished Powell was still a Blazer

as for Cronin's draft picks, other than Jalen Williams I don't see anybody else in that draft better than Sharpe. Jeremy Sochan would have been an interesting choice, but he's not better than Sharpe and doesn't have a higher upside, IMO

in 2023, after Wemby & Miller were off the board, I'd imagine most GM's would have taken Scoot. Obviously, at this point, Amen Thompson is a better player, but he's about the only guy in Scott's draft class that is better with a higher upside. Not a fan of Murray at #23

2024? well, Clingan has his warts to go with his upside. To early to gauge how big the warts are and how high his upside is. It is concerning that he's had two injuries in less that half an NBA season when he averaged less than 17 minutes

 

Joe's tenure has been such an absolute clusterfuck that trying to parse out what just one of his bad moves impact has been is very very difficult. The Norm/RoCo for nothing trade was terrible. Not actually going all in for Dame was terrible. Fuck, trying to pair Dame and Ant in the backcourt was one of the worst ideas any GM of this team has had in a long time, especially a GM that had been in the front office the entire Dame/CJ era. Brining in Jerami was good in theory but it was paired with the Dame/Ant backcourt fuckup. We never went all by guaranteeing our pick to the Bulls and using our future draft picks to get a second all star in here.

So Joe completlely fucked up the retool around Dame and now Joe is halfassing our youth rebuild. Joe is one of the worst GMs we've ever had... worse than Neil and Neil fucking sucked.

There is a possibility that both Jerami and Ant will be moved for a combination of prospects, picks and salary matching vets who make sense to either waive or ride the pine. Maybe Joe will finally pull his head out of his ass but I don't think it's likely. Three weeks to find out.

 

Gotta’ pay them bills FAMS!

 

I also was optimistic about Cronin.

I'm not finding anything here I'm not finding anything here that I can argue with.

 

So right now I assume you do not want to trade Grant to get out of his contract? Maybe for a couple 2's and an ending contract?
I would and I don't see much difference from the Norm/Roco trade.

 

Of course I would take that for Jerami at this point but reports say Joe could have done better earlier and a lot of this stuff is about timing. Right now we need to get rid of win now players to free up time for our future... when Joe made that Norm/RoCo trade we were still supposed to be in win now mode with Dame so shedding guys with value to another win now teams, with no return was a completely bullshit move.

Timing matters. Roster fit matters. Joe is shit at both timing and building a cohesive roster. Holds onto guys at the wrong time, trades guys at the wrong time and has yet to put a roster together that makes any sense. He admitted that until this season and this might be the most nonsensical roster he's constructed, with its bullshit two timelines... unless of course he pulls off some moves that make sense in the next three weeks. Fingers crossed but not holding my breath.

 

When you account for defense, Powell is a better player than CJ... At worst it is negligible between the two.
I prefer and like Norm's game a whole lot more.

 

CJ got us value.
Norm could have maybe gotten us a 1st if we had waited, but would that have helped Dame?
Roco was not going to get us jackshit. I was glad to get rid of him and his attitude.

 

Powell is not a good defender; that part of his game was overrated when the Blazers traded for him. Better than CJ at defense? I think it's probably a draw

 

I have ZERO issue with Norm being traded BUT Cronin in all his wisdom ... ah fuck it stupidity doubled down on being a clown by not only trading him to where he wanted he got a package that was so bad cause even if you could say maybe clearing room for something else guess what -- NOTHING else came from it. I mean unless you count we traded the best player this team has ever had and this team has been Clipper bad and I am talking the Clippers from like 88' to forget when they got good around when Blake got there. Now this is not a Dame should still be here it's that again the follow up has been crap and not talking about Scoot cause I think he can still be a good solid piece to the rebuild at worst.

My plan to rebuild this team assuming that clown stays (Cronin )

1) Fire Billups
2) Trade Grant , Ayton , Thybulle and Ant for anything as long as you not giving up future 1sts to do it -- Keep Williams UNLESS he asks to be traded OR you can get a 1st for him
3) Hand the reigns of this team to Scoot , Sharpe , Deni , Camara and a 3 headed Center since DC is not ready to start - so might have to bring in a solid center in one of the trades to make this work -- and see how it goes
4) Pray we get the Top pick --top 3 at worst but assume this tank blows up in Joe's face like usual and find another good building piece or maybe trade it but we shall see

 

Agreed. But a big part of his job is developing relationships with agents. I assume he had a verbal agreement in place with Rich Paul and honored it.
I don't like it but reneging on it could have negative effects for years to come. Rich Paul is not going anywhere.

 

My mistake. We should have traded Simons and CJ then and moved Powell to guard.

 

Probably not. There is a theory that any team whose main star is Lillard cannot win a championship.

 

Dame
Powell
Hart
Camara
Ayton (if motivated)