Lillard had control of the Blazers' Twitter account and was asked who'd be on his Mount Rushmore. He said Walton, Drexler, LaMarcus and him. A bit immodest, but I have more qualms about Aldridge. I was thinking it over and I think: Walton: a lock. Best player on our only title team, our only ever league MVP. Drexler: probably. Best player on a team that got to the finals twice and had the best record in the league sandwiched between them. The other two spaces are open. Candidates: Dame and Roy for talent. Somebody (Sheed?) from the JailBlazers, which was the second-best squad since the finals' team. Early talents like Petrie and Wicks? Sabonis just because he was an all-time great before he played for the Blazers? But then you could say the same for Pippen and he shouldn't be there. Who's played the most games ever as a Blazer?
Walton, Drexler, Lillard, Wallace I mean, if I were selecting a Blazers team from all the players in Blazers' history in their (Blazers) prime, those would be my first four selections.
Walton, Drexler, and Lillard are locks as mentioned above. If we're opening this up to non-players, then Schonz is easily my 4th. If we're sticking to players-only, then I'd rank the 4th Blazer in this order: Porter, Lucas, Kersey, Wallace
Dame and Clyde for sure. Probably Sheed and Porter too. Honorable mention of Kersey and Sabonis. Duckworth, Buck, Lucas, Pippen, Roy, LaMarcus, Wes are next. Walton doesn't make it because his peak was too short. I wouldn't put Kawhi on a Toronto Mt Rushmore.
Unmentioned thus far, and I think unfairly so, is Cliff Robinson. Not saying he belongs on the mountain, but he's on the next tier with Kersey and Matthews. As for who's actually worthy of that 4th spot, I think we have a tendency to gravitate towards Lamarcus or Sheed because they were the team's best player for a significant stretch, or Mo for sentimental reasons and because he was the second best player on the title team, but I think Porter might actually have been a greater overall contributor to team success than any of them. He'd be my fourth.
I think you're the only person with sentimental feelings about Maurice Cheeks. Though him singing the national anthem with that girl was nice.
I'm just glad I didn't refer to him as "Big Luke", otherwise I would've gotten "I think you're the only one with sentimental feelings about Luke Babbit..." and "Don't be silly - he's talking about Luke Schenscher..."
