Chris Haynes on what Portland did at the deadline

yeah, I think Cronin fucked up the Clippers trade but I don't believe at all that he was ambushed by the Harden/Simmons trade. That's been talked about for a month. I'm not sure I'd immediately accept Haynes' characterization of "desperation". Maybe, maybe not. Dumb trade yeah

I do think between the CJ-Powell-RoCo-Nance the Blazers might have squeezed out one more 1st round pick or 2-3 second round picks. Problem is that the Blazers apparently locked onto the Clippers as a trading partner, a team which had no 1st's to trade till 2028. That looks like a mistake to me and I'm real suspicious that the blame for that is Seattle-centered. Also, I'm not sure I'd immediately accept Haynes' characterization of "desperation". Maybe, but it's pretty easy to say that now. Bad trade, sure

as For the Grant trade, I doubt it's coincidence that the Blazers potentially have two lottery firsts and we heard the Pistons were asking for two firsts. I think it's real debateable if Grant is worth one lottery pick, but for damn sure he's not worth 2. And I kind of doubt that a future 1st rather than a lottery 1st would have tipped the equation

 

I'm not that disappointed. Can still use those picks and cap space to acquire Christian Wood.

 

no one said anything about surprise. just that Morey/Marks completed the deal without us getting involved

 

Absolutely - but wasn't the point of getting rid of Olshey to bring in somebody better? Was that concept too hard for Jody and the Vulcans to grasp?

 

I don't understand what was desperate about our situation? We didn't have any star free agents demanding to leave for nothing. We weren't trying to win a title this year. We weren't trying to end a playoff drought. We didn't have a horrific contract such as Westbrook or Wall. We didn't have a star making public trade demands or roster changes.

All we needed was two simple things;
1 Trade a guard for a forward
2 Extract value from vets

That is pretty freaking simple task for a competent NBA GM. We basically did the first part of that in the CJ trade. We completely failed on the second part in the Clippers trade.

 

Tanking was an absolute goal this year to retain our pick.

 

The whole narrative of desperate seems to have come from Haynes; I don't know if they were desperate or not. I suspect if somebody wanted some of the people we traded that they would have put in higher bids. Mostly I just want to look ahead.

 

So basically a lot of the options we thought we would have are already gone.

 

I know. But I think the Blazers would have probably gone this route regardless of that trade.

I mean, obviously it's better to know who you're targeting, but there isn't a better way to add a star caliber player to this team than with an unbalanced trade.

 

But just getting rid of Olshey doesn't get rid of the situation he put the team in.
What just happened was getting rid of the Olshey situation.

 

Dallas probably wanted Powell in return (they were interested in him in free agency).

But the Clippers got him.

 

Not sure how anyone can say we are not desperate. Got the best blazer ever on our team and his window is letting in less air by the day.

 

Deeesssperate good times… come on!

 

I still can't say for sure he is better than Clyde was.

 

What really gets me is that nothing that has transpired since the Clippers trade serves to justify it whatsoever. Actually quite the opposite.

1. No part of our other two deals were contingent at all on the Clippers trade happening. They were both occurred completely independently of it.

2. Cronin obviously had no coherent plan for flipping any of our Clippers return at the deadline, or else it would have happened. In other words, no one around the league actually valued any of the crap we got. Big shock.

3. The one that really pisses me off is just how frigging busy this deadline day wound up being! So many teams looking to make deals at the last minute. A record busy deadline. And here Cronin was making this trade a week early when he very well could have had 10 other offers appear by the deadline if he had just waited. And they undoubtedly would have all been better.

4. The plan of "retooling" around Dame this summer has now been made clear by Cronin. And yet he just pissed away one of our few appealing assets in Norm, which now makes the retool idea exponentially more difficult.

5. Just to top off the shit sandwich, the trade "prize" of Keon Johnson apparently is out possibly for awhile with an ankle injury that he first suffered awhile ago. Yay. A scrub on a tanking team getting his chance and we don't even know when we're going to get to see him.

 

I will probably get killed for this, but if you mean best career you have to go with Clyde. (more team sucess on his watch)

If you mean best peak performance, Walton is still tough to beat. (I say that even though I despise Walton and like Dame) Heck, I would even argue for a healthy Roy to be neck-and-neck with Dame.

Comparing Dame to Clyde, Walto, and Roy is no insult...though I know some posters will take it that way!

 

At that point just use the TPE for him and keep the MLE and the other TPEs

 

I think they did it to guarantee they were below the luxury tax in case the New Orleans deal fell through. It was insurance..... which sucks.

 

To summarize:

FUCK YOU NEIL OLSHEY

 

The worst GM in team history when you factor in how long he had control.