I'm wondering what exactly was it he "chose" and what was the choice based upon? and were there any choices by management in the 11 years he was in Portland that plotted a path to Dame's 'choice' 7 months ago? I know plenty of posters here were really happy Portland 'moved on' from Dame (don't want to get bogged down in debating how 'necessary' it was). I wasn't one of them for a couple of major reasons. One was that it was due to a decade of totally shitty management by the Blazers. The other was that I knew Portland was headed for several straight years in the lottery and that was going to get old fast...and it has
Agree 100%. I was not excited about this, and I'm not excited about it now. I don't have faith in anybody involved with the team (Jody, Cronin, or Billups) to make this team as good and fun as Dame made this team. None of them are as good at their job as Dame is. Huge step down.
Agreed... I think it's easier for some people to simplify situations to where there is one person totally at fault and another who is 100% a victim. For me, both parties (Dame and the organization) did things that increased the difficulty for Dame and the Blazers to have a championship contender in Portland. The semantics of who made the choice for the relationship to no longer be mutually beneficial doesn't seem that important to me.
Most importantly, he ate up a large chunk of the salary cap. Do I blame him for getting his money? Absolutely not. Did that decision hurt Portland's ability to surround him with the most talent? Yes. A case could also be made about his reported desire to win with current teammates. This of course puts pressure on management to retain players, often above market value, to stay in Portland.
Terrible recruiter! Couldn't take advantage of all the NIL! Time to bring in Dan Lanning to build up our progrum!
If Dame wants to call himself a musician he would never be bored watching TV and lonely. Any gazillionaire with time on their hands that claims boredom is just a victim of their own poor choices.
Dame has realized what most of you have forgotten, the PNW is a pretty damn special place to live. Special enough for Dame to bring his family here, to invest here, and to live year-round.
Huh? can you name one contender, now or recently, that didn't have at least one max-player on the roster? Dame's salary was only 35% of the cap and last season, for example, Portland had a margin of 72% under the tax line after accounting for his salary. That was 108M for chrissakes. The notion it was Dame's salary that kept Portland from building a contender isn't logical Blazers aren't saddled with Dame's salary this season...how much contending are they doing?
Funny enough, I have a friend in the recycling industry who says catalytic converter business is way down and they are actually laying some people off.
A few things: I never claimed I thought Portland was better without Dame's salary or that they would be, so I no clue why you're even bringing that up. I have stated over and over that I thought trading Dame was less likely to yield better results than keeping him. I don't think Dame's contract was the #1 reason we didn't win a title with him. I never implied such. If I gave you an contender in the last 10 years that didn't have at least one max-player on their roster, would that change your stance? I'm aware of Dame's salary and what percentage it made up of the salary cap. That still doesn't make what I said inaccurate. If a player was making 20% of the cap vs 35% that would unequivocally allow the organization they played for more options to build the team around them with more talent. I'm not sure how that's even debatable. I think Dame's #1 priority was getting paid and making sure his guys (CJ for example) got paid. And I repeat, I don't blame them for it being their #1 priority, it should be.
Yeah man, I seriously doubt when considering that compound he built here that Dame's plans included getting divorced and being on any team other than the Blazers. Dude tried to force the front office into going all in on a title run for him and for whatever reason they didn't do it. Sure he could have backed off of that trade demand (and by some reports he did) but then what? Play for a paycheck and not for true competition? Dude chose to try and win big over the comforts of home. I don't know if it was a wise choice and it doesn't seem like he's truly enjoying it but everything considered I don't think where he's at in his professional or personal life are what his ideal situation was this time last year and I feel for the guy... regardless of if he got there by making mistakes or because his hand was forced by others.
