Game Thread GAME# 15: BLAZERS @ PELICANS - NOVEMBER 19, 2019 - TUESDAY, 5:00 PM, NBATV & NBCSNW

oh for fucksakes...will you just stop with the trolling already?

Dame didn't have any say in that decision. Either Hezonja or Tolliver is costing Portland around 4 million in salary and tax. Aminu would have cost 26-28 million more in salary and tax than either of those scrubs. This was a financial decision like so many were this summer. More punishment for the massive miscalculations of 2016

 

I wasn't against moving Aminu, Harkless, Turner, or Meyers. But the object is to get better, not go from conference finals to lottery in one season.

The buck stops with Neil Olshey.

 

Without Nurk though a guy like Whiteside was just a temporary filler until we could trade him, same with Bazemore. The opportunity to make trades and get better still exists.

 

Burden of proof

I can do this too.

 

sure...the opportunity might be there. I'd wonder if the will is there considering the financial constraints

The Blazers have 91M in guaranteed salary scheduled...for 7 players (Dame-CJ-Nurkic-Zach-Simons-Little-Trent)

for giggles let's assume the China thing hurts just a little and the tax line hangs around 130M. Let's also assume thhere is a wink-n-nod agreement with Hood to max his salary next season. So he opts out, Portland uses early-bird right and signs him to a deal with a starting salary of around 10M

so now, the Blazers have 101M for 8 players. About 30M, maybe less away from the tax.

so let's say the Blazers trade Whiteside and their 1st for Love. Whiteside is an expiring but Love has a 31M salary next season, so Portland is 1-2M over the tax line and they only have 9 players. Maybe they have included Hezonja in the Love trade. If not, he could opt in putting Portland 4M over the tax line with only 10 players. And might have even worse big man depth than this season.

worse then all that is it would make Portland a taxpayer for the 3rd straight season, meaning they'd be in repeater tax danger in the first year of Dame and CJ's new contracts. It may be that the expiring contracts of Whiteside and Bazemore have more value to Portland than anybody else. And all this would change if the China thing did drop BRI by a significant amount

And all of this might be happening after Portland's worst season in years. How much stomach would Jody Allen have for another big tax bill? My hunch is if Portland does make a trade it will probably be an exchange of expiring contracts. I just have a hard time imagining something like this over the next 3 years:

Dame - $31,626,953 $43,750,000 $47,250,000
CJ - $29,354,152 $30,864,198 $33,333,333
Love - $31,258,256 $31,258,256 $28,942,830

........92M......106M......110M......yeeeeesh

 

Simple solution... Trade CJ for Love (or preferably Blake).

 

It’s widely known that superstars approve of major trades the team makes. It is naive to think Dame couldn’t prevent Aminu from leaving. (Again, I’m not saying he should have. But if you’re gonna start the blame game and throw this season all on Olshey you should stop denying reality and admit Lillard co-signed Olshey’s ideas e.g. was very high on whiteside.)

also funny how you’re blaming salary cap issues when Dame has one of the biggest contracts in NBA history. Was he not capable of taking less money so his team would be better? Is this another one of those things that many athletes do that is somehow impossible for lillard?

 

burden of proof is on you, genius.

 

How do you explain Ed Davis leaving then for dirt cheap? Dame was pissed, but I guess that was fake?

 

God bless the ignore button.

 

Aka the hive mind, ‘don’t trigger me with your opinion,’ button. HMU if you can respond to a single point I made and do something more than classless insulting.

Lillard is arguably my favorite player, but you guys carry his water like he’s a saint.

 

Tu quoque

 

(you don’t know what tu quoque means)

Here’s Lillard literally endorsing Whiteside as “the best shot blocker in the league” and talking Bazemore up. He also said “we got better. Change is good.” right after Aminu, Meyers and Harkless left.

https://www.oregonlive.com/blazers/...nd-trail-blazers-offseason-we-got-better.html

If you’re still denying Lillard endorsed the moves at this point you’re beyond reason.

 

Except I dropped the mic with Ed Davis and you ignored that post.

 

Correlation/Causation

 

Thanks for posting that. I think a lot of us were thinking the same thing, but just didn't have the energy to think it through and write it.

 

I didn’t say Lillard caused the trades.

I said Lillard didn’t protest the trades. Then I sent you a link of Lillard explicitly endorsing the trades. You’re hopeless. If you carry Lillard’s water more maybe he will take a pay cut for the good of the team.

PS like half of you are on record here endorsing the trades too. But you wanna throw Olshey under the bus for making trades that all seemed logical at the time. Doesn’t get more absurd than this.

 

I agree, you don't know what you said or are saying. I wasn't arguing with you, just pointing out your fallacies. But yeah, I'm the one that doesn't understand words. Okay. IGNORED.

 

seems appropriate. Ignoring someone is as childish as your arguments.

 

You know its bad when youre going against the ENTIRE forum, and then hypocritically blaming others and calling them childish for ignoring you.