I hope the best for him. It's a shame that his return will cause a hit on the Blazers salary cap, but it would be a bigger shame if someone so young was unable to continue his chosen career path due to an injury.
Unless Darius suddenly gains the ability to regenerate cartilage, his career path has already been pre-determined if he chooses to play and some team gives him consistent and productive minutes.
Best of luck to Miles, I've often wondered if so much of the negative perception of Miles was more related to the local media smear job or more to do with his past behavior, I think this article does a nice job of showing that it's probably a little bit of both. It sounds like he's probably matured, and if he's able to salvage some part of his career I wish him well. BTW, John Canzano can go to hell. I almost have no doubt now that he's been prosecuting a personal vendetta for ratings/circulation and to satisfy his own bloated ego for several years now. Shame on him.
TO me Miles is not the issue, it could have been any player. Sure Miles has a right to pursue his career! The issue to me is the underhanded dealings done by a morally bankrupt GM who has no intention of playing Miles past the allstar break. The sole reason for signing Miles was to attack a competitors tax situation in hopes of impeding the Blazers free agent off season aspirations. What some may think is savvy business, I see as the ushering in of a Gorden Gekko time of NBA business dealings. Congrats to the NBA and the league office! The Blazers have the wealthiest owner in the NBA, and a GM that is known for great deal making, now you given both of them a green light, maybe even called them out, to raise the bar and really become aggressive. Oh and Memphis........ you wont be forgotten for this, something tells me!
I hope Miles can still play and has a successful few years (or more) before his final retirement. I didn't want the cap hit if Miles really couldn't play and was just getting a couple of minutes to help a GM spite the Blazers, but I'm perfectly okay with the cap hit if Miles can play again and manages to get his career back on track. I have no ill will toward Miles. Good luck to him.
and amazingly enough, that's what the Blazers have said. Unfortunately, people have forgotten/ignored that "Please be aware that if a team engages in such conduct(specifically and maliciously to hurt our organization) , the Portland Trail Blazers will take all necessary steps to safeguard its rights, including, without limitation, litigation” part.
Yes, I think people are a bit too eager to frame this as a "big company trying to screw the little guy" story. While that's a good emotional play (since it is terrible when that actually happens), I think that's an inaccurate description of what happened here.
sure, but that doesn't render the analogy invalid. It's not a perfect one as their talent levels were different, but it's about as good a comparison as I can think of as both guys battled back from bad injuries and are now shadows of their former selves. STOMP
I don't necessarily see the Hill comparisons... For one, by all accounts Hill's ankle actually healed, right? Kind of like Ilgauskas' feet? I don't know that Miles' knee has the capability to heal. In an extreme case, Miles' is much more like an amputee who can't grow his leg back than Hill's ankle healing.
I don't recall anything major that Darius did that I considered that big of a deal. Went off on WeakCheeks but that's completely understandable, IMO. Most posters here have done it, just not to his face. I always saw him as a maximum effort person in games, and an asset to the team chemistry-wise on the floor. I like his game. He does mremind me of Grant Hill, who is helping my fantasy team immensely this year.
Without all this drama and posturing involved, they'd probably sign him to 2 consecutive 10-day contracts and then decide whether to gaurantee him the rest of the year. That's what we would do with a player to replace an injured player. That's what we'll see most likely.
I'm not one of the people who think Darius signed the big contract and then coasted. I think he really meant everything he said at the time and he came out and backed it up until the injury. That's where I think everything went wrong. Darius seems like a really nice guy but he might not be as driven as some of the other players who have come back from this kind of surgery. His antics with Zach and marijuana were pretty minor but that coupled with the huge amount of weight he gained made it appear he was just sitting back collecting a paycheck after the injury and wasn't in any hurry to help the team win. I hope Darius can come back and it irks me that the media is portraying it as the Blazers trying to thwart a comeback. They're not. What they're trying to do is define what "career ending" means and that's a benefit to every other team in the league. It's pretty clear that we need set guidelines that signing a player to a 10 game contract and playing them 1 minute a game is not what the rules were written to address. If Darius can really come back and contribute meaningful minutes nobody is going to have a problem with it... including the Blazers.
The Blazers look like bigger and bigger dicks for sending that email out. I think the FO messed that up pretty badly. Leave the guy alone.
