The "Build Around Dame Vs Not" Myth?

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WesleyMatthews said:
I can root for the team and support or critize them however I want. Maybe you want to hope for the best and leave it at that... whatever your choice. But when the team does good or bad decisions I'll comment on it.

Maybe I'm a bit grouchy now, same as many many Blazer fans, since Cronin did huge franchise altering trades that setup the team to fail for the years ahead.
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Yep, I already acknowledged that we have choices. Obviously, you're free to choose the pissed off and miserable option if you like.
 
WesleyMatthews said:
We should have done moves that improve the team. Not change for the sake of change that sacrifices talent, saves money, and leaves no realistic way to add talent back.
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Those moves weren't available, obviously. When you have overpaid players you have to sacrifice talent or financial flexibility. We tried sacrificing financial flexibility for the last 5 or 6 years and we didn't have any more to do.

Choices were to keep that group together or sacrifice alot of talent in hopes of trying something different. Dame very publicly demanded that we try something different.
 
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Jerami Grant is 28
Christian Wood is 26
Collins and OG are 24

The "win-now" players people are advocating for acquiring (and the one Dame apparently wants) are young, and can support both a present win-now plan, as well as a future "post-Dame". If somehow Sell-Low Joe is able to acquire a couple of the players above (I'm not particularly optimistic, but who knows?), and then add another young win-now piece with the MLE (Smith [22], Bamba [24], Warren [28], Anderson [28]), it'd be tough to say with a straight face that that roster wouldn't have at least a chance of developing into a contender, or having a decent future if Dame were to ask out.
 
I mean, add Grant, Collins and Bamba (for example) to our existing roster, and you're looking at:

Dame/Ant
Ant/Hart
Grant/Nas
Collins/Winslow
Nurk/Bamba

I'm sorry, but if they're able to play together cohesively, and healthy Dame is what we perceive healthy Dame might be, that's a dangerous roster.

We just have to see what happens. Cronin's basically got 50 days to try to pull this off and prove his GM chops. I don't truly believe he can do it, but it's premature to claim that there's no way it can be done.
 
PtldPlatypus said:
I mean, add Grant, Collins and Bamba (for example) to our existing roster, and you're looking at:

Dame/Ant
Ant/Hart
Grant/Nas
Collins/Winslow
Nurk/Bamba

I'm sorry, but if they're able to play together cohesively, and healthy Dame is what we perceive healthy Dame might be, that's a dangerous roster.

We just have to see what happens. Cronin's basically got 50 days to try to pull this off and prove his GM chops. I don't truly believe he can do it, but it's premature to claim that there's no way it can be done.
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I’m not sure that’s achievable, but that’s a better constructed roster than we’ve had in years
 
WesleyMatthews said:
We don't have cap space.

TPE rarely provide the value of a second round pick.

We traded away 4 starters and got a Milwaukee pick 3 years from now, Hart and Didi. Would much rather have those assets back to remake the roster this summer.

Even at that prior talent point we were as you say a middling playoff team. Instead, now with less talent we're one of the if not the least talented team in the NBA.
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No cap space? I’ve read articles that we have flexibility to sign Zach Lavine.
 
I think we are going to miss out on getting maximum value for Lillard in a trade. Because it’s clear to me we aren’t putting a championship caliber team around him anytime soon.
 
MickZagger said:
I think we are going to miss out on getting maximum value for Lillard in a trade. Because it’s clear to me we aren’t putting a championship caliber team around him anytime soon.
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I don't think we could get max value out of Dame right now anyway... If he shows that he's back and better than ever we should get max value after this coming season or by the deadline the following season.
 
Phatguysrule said:
I don't think we could get max value out of Dame right now anyway... If he shows that he's back and better than ever we should get max value after this coming season or by the deadline the following season.
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Why not this next season's trade deadline? If the team is meh again as expected but Dame is back to his full superpowers, I would hope that options are explored.

STOMP
 
STOMP said:
Why not this next season's trade deadline? If the team is meh again as expected but Dame is back to his full superpowers, I would hope that options are explored.

STOMP
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Could be... I would just expect them to take a swing at improving the team around Dame at the deadline.

But maybe of they aren't getting the offers to build around Dame they'll pivot. So yeah, it could happen at this coming deadline.

But really, I just think the value of the team with Dame is going to be higher than it will without Dame. So I don't expect ownership to do anything to upset him. They'll do whatever they can to keep him around until the team sells.
 
wizenheimer said:
the "build around Dame" vs not....I'm thinking that it is mostly nonsense

Q) What would be the kind of players you'd want to in order build around Dame?
A) It would be 2-way wings and forwards with length; perimeter shooting; defense; ball-handling

Q) What would be the kind of players you'd want in order to build to a contender?
A) It would be 2-way wings and forwards with length; perimeter shooting; defense; ball-handling

I thinking it's kind of a false narrative to say there are two different tracks here. There is no reason both can't be the same track
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The difference is one can be 20 and the other is likely 28+. Every team at every level wants long athletic wings. That’s like wanting good starting pitching. But are you going with the minor league call-up and letting him flourish or going out and buying Clayton Kershaw.
 
HailBlazers said:
If Dame is back to his full superpowers this team will NOT be meh.
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It's a team game and there are many variables to the PTB besides just Dame. They have no defensive stoppers... teams lick their chops deciding who they're going after. As of right now, their forwards are maybe the worst collection of talent in the league. Even if everything goes right for them, short of fleecing team(s) in trades, I don't see them as contenders next year which is what I meant with the meh comment. Certainly if Dame is 100 there will be some exciting moments, but I'm talking about being legitimate contenders.

STOMP
 
Phatguysrule said:
Could be... I would just expect them to take a swing at improving the team around Dame at the deadline.
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The big swing they could take (of course) is moving Ant for talent that is a better fit beside Dame. Other then future draft assets (please god no), thats about the only real desirable commodity they've got. With how far this team seems from competing for a championship, he seems to be the much better choice to build around but very possibly there are factors I'm not considering. Hopefully this offseason brings magical upgrades that change the analysts.

STOMP
 
Mediocre Man said:
Especially in the playoffs
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Dame is the king of the pick and roll, the dude uses single screens more than anyone else in the league and isn't close to the league leaders in iso. If you're just talking about simple offense that doesn't involve enough ball or player movement then yeah, that's what we've seen Dame in to this point in his career but ISO is a mischaracterization.
 
blazerkor said:
Dame is the king of the pick and roll, the dude uses single screens more than anyone else in the league and isn't close to the league leaders in iso. If you're just talking about simple offense that doesn't involve enough ball or player movement then yeah, that's what we've seen Dame in to this point in his career but ISO is a mischaracterization.
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Not according to ISO stats
 
Mediocre Man said:
Not according to ISO stats
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in the 2020-21 season, when Dame was Dame, ISO stats:

upload_2022-5-21_8-37-55.png
upload_2022-5-21_8-39-48.png

so he was 8th in ISO frequency. But also, among those with no sample size issue, he was 3rd in percentile and 2nd in points/possession
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something else though, look at last season's playoffs:

upload_2022-5-21_8-45-40.png
upload_2022-5-21_8-46-22.png
upload_2022-5-21_8-49-16.png

when you toss out all the players disqualified for sample size, Dame had a high frequency of ISO, but the relevant context is he was by far the best at iso of everybody in the playoffs. I mean, 1.65 ppp is pretty damn awesome

in other words, Dame's ISO rate was NOT the Blazer problem in those playoffs. The problem was that Dame had poor, imbalanced talent supporting him. Dame going ISO was necessary because none of his teammates were capable of any kind of consistent production. They sucked

Portland's big problem in the Stolshey era wasn't X's & O's as much as it was jimmy's and joe's
 
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