I see the Olshey Kinda Sucks argument can be used for almost any purpose now. We don't really know how smart those guys are (other than T-Rob and LMA). Wright seemed fine, but wasn't talented enough to help. Same with T-Rob. LMA I think was more Allen's desire than Dame's. It's not like Dame owns the team, even if he is an influence. Likewise, Aminu was an Olshey hire. Kanter and Hawes seem smart. Monroe? Who knows. Most of the guys on that list have talent troubles more than brain troubles.
Details. They have way too many shooter and no big except the Brazilian flopper. Thompson, Curry, Durant averaged 58 shots between them last season. Not going to work, especially with no big. Wow would our team improve with Thompsons, defense alone. Of course I wouldn't do it if I were them. I would wait until Durant could be traded for the best big around. Perhaps NO has someone.
Ha! The way some were talking I thought they were on opposite sides of the arena....not a few seats away.
While they'll start all three, they'll likely stagger their minutes through the game so only two of those three are on the court most of the time (except certain segments when they play their new death lineup). And Pachulia is a decent big man. It'll be interesting to see if they add one more.
Bump & discuss! In my opinion Damian Lillard should be the ONLY untouchable on this team. C.J. would have the most value.
CJ is on offensive plus to be sure but he doesn't pass much and doesn't play good defense when Dame already doesn't play good defense. Too lopsided they way they are constructed now.
I'd support trading C.J. for Cousins if we could land Jrue Holiday. With the way the Poison pill works, we'd need to get rid of some salary. We Get: Cousins and Holiday Sac Gets: C.J. + filler NOP Gets: 1 or 2 of our big men BKN and/or PHI could jump in to balance salary.
Well, I was wrong that we'd have traded him by now. I still think we will at some point. But we're going to have to lose some more before it becomes acceptable. Even at .500, it's just really risky for the GM to stake his career on trading a young, talented, locked-into-a-long-contract cornerstone. With Dame and CJ as our cornerstones, I just don't see Portland ever getting past the first round (barring injuries like happened with the Clips). It's just too much defensive pressure on the team to have to cover for all the open shots they give up.
Yup one of them has to go. I would love Cj for Cousins but I don't like how Cousins could walk in free agency so that makes me hesitant to pull that trigger
Realistically, If we traded CJ for DMC today, what do you think our record ends up being then? I see it this way. DMC is tired of losing. He has been on that shitty losing team his whole career. If we could get him, get 45-55 wins, make the playoffs and make it to the second round? I think he says yes!!! A winning team. Lets stay with this, let them put the right role players around us and we are major players/contenders for the next decade. Winning means ALOT to most disgruntled stars. Show me a head case on a winning team? There have been a few (Rodman), but by and large, most disgruntled stars that seem to have issues are on losing teams like DMC and Carmelo. I think its worth the risk and believe that Dame, combined with winning, can bring the best out of him.
Okay, I cant get the trade machine to do what I want because of untouchables until later, but the moment all of these players are open for trading, what about this colossal 4 team trade??? Portland gets: NO - Anthony Davis, Tyreke Evans SAC - Willy Cauly Stein PHI - Okafor NO Gets: SAC - DMC POR - ED Davis, Connaughton SAC Gets: POR - CJ, Aminu, Meyers Philly Gets: SAC - Pondexter, Crabbe (or Turner?) I think the money would roughly work out, may need small tweaks and/or fillers to make it all work, but that would leave us looking like this: Dame/Napier/Quarterman Evans/Crabbe? Harkless/Layman AD/Vonleh Okafor/Plumlee Is that even remotely possible in my fantasy world? We wold obviously need to fill a couple holes, but I think NO is good at finding young cheap role players. That's a pretty hot balanced lineup no? Scoring, Defense... Yeah, I'm still kinda drunk...
We should first try to trade for a good big avoiding letting CJ go - could be second tier but still very good like Noel, Valanciunas, Lopez etc. If that fails, a straight up CJ for Cousins but ONLY if we get assurances from Cousins that he will extend here beyond 2018 - even sign him up immediately until 2022. Otherwise keep CJ because in the next 12-18 months there will come an opportunity to trade him for a top talent. Even getting something like Jabari Parker + Milwaukee's pick would be good for us. We may also get a good big without giving up CJ. Honestly, either trade him for an absolute superstar or not at all. Trading him to Philly would be silly.
Not to be rude, but this is delusional; I think you vastly overrate CJ's market if you believe that A) we have enough ballast to add to a trade to get Parker alone (never mind their pick) and B) that this team is going to be able to trade its table scraps and "get a good big" without throwing CJ into the mix. Which players on this team are other GMs salivating over and dying to acquire in trade? I'd say it's a pretty fucking short list of 2, and even then I suspect McCollum isn't quite the prize people around here imagine. He's a smallish 2 guard that doesn't draw a lot of fouls and is a poor defender, but he's a good shooter. If there is any trade to be made it's probably CJ for a draft pick in the mid-lottery range.
Seriously, CJ for a mid-lottery pick? We may as well close the business altogether if we are trading a 20 ppg consistent proven player for a mid-lottery draft pick. What's next, the rest of our team combined for top 55 protected 2nd round pick? Lillard for no. 12 pick from Washington? I know the rest of our team is not great but they are not that terrible. Players like Aminu, Crabbe and Harkless have some value. Plumlee could be a good back up at a lot of teams. I am not saying we will get Cousins for them but there will be players with lowish stock that we could work with - Noel for Crabbe could be doable, Faried for Aminu and something could be doable. We could get Monroe for scrubs and it might work out better for us too. I don't buy that all our player are worthless because we lost three games in a row in the middle of November. I don't believe that McCollum is worth as much as George Hill either.
We have a lot of middling players being paid a lot of money (Crabbe, Turner, Harkless, et al.) that are producing very little. Expensive players with a lot of years left on their current deals, that don't make a difference are the least desirable trade commodities in the NBA. As for CJ being a super-desirable acquisition, I'm sure there's some contender out there that would be happy to have him as a third "star," but what would they be wanting to trade for him? Also, is anybody looking at him seriously as a foundation piece to build around? I doubt it.
That's what I've been trying to tell all the yahoos on this forum that are calling Turner, Crabbe and Leonard "trade assets". If your contract outstrips your value as a player you've got negative value in a trade. I don't see why this is so difficult for some to understand.
Would we be having this conversation about Giannis Antetokounmpo? Rudy Gobert? Or even Steven Adams? Bear that in mind when we praise Olshey as a drafting genius. (Disclaimer: I really do like CJ. When he does well, he's probably my fave Blazer. But there were several players available who would've been much more useful, and would still be. Especially as we went on to draft Allen Crabbe in the same draft, who will never get the minutes he needs so long as we have CJ.)
