Counterpoint - everyone in the NBA world is freaking out about Wembyamayama and what he did to a GLeague team. There's several guys who played last night for Maccabi who were in the NBA recently. Personally, I'm not watching this and saying he's ready to play right now. I'm saying we needed to see that he could play well against non-high schoolers. We needed to see some confidence. Do you think the players on Maccabi are worse than a D1 school? I watched that and I'm positive he would have been a star at Kentucky. I think he would have been a top 3 pick this summer.
The only way you become a contender in the NBA is with very,very good players. If Sharpe seems like he could be one of those players, his development is the number one priority of the team, or should be.
I think that's a huge mistake. I don't think OG is a star. He's a good role player. Sharpe has the potential to be a star.
Eh.... the dumbest thing would be to not play him for three years, not offer him a qualifying offer and then let him walk for nothing
OG is a nice player, not special. If he was special, the Raptors never would have drafted Barnes. Ujiri tried to snooker people asking for 2 1st rounders, after Nurse reduced Anunoby's PT with Barnes getting more of the love, and pissing off OG.
Someone in the Blazers Uprise video comments mentioned that Luke Kennard also went off against Maccabi and did something like score 16 points in 16 minutes. Kennard is 26 years old, has played in about 300 regular-season NBA games, and shot 45% on threes last season, so I'll take that as a complimentary comment, even it it wasn't intented.
We have way too many guards. Send him back to Canada and fix our SF dilemma with OG. . And we won't have to worry about G-League or not. . Ok I'm full of $h!+. I'm just as excited we have Sharpe, I even went to Moda on Tuesday just so I can say I watched his first ever Blazer home game coz I think he's gunna help us win Championships. The dream would be for Shaedon and Dame's timeline to overlap in the Duncan/Robinson fashion. Cronin needs to make good decisions for this to become reality. He's got the physical gifts and talent but he's too inexperienced. Right now, he's not in the rotation. He needs repetitions. He needs to continually improve and play great in practice to make it impossible for Chauncey not to play him in a real game. Blowouts, injuries and underperformance from rotation guys is where his opportunity will come from early on. By trade deadline, a consolidation trade/s should happen to open up time for him to be thrown into the fire (if his play is deserving)
I really like Hart on our team but something has to give, someone has to be dealt at the deadline for a big man. It is probably him.
I think Billups will find him some table scrap minutes. My guess he’ll average 8-10 in 1st half of season if he plays well he’ll get bumped up to 15. Where those Will come from not sure but they’ll find them somehow even if it’s just extended minutes during blow out games.
I would trade Ant. I'm still not convinced that Dame and Ant can work together. I think Sharpe should be the future shooting guard. I'd let Hart hold it down for now. I'd trade Ant for a small forward.
Ant is going to need to bring more in (a lot more) than Hart. I just don't see a deal out there that is fair for Ant. Hope I am wrong because I am not against moving him but it better be for someone who is on the cusp of all-star or has played in a game (not over the hill though). I don't see POR brass trading Ant unless it is a slam dunk.
The more I think of it, we need a consolidation trade. I still think Ant and Sharpe (let alone picks) is slightly too much for Shai Gilgeous-Alexander but something along those lines might need to get done at the deadline (not with those players necessarily).
