Exactly how good is Whiteside? If we were winning, he would be considered an MVP candidate right now. His numbers certainly support a case for an All Star spot. If he keeps these numbers up over the next month and we climb back over .500 before Nurk gets back, I would think it's a given. If we can trade Baze for Love, flip a young player for Iggy, and keep Whiteside, we'd be in good shape. Who cares who starts? Give Whiteside and Nurk 24 minutes each.
Whiteside has been a lot better than his detractors have claimed. He has flaws, and his style sometimes makes it look like he's not engaged, but for the most part I don't think that's the case. He leads the team in PER, TS%, all rebounding metrics, winshares/48, Defensive Winshares, & Defensive BPM; and he's 2nd on the team in Offensive Winshares, Offensive BPM, BPM, and Value Over Replacement. He's at career highs in PER, TS%, Offensive BPM, & BPM. And he's Portland's only real rim protector and interior defensive presence. His rebounding is down a little but he's had to be a man alone on the glass, and his teammates are lousy at blocking out. he's easily been Portland's 2nd best player and Portland looked like shit in the 3 games he missed on the other hand, I just can't see Portland re-signing him unless he accepts less than 10M/year to be a backup, and even then, the Blazers probably can't afford him (or unless Nurkic has issues coming back). Still, I'd question if Jody Allen would be willing the tax exposure of bringing Whiteside back, but that also means trading him for a longer contract may not be in the plans either. I wouldn't be surprised if Whiteside remains a Blazer all season then walks this summer. Portland may value his expiring contract more than they would any trading alternative
It's basically impossible to get Iggy and Love without giving up both Whiteside and Bazemore unless you're suggesting to trade Nurkic, which would be dumb.
Lillard: watches as his opponent goes around a screen Whiteside: contests shot at the rim Whiteside’s matchup: gets an offensive rebound bc whiteside had to help on Lillards’s man for 50th time this game Blazer fans: “WTF WHITESIDE STOP BEING LAZY!”
he is hitting that short one armed set shot whatever you want to call it. That is huge going forward. he embarrassed jokic with his athleticism and stamina. they had a shot at that game had we had a backcourt and or a bench.
I’ve been a vocal proponent of Whiteside since he’s come back from injury. It’s also worth noting that he challenges the third most shots in the league. He’s about average or above average in terms of %. https://stats.nba.com/players/defense-dash-lt6/
He had good stats per minute in Miami too, but Heat fans called them empty stats. Now that he's here, they jumped up in the standings and we jumped down. It took a year for Blazer assistant coaches to make Nurkic the star of our team. They would vastly improve Whiteside too, but they won't have him for 12 months, so it won't happen.
that's a real loopy correlation to make * Miami added Jimmy Butler and he's playing MVP level ball * moving Whiteside opened the C role up for Abedayo, who has responded by increasing his production 6 points, 3.3 reb, and 2.4 assists. This was like when Portland moved Randolph to make way for Aldridge, or Denver moved Nurkic to make way for Jokic. It does not mean the players moved sucked or that they had "hollow" stats. * Miami added two great rookies in Nunn and Herro who are combining to average 30 points, 7 rebounds and 6 assists...think about that * Duncan Robinson has gone from 3.3 pts to 11.6 pts and he's doing so while shooting 63% on two's & 44% on three's while sporting a .668 TS% * Meyers and Olynyk are combining for 15 & 9 while shooting 44% on three's and a TS rate around 66% meanwhile, Portland went from a PF rotation of Aminu/Zach to Tolliver/Hezonja to Melo/Hezonja. They got better offense but worse defense in the Hood for Harkless exchange. They didn't upgrade in the Turner for Bazemore swap; Simons has been worse than Curry. And last season Curry and Meyers combined for 18% of Portland's three's on 45% shooting...all that efficiency is kaput this year.
Hey, it's not impossible. All we have to do is send out Bazemore, Hood, Collins, Skal, Little, Hezonja and Tolliver. Piece of cake!!
No, Kingspeed, he would not be considered an MVP candidate if we were winning. Didn't you just say Melo was an MVP candidate last week? Are we talking about the same MVP award? And if we don't trade Bazemore or Whiteside for Iggy, how do we match his $17M in incoming salary? How does a young player match that? We'd have to send out at least $13,668,148. None of our young players come close to that.
