Blazers Odds & Ends
Couple quick things today…
Please, leave Nate McMillan alone. If you didn’t see it at the end of Jason Quick’s story today over at OregonLive.com, Mac-10 astonishingly turned down a chance to talk about an extension of his contract today. Gavin Dawson was all over this on the radio. Dave at Blazer’s Edge nailed it, as usual, today.
Its easy to want to play amateur psychologist when news likes this comes out and we all have to worry that everything isn’t perfect at One Center Court, but we should all relax. There isn’t an agent in the land that would have allowed his client to sell low like Nate would have by signing an extension with two years left on his deal, and the team about to take a big step forward. If the next year goes like we all assume it will (Blazers make playoffs, become heralded AND successful young team, etc.), Nate will be in line for better extension than he would have gotten this summer. And if he waits until the following summer? Assuming again that the Blazers have seen two years of solid improvement (maybe a deep playoff run in the ‘09-’10 season), Nate would be able to command maybe the largest contract for any coach in the league.
And if Nate walks? Well, I’m pretty sure KP could find a coach who could make a winner out of this group. I like Nate. I think he’s a great fit for this city and for these players, but this next season is a big test for him too, just as it is for many players on the roster. If Nate wants to earn his big extension (yes, I think its a smoke-screen comment), then I’m happy to let him do so.
Good to hear Bayless, Diogu, and Batum are in the house. Not just those guys, but Webster and Frye were working out at the facility Monday as well. Read that OregonLive story, its music to my ears. I really think Bayless can be the point guard-like guard the Blazers need to fit next to Brandon Roy, and to read an article like this cools my nerves (Nate is thinking along these lines too). I’m looking forward to seeing Bayless and Petteri Koponen play in summer league too - Koponen was off the ball last summer next to Sergio Rodriguez, and hopefully this will be a good start for Bayless as he develops his PG ability.
Another quick note on Bayless - I went and saw the documentary “Gunnin for that #1 Spot” last week. If you have a chance to check it out, by all means do. Really interesting to get a look at the Oregon boys (Love and Singler), cool to learn more about Beasley, and a chance to meet our newest rookie Jerryd. I think this kid is going to fit in GREAT in Portland. Like so many of our other players, he’s a gym rat. His game looked a little robotic in the context of Rucker Park, but its clear his skills have been honed through hard work, repetition, and fundamentals.
I just hope he makes the most of his opportunity with the Blazers, develops his game, and accepts his role with the Blazers. This dude has been the best player on his teams for a long, long time. Its not going to be like that here, but he could become an integral piece of the puzzle.
Good luck getting another job Darius. Seriously, if you can stick it to the Blazers by signing with another team and playing 10 games, you’ll have earned that contract more than you ever earned a dime from the Blazers.
I tried never to blame Darius for how things turned out for him in Portland - I don’t think he loved basketball. I don’t think he cared about being a part of a winner in Portland, and I’m sure it was tough being the last hold-over from the teams where the inmates ran the asylum. But smoking pot during his recovery and failing enough tests to earn a 10 game suspension probably wasn’t the best statement to the other 29 GMs about his commitment to the game, so here’s hoping Darius took care of his money, finds something to do with himself, and doesn’t go on some smear campaign against the Blazers.
Non-Blazer alert - Brand going to Sixers? Whoa, this would be a serious stomach punch to the Clippers organization. If Brand leaves for the Sixers offer, does this make him a worse traitor than Carlos Boozer? The Clippers went and signed the very guy he asked them to get in Baron Davis, and then he stiffs them? On 2nd thought - forget about it, I’m glad Brand is leaving them at the alter and helping keep the Clippers down. Kaman can’t guard Oden and Aldridge by himself…
Sayonara, Sonics. I haven’t really talked about this much, but to put it bluntly, I have always hated the Seattle SuperSonics. With a passion. They’ve obviously been our #1 rivals since I was a kid. Aside from their cool old-school uniforms, they were the perfect villains for our Blazers and really easy to root against.
Then, I went to college. In Tacoma, WA. In the belly of the beast, I was surrounded by Sonics fans. Unsurprisingly, I found that they felt pretty much the same about the Blazers as I felt about the Sonics. I was in Tacoma from mid-’92 through mid-’96, a good run for the Sonics and an OK one for the Blazers. I was there for Kemp, Payton, Mac-10, Detlef, Sleepy (Stoned) Sam, the Hawk - and I disliked them all. I was in Seattle the day the Nuggets knocked off the #1 Sonics - and out of personal safety refrained from laughing in the faces of every depressed Soncis fan I saw that day (it was quite a day). But I always heard it from my buddies, and it was definitely an ear when the Sonics were better than the Blazers.
And now, 12 years after coming back home to Portland, I can say I’ll miss the Sonics now that they’re gone. Its not because I’ve come to like them - Nate McMillan as Blazer coach hasn’t turned that around.
I’ll miss the Sonics because, as I look ahead to the 10+ year run the Blazers are about to begin, they won’t be around to bear the brunt of our excellence. The Blazers are entering an era that will be judged by how many titles they are able to win. But for fans like me, part of the fun of this era was going to be sticking it to teams like the Sonics, Lakers, Suns, etc - old rivals who have given us our share of heartbreak.
Clay Bennett stole the Sonics from Seattle, but believe me - I feel robbed in all of this too. Whipping the OKC Whatevers just won’t provide the same thrill as killing the Sonics.
This entry was posted
on Tuesday, July 8th, 2008 at 7:38 pm and is filed under Martell Webster, The Inferno, Las Vegas Summer League, Nate McMillan, 2008-2009 Season, 2008 Offseason, Kevin Pritchard, Sergio Rodriguez, Portland Trailblazers, Channing Frye, Los Angeles Clippers, Seattle Sonics, Blazers History, Brandon Roy, Trail Blazers.
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8 Responses to “Blazers Odds & Ends”
July 9th, 2008 at 11:28 am
Houston-
First off, there will never be a bigger traitor than Carlos Boozer. Why? Because Boozer’s option was a TEAM option, and he LIED to the team, including our blind ex-owner, to get them to decline that option. THEN he decides to go to Utah, of all places, to another rebuilding project. Brand just declined a player option, said he was coming back, and didn’t follow up. Either way, he didn’t lie to become a free agent, and he didn’t lie to a blind guy who was trying to look out for him.
Hmmm…something about this undersized power forwards from Duke…;-)
I’m glad you defended Nate Mc here. McMillan is going to be the coach of this team if it wins a championship. He works so well with this group, and they respond to him very well, too. Him declining that extension was simply about him looking out for himself. He doesn’t want to be the guy that gets canned two years from now if things head south. At the same time, if this team improves upon last year’s .500 or so record, which it will, it increases his value as a coach. In two years, if the Blazers are coming off a 50-win campaign and a second-round playoff appearance, that value of that new contract will be infinitely higher than that extension Allen and Pritchard offered yesterday.
You should have be listening to 95.5 yesterday when some clown named Dave claiming to be D-Miles’ friend came on and said how D-Miles WILL get another job in the NBA, he WILL play in 10 games, and he WILL stick it to the Blazers by making them pay the $20 some odd million that they owe him. I nearly steered off the road when I heard that. I mean, seriously? No team has publicly said that Miles’ knee is good to go and ready for NBA action. He had knee issues when he came into the league (I think I remember him wearing knee wraps as a rookie with the Clips), and they aren’t getting any better.
Even if he does play 10 games or whatever, I doubt it matters bc the Blazers don’t have any roster spots for any free agents. This team is loaded as is…the nucleus is in place and the team just needs to grow as a unit for the next year or two. Free agency should be the last thing on their minds. Even if they want to go outside the circle to get better, they can still use LaFrentz’s expiring coupled with some first-round picks to get a good talent at the deadline to make a stronger push. But I wouldn’t worry if I’m a Blazer fan, especially when KP is the man in charge.
July 9th, 2008 at 11:33 am
And I totally agree with the OKC/Seattle thing. The two Pacific NW markets - Portland and Seattle - are model NBA markets. The NBA would have benefitted greatly by seeing those two go at each other with their young nuclei for the next 10 years.
Oh…and so much for the theory that Sonic fans will become Blazers fans now…lol.
July 9th, 2008 at 8:33 pm
I heard that idiot call into 95.5 regarding Darius - clearly a prank caller or something. He kept making the point that the Blazers will have to eat that money and pay Darius… If that guy actually knew Darius, he’d know that Darius is getting paid that money, and the question is whether the Blazers get relief from the cap or not.. All NBA contracts are guaranteed, the Blazers were never trying to get that monday back from Darius, they were just trying to get cap relief.
I, personally, have no problem with Sonics fans coming to the Blazers. Granted, I’d never turn down the chance to remind them that they’re always Sonics fans in my eyes and dirty rotten traitors for joining the Blazers bandwagon just as the getting is getting really good, but until I’ve had a team flat-out stolen from me I won’t judge how those fans handle the aftermath.
Most of the Sonics fans I know would rather stop following the NBA than pull for the Blazers, which is fully what I’d expect. The ones that will have the hardest time resisting the Blazers will the Seattlites that now live in Portland - that would suck.
And not to argue for/against Boozer - but the Cavs were dumb enough to actually turn down their option on him. The Cavs didn’t have to do that, and that mistake is on them… Brand initiated all of this, gave the Clippers direction (which they followed to a T) and then ditched their asses. That team essentially just traded Brand and Maggette for Davis and some cap space. Ouch.
August 1st, 2008 at 10:39 am
Houston-
You’re gonna hate my guts for this to no end. But it had to be done…
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/43170-taming-the-blazer-myopia-in-portland
August 1st, 2008 at 2:48 pm
Hey Amar - I don’t hate you, but I am less than impressed. You could have done better than trot out the same of stuff over again (Oden’s knee, Roy’s heel, never played together, fans way ahead of themselves, bleh).
Nobody thought this team was a title contender last season with Oden. So, you overstate the optimism to set up your argument, and then fail to mention the other good things that have since happened (Oden looks healthy, Bayless, Rudy, etc).
I’ll do a response over there to get comments going, but that was truly written like a Cavs fan stuck living in Portland.
August 1st, 2008 at 2:52 pm
BTW - the take on Aldridge was particularly laughable. Dude tied for 39th in the league in FG%, and only 9 players took more than 1,100 shots (LMA took 1,160) and shot better than he did. You could argue he needs to get better on the block (but if Oden is healthy, why?), but to say he disappointed as a mid-range player taking a lot of shots (30th in the league) by shooting *only* .484 makes you look desperate to find negatives to support your theory.
August 1st, 2008 at 11:14 pm
Houston,
Like I said, it had to be done. I’m glad that you don’t at least hate me for writing that, but it definitely triggered quite a debate amongst the Blazer faithful, all of whom collectively came together and flung mud at me. Heck, even my own brother signed up just for the opportunity to rip me apart on there.
You make a lot of valid points, and I definitely appreciate you commenting on there for me (no matter how irked and annoyed you sounded), but that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
August 2nd, 2008 at 8:29 am
You keep saying “it had to be done” - that’s find, but the article you wrote just wasn’t very good at all. So what had to be done, someone provoking the fanbase? That’s really all you did.
Even the Roy all-star argument - I assume you realize how ridiculous it is to argue a decision shouldn’t have made based on data that wasn’t available until three months after the decision, right? You do see the flaw in that argument, right? Or do you stand by the fact that someone had to do that too?
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