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LaMarcus Aldridge: I’m not going to get into all of that. What’s done is done. I feel like both sides kind of have what they want and now I’m here.
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My interpretation - Maybe they(Olshey, Paul, Terry, Dame) realized Dame was better suited to be the leader. After being put into a position he was uncomfortable in, and trying his hardest albeit coming up short.

Portland got their leader in Dame, and Aldridge got back into his comfort zone in SA.


On what he wants to say about dame
LaMarcus Aldridge: I don’t know, he doesn’t need me to say anything. He’s the face of the team, he’s been playing well. There’s not anything from me that needs to be said.
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http://forwardcenter.net/transcript-lamarcus-aldridge-discusses-his-return-to-portland/
 
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http://sports.yahoo.com/news/five-d...courtship-of-lamarcus-aldridge-225556837.html

Throughout the final, formal meeting in late June, it became clear that Aldridge hadn’t completely let go of years-old issues with the way he believed ex-Blazers Brandon Roy and Greg Oden had overshadowed him in the early part of his career. This was part of Aldridge’s personality that everyone surrounding him understood – that the teams recruiting him had researched and debated internally on how to navigate in the recruiting process.

Leaving that meeting in Dallas in late June, perhaps little was more telling than the fact Aldridge never raised one particular name: Damian Lillard. Ultimately, this was the enigma of LaMarcus Aldridge. He wanted talent around him, but never too much that it might cast a shadow on his own marquee. Pleasing Aldridge was never easy, and nobody knew that better than the Portland Trail Blazers.
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Aldridge loathed driving around Portland and seeing those Lillard billboards that adidas had mounted for him – even when the Blazers made Aldridge the centerpiece of every franchise marketing investment. Here’s how it worked in San Antonio, they told him: No Spurs player is ever alone on a billboard.
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http://www.oregonlive.com/blazers/i...ldridge_is_gone_and_now_the_trail_blazer.html

But he was so bitter about perceived slights that happened nine years ago – 9 years! – and so insistent that he was always getting the short end of the stick that the entire organization walked on egg shells around him.

The Blazers were so concerned with Aldridge's sensitivity of feeling overlooked that it sent a memo to the marketing department. All commercial and publicity projects were to first run through Aldridge. When the NBA Cares commercial came through Portland this year, Aldridge turned down the opportunity. So second choice went to Damian Lillard, who did the shoot.

Once it aired nationally throughout NBA broadcasts, Aldridge became chaffed and took it as another example of Lillard being the franchise's darling.

The Aldridge-Lillard tension was real ... and created entirely by Aldridge's insecurity. Lillard is bright and polite, and sensed Aldridge's delicate ego. As a result, he always went out of his way to compliment Aldridge, and to trumpet that the Blazers were Aldridge's team, Aldridge's franchise.

Lillard's public acquiescence was not enough for Aldridge's camp. They felt the kid needed to bow to Aldridge in person. They wanted Lillard to say it to his face.
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Natebishop3 said:
http://sports.yahoo.com/news/five-d...courtship-of-lamarcus-aldridge-225556837.html
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Natebishop3 said:
Woj is a pretty good source, wouldn't you say?
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Yes and those a great quotes but I'm not sure they entirely support your point.

In your second quote the mention of how the Spurs are "never alone on a billboard" speaks to the first quote of having issue with Oden and Roy. It doesn't necessarily mean he was upset that Dame was "more popular" than Aldridge, but more likely that it reminded him of what he considered a selfish basketball culture.

As we all know now dame grouped this team up during the summer in San Diego because he wanted it to feel more like a family than a team. A good example of why not to assume that just because something happened one way in the past, means it will happen the same in the future.
 
oldmangrouch said:
As a team first guy, I fully agree with the "no player alone on a billboard" policy.

OTOH, it is kind of sad that you would need that as a formal rule. That makes LMA sound really petty and immature.
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But he's talking about Dame's Adidas billboards. The Blazers have no control over that. Dame is more marketable because of his personality. Aldridge is quiet and introverted. He's not a good interview. He's his own worst enemy when it comes to endorsements.
 
Fonzthecpt1 said:
Yes and those a great quotes but I'm not sure they entirely support your point.

In your second quote the mention of how the Spurs are "never alone on a billboard" speaks to the first quote of having issue with Oden and Roy. It doesn't necessarily mean he was upset that Dame was "more popular" than Aldridge, but more likely that it reminded him of what he considered a selfish basketball culture.

As we all know now dame grouped this team up during the summer in San Diego because he wanted it to feel more like a family than a team. A good example of why not to assume that just because something happened one way in the past, means it will happen the same in the future.
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Did you see this part? "He wanted talent around him, but never too much that it might cast a shadow on his own marquee. Pleasing Aldridge was never easy, and nobody knew that better than the Portland Trail Blazers."

Who the fuck feels that way? Dame would never give a shit, as long as he's winning.
 
Natebishop3 said:
What does that have to do with anything? We're talking about what happened behind closed doors while Aldridge was here.
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I guess I should have kept those as one post as they were meant to be correlated.
 
Natebishop3 said:
Did you see this part? "He wanted talent around him, but never too much that it might cast a shadow on his own marquee. Pleasing Aldridge was never easy, and nobody knew that better than the Portland Trail Blazers."

Who the fuck feels that way? Dame would never give a shit, as long as he's winning.
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That is cleverly worded. I look at it like he never wanted anyone else to be held in higher esteem than him, not necessarily that he wanted to be the best on his team, or the biggest name.

Just look at how he has handled his short time in SA, where he is 4th or 5th on the popularity totem pole after the big 3 and Kawhi. The difference is the Spurs aren't making him feel like they want it to be known where he stands. It seems like he felt that way in the Roy/Oden years, and perceived the direction to be headed that way with the emergence of Lillard.
 
I could bloviate about LMA all night - but I will limit myself to this: When people strike it rich, they tend to react one of two ways. Some people feel blessed by their good fortune and are generous and gracious to the folks around them. Others become arrogant, entitled, insecure, and jealous.

The fact that the highest paid player on the team resented a team-mate getting an endorsement deal is pretty self-explanatory.
 
Dom McBlazer said:
Nah. I'll trust Olshey's judgment on this though.
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This is ultimately my answer to every FA question, but it's not fun to just say that over and over.

Really nice having Olshey going forward. I'd hate sitting around wondering how someone like Morey was going to make the situation worse. Instead we get to wait and see what genius Olshey is hiding up his sleeve this time.
 
oldmangrouch said:
I could bloviate about LMA all night - but I will limit myself to this: When people strike it rich, they tend to react one of two ways. Some people feel blessed by their good fortune and are generous and gracious to the folks around them. Others become arrogant, entitled, insecure, and jealous.

The fact that the highest paid player on the team resented a team-mate getting an endorsement deal is pretty self-explanatory.
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I don't know. I'm still not convinced that it was a personal issue with Dame, and not more of an overall issue where he felt like a castaway. I guess either way it's a moot point as neither of those mentalities personify what it means to be a Trail Blazer.
 
Fonzthecpt1 said:
I don't know. I'm still not convinced that it was a personal issue with Dame, and not more of an overall issue where he felt like a castaway. I guess either way it's a moot point as neither of those mentalities personify what it means to be a Trail Blazer.
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Well, wait, that's not really what we were talking about. You said that we essentially pushed him away because we were trying to make him into something he's not - a leader.

I was trying to show that the team was doing what Aldridge said that he wanted - to be THE MAN. Whether or not that's what he actually wanted, or was comfortable with, was not the issue. He felt slighted because he felt like the team never held him in the same esteem as Roy/Oden or Lillard.

They were constantly worried about offending his sensibilities. THAT was the issue. He's a diva. He's overly sensitive.
 
Natebishop3 said:
Well, wait, that's not really what we were talking about. You said that we essentially pushed him away because we were trying to make him into something he's not - a leader.

I was trying to show that the team was doing what Aldridge said that he wanted - to be THE MAN. Whether or not that's what he actually wanted, or was comfortable with, was not the issue. He felt slighted because he felt like the team never held him in the same esteem as Roy/Oden or Lillard.

They were constantly worried about offending his sensibilities. THAT was the issue. He's a diva. He's overly sensitive.
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Come on Nate, read your own posts.

Natebishop3 said:
What?....... What? He WANTED to be the face of the franchise. Did you not read all the stories about him getting butthurt about Dame getting more attention?
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Natebishop3 said:
I don't think he really wanted the spotlight either, but he also didn't like that Dame was more popular than him. He didn't like that Dame had a massive shoe contract. He didn't like that Dame was doing national ad campaigns. There were a number of articles that came out about this very subject.
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Yes that was my initial statement. I still believe that they knew there could be a problem like this and to try and cut the head off they mistakenly made Aldridge "the face of the franchise", when really that's not what he wanted, he wanted exactly what he has in San Antonio.

I think the FO misinterpreted what Aldridge truly wanted, which possibly speaks more to Aldridge's difficulties conveying what it was he wanted than negligence by the FO.
 
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Fonzthecpt1 said:
Come on Nate, read your own posts.





Yes that was my initial statement. I still believe that they knew there could be a problem like this and to try and cut the head off they mistakenly made Aldridge "the face of the franchise", when really that's not what he wanted, he wanted exactly what he has in San Antonio.

I think the FO misinterpreted what Aldridge truly wanted, which possibly speaks more to Aldridge's difficulties conveying what it was he wanted than negligence by the FO.
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In those quotes I didn't say that there was a problem personally between Dame and LA, although some of the articles would actually support that there was.

I was saying that Aldridge hated that other players got more attention than him. Dame was the most recent example of that. "That's not what he wanted, he wanted exactly what he has in San Antonio." I mean.... that's a nice theory, but the facts don't back it up. if Aldridge was uncomfortable with leadership, or being the face of the franchise, he would have been happy that Dame was taking some of the spotlight off of him. He wasn't.

One example was in that Oregonian article, "The Blazers were so concerned with Aldridge's sensitivity of feeling overlooked that it sent a memo to the marketing department. All commercial and publicity projects were to first run through Aldridge. When the NBA Cares commercial came through Portland this year, Aldridge turned down the opportunity. So second choice went to Damian Lillard, who did the shoot.

Once it aired nationally throughout NBA broadcasts, Aldridge became chaffed and took it as another example of Lillard being the franchise's darling."

That excerpt directly contradicts your theory.
 
Woj is a pretty good source for breaking transactions and rumors. But his editorial pieces are pretty biased/targeted and he's been known to play favorites when churning out stories.....
 
B-Roy said:
Woj is a pretty good source for breaking transactions and rumors. But his editorial pieces are pretty biased/targeted and he's been known to play favorites when churning out stories.....
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But it wasn't just Woj. There were multiple articles from multiple sources. Hell, you could just look at the guy and see that he was quiet and introverted and slightly brooding. When these articles came out, things made a lot more sense to me.
 
All I am saying is that I don't really read into Woj's editorial pieces because he's extremely biased. He hated KP and hates LeBron with a passion. Injects himself too much into the articles.

There was definitely something of a weird dynamic with LMA and Lillard. You don't need someone to write an article on it to tell. But it was still probably overblown and not as serious as it looked.
 
B-Roy said:
All I am saying is that I don't really read into Woj's editorial pieces because he's extremely biased. He hated KP and hates LeBron with a passion. Injects himself too much into the articles.

There was definitely something of a weird dynamic with LMA and Lillard. You don't need someone to write an article on it to tell. But it was still probably overblown and not as serious as it looked.
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But see, the thing is, that's your opinion. And Fonz is sharing his opinion. You guys aren't basing them on fact. You're taking what was reported from multiple people with inside sources and you're disregarding it because you don't think it's accurate.

To me, it makes a lot more sense that Aldridge had some bad feelings towards Dame. There was that story that Dame tried to reach out to him to convince him to stay and Aldridge would only text with him. The story about him flying back alone, and CJ actually said that he knew Aldridge wouldn't come back after that happened. The guy is a moody, overly sensitive, selfish, diva. That's what the evidence points to. That's what I personally see when I look at how the guy interacts with people.
 
My opinion that the "Articles" in question are overblown and exaggerated are just as valid as your opinion of their factuality. Let's not get it twisted here.
 
B-Roy said:
My opinion that the "Articles" in question are overblown and exaggerated are just as valid as your opinion of their factuality. Let's not get it twisted here.
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You think the team leaked info to make him look bad?
 
Natebishop3 said:
You think the team leaked info to make him look bad?
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I'm not here to speculate. I just know they sound injected with too much hyperbole and exaggeration. Plus the mood at the time they were written was not good. No one was happy with Aldridge.
 
B-Roy said:
I'm not here to speculate. I just know they sound injected with too much hyperbole and exaggeration. Plus the mood at the time they were written was not good. No one was happy with Aldridge.
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Something was obviously amiss. LMA said he wanted to stay not more than one year earlier. He said he was happy. He said he wanted to be the best Blazer ever.

Fast forward one year later and he's flying home on his own, he's refusing to talk to Dame when Lillard tried to talk him into staying. One report was that Dame flew out to LA to see him face to face. Not sure if that was true or not. Regardless, where there's smoke, there's fire. It's not the stuff that was reported was completely out of character. There were little stories here and there about Aldridge being unhappy for years.

It's not like this is Dame, and everything that he says or does indicates that he loves it here. If an article leaked that said Dame was a horrible human being and he hated his teammates and he was hard to work with, I would be extremely skeptical. Aldridge was never that engaging. He was never that outgoing. That's not who he is. I know some people were shocked that he left, but I sure as hell wasn't.

I predicted he would leave, two years before he did. Everyone slammed those reports that leaked at that time as being false as well. Maybe the Blazers were so fed up with the guy, that when he finally left they just dumped their dirty laundry because they were so frustrated with him. That's a totally human reaction. People do it all the time when relationships go south. Maybe some of it is exaggerated, but the basis of the articles sound very legitimate to me. Totally believable.
 
Joerger wanted out of Memphis to go to Sacramento. I'm starting to think Memphis is going to blow it up and Gasol will be available.
 
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