Brutal Blazer Assessment

Welcome to our community

Be a part of something great, join today!

Register Log in
GrandpaBlaze

GrandpaBlaze

Predictions Game Master
Joined
Sep 16, 2008
Messages
8,163
Likes
9,227
Points
113
https://deadspin.com/deandre-ayton-portland-trailblazers-ice-nba-lillard-1851176409

The NBA trade market is open for business and one team in particular would like you to know that it is jarringly open to offers. The Portland Trail Blazers might not have issued a news release saying as much, yet when your starting center misses a game due to too much ice, the telltale signs of rebuilding apathy have set in.

Deandre Ayton was unable to participate in the Blazers win against the Brooklyn Nets because he couldn’t navigate the ice around his house.
Click to expand...

as long as Rip City is losing, GM Joe Cronin is happy. Player development, coaching, trying, even showing up — it’s all optional as long as it results in more draft assets and an indefinite reign over the front office.
Click to expand...

The issue with that is the team traded Damian Lillard for quarters on the dollar, and has since moved at least one real quarter (Jrue Holiday) for dimes and nickels. When was the last time Portland “won” a deal? They own their pick and the Warriors’ top-four protected pick (via Boston) in this year’s draft, but then have to wait until 2029 to use the first-rounders they received from Milwaukee and Boston. While there’s a couple of pipedream pick swaps with the Bucks in 2028 and 2030, and Portland has all of their first-round selections, it’s nothing compared to other franchises that did what Cronin is trying to do.

Assuming Jerami Grant, Malcolm Brogdon, Matisse Thybulle or Ayton will fetch actual returns also assumes those players are performing like desirable assets. They’re all discounted because Chauncey Billups isn’t getting sh*t out of them.
Click to expand...

Top-three selection Scoot Henderson sees 20 to 35 minutes per night, most of which he roams aimlessly and chucks up bricks. Shaedon Sharpe, arguably Portland’s No. 1 asset, spent the first portion of the season getting 30 to 38 minutes per game because Anfernee Simons was hurt, but now only cracks 25 when Simons sits.
Click to expand...

Billups isn’t winning or developing talent, and his relationship with Cronin appears to be the only thing keeping him employed.
Click to expand...
 
Yeah, tough to read, but reality.
 
The Sharpe stuff is out of pocket and the "pipe dream" of swaps was idiotic but the rest of it is pretty spot on.
 
Surprises me that some of you see this drivel as an accurate description of what’s going on with the Blazers. The first paragraph about Ayton and the ice storm is uninformed BS. The Blazers did send staffers to Ayton’s neighborhood and they couldn’t get to him safely either. Any of you who live in hilly areas that aren’t plowed ought to know better.

The crap about “not winning trades” shows a total disregard or lack of understanding about what the Blazers have been trying to accomplish with the moves they’ve made. Acquiring draft picks and players who are tradeable for them has been Cronin’s aim at this stage of the rebuild. This guy is a total dummy.
 
e_blazer said:
The crap about “not winning trades” shows a total disregard or lack of understanding about what the Blazers have been trying to accomplish with the moves they’ve made. Acquiring draft picks and players who are tradeable for them has been Cronin’s aim at this stage of the rebuild. This guy is a total dummy.
Click to expand...

I'm a little confused myself about what the Blazers are trying to "accomplish"

last night the veteran combo of Ant-Grant-Brogdon averaged 35 minutes between the three. They were the only 3 players that played 30 minutes or more. They took 58 of Portland's 86 shots (67%). That secured a meaningless win that might actually hurt their lottery chances

I know the argument could be the Blazers were trying to enhance the value of those three players, especially Grant & Brogdon, but I don't buy that for a second. All 30 teams know who those 3 players are and what they can and can not do.

At this point, I have no desire to watch a game where those 3 players dominate the offense and take more than 2/3rds of the shots
 
e_blazer said:
Surprises me that some of you see this drivel as an accurate description of what’s going on with the Blazers. The first paragraph about Ayton and the ice storm is uninformed BS. The Blazers did send staffers to Ayton’s neighborhood and they couldn’t get to him safely either. Any of you who live in hilly areas that aren’t plowed ought to know better.

The crap about “not winning trades” shows a total disregard or lack of understanding about what the Blazers have been trying to accomplish with the moves they’ve made. Acquiring draft picks and players who are tradeable for them has been Cronin’s aim at this stage of the rebuild. This guy is a total dummy.
Click to expand...

The way some of it read, it's clear this person just looked at stats and nothing more.
 
I think Cronin is just smarter than the person that wrote this thread. I saw on the Internet that there is this eighth grade class in Ohio that are elite players. Whether or not they continue to develop as hard to determine, but those eighth grade players will be eligible when the 2028, 2029, 2030 draft happens.
I grew up watching the Lakers and saw two older players that they traded for future draft choices, turned out to be the first picks in their respective years, 1980 and 1982, Magic Johnson and James Worthy. They won five rings in the 1980s. Obtaining potential lottery picks is the way to build your team not trading for somebody else’s max player that they’re trying to get rid of. I’m glad they traded Dame and got something for him. As much as I hate Boston, Danny traded two old players to New Jersey, and drafted Tatum and Brown.
Also, those of you who want to fire Chauncey Billups are idiots. I think he’s doing a great job with this young group.
Some people like the Phoenix method, trade every draft pick for the next six years. Let’s see how that works out for them in a few years. I like the Oklahoma City method, they have so much ammunition now to load up in the draft. Let’s see five years from now who’s better off?
 
I remember when Jerry West traded in old Vladi Divac for some high school kid drafted like number 13 named Kobe Bryant (12 teams past and Kobe, including New Jersey twice.). Then I remember Jerry West went to the clippers, they had the 12th and 13th pick in the first round. He swapped the 12th pick +2 second round picks to move up one spot to number 11 and drafted SGA. It wasn’t his fault that the clippers stupidly traded him to Oklahoma.
When Jerry West was advising the Golden State Warriors, they wanted to trade a first year Klay Thompson for somebody else’s established star and he threatend to quit if they did that trade. Good thing they didn’t, he was and important part of their dynasty.
Great GM’s are always looking way into the future. Crappy GM’s are always trying to catch up now. I think the trailblazers are very blessed to have Cronin and Schmitz running the draft
 
wizenheimer said:
last night the veteran combo of Ant-Grant-Brogdon averaged 35 minutes between the three. They were the only 3 players that played 30 minutes or more. They took 58 of Portland's 86 shots (67%). That secured a meaningless win that might actually hurt their lottery chances

At this point, I have no desire to watch a game where those 3 players dominate the offense and take more than 2/3rds of the shots
Click to expand...

So you want them to break Detroit's new record? That will be so much fun.
A win once in a while is good for morale. Certainly, you can agree to that

Who did you want to have shoot more last night?

Walker played 20 minutes. 1-4 in 20 minutes (Probably not)
Reath played 25 minutes and was 7-9. ( Perfect IMO)
Camara 3-4 in 20 minutes: ( Perfect IMO)
Scoot 1-6 in 23 minutes. (Did not have a good night)
Thybulle 1-4 (left the game)
Ibagi 1-1 in 13 minutes (Perfect)

I guess you could make an argument for Rupert and Murray, but they will get their minutes in March/April
 
Bif said:
I think Cronin is just smarter than the person that wrote this thread. I saw on the Internet that there is this eighth grade class in Ohio that are elite players. Whether or not they continue to develop as hard to determine, but those eighth grade players will be eligible when the 2028, 2029, 2030 draft happens.
I grew up watching the Lakers and saw two older players that they traded for future draft choices, turned out to be the first picks in their respective years, 1980 and 1982, Magic Johnson and James Worthy. They won five rings in the 1980s. Obtaining potential lottery picks is the way to build your team not trading for somebody else’s max player that they’re trying to get rid of. I’m glad they traded Dame and got something for him. As much as I hate Boston, Danny traded two old players to New Jersey, and drafted Tatum and Brown.
Also, those of you who want to fire Chauncey Billups are idiots. I think he’s doing a great job with this young group.
Some people like the Phoenix method, trade every draft pick for the next six years. Let’s see how that works out for them in a few years. I like the Oklahoma City method, they have so much ammunition now to load up in the draft. Let’s see five years from now who’s better off?
Click to expand...

you should post more. :)
 
wizenheimer said:
I'm a little confused myself about what the Blazers are trying to "accomplish"

last night the veteran combo of Ant-Grant-Brogdon averaged 35 minutes between the three. They were the only 3 players that played 30 minutes or more. They took 58 of Portland's 86 shots (67%). That secured a meaningless win that might actually hurt their lottery chances

I know the argument could be the Blazers were trying to enhance the value of those three players, especially Grant & Brogdon, but I don't buy that for a second. All 30 teams know who those 3 players are and what they can and can not do.

At this point, I have no desire to watch a game where those 3 players dominate the offense and take more than 2/3rds of the shots
Click to expand...
My take is that they play those guys a lot in any game they think we have a chance to win.
 
wizenheimer said:
I'm a little confused myself about what the Blazers are trying to "accomplish"

last night the veteran combo of Ant-Grant-Brogdon averaged 35 minutes between the three. They were the only 3 players that played 30 minutes or more. They took 58 of Portland's 86 shots (67%). That secured a meaningless win that might actually hurt their lottery chances

I know the argument could be the Blazers were trying to enhance the value of those three players, especially Grant & Brogdon, but I don't buy that for a second. All 30 teams know who those 3 players are and what they can and can not do.

At this point, I have no desire to watch a game where those 3 players dominate the offense and take more than 2/3rds of the shots
Click to expand...

Seems to me that it’s Cronin’s job to acquire talent that fits the rebuild timeline. It’s Chauncey’s job to develop the talent in the midst of trying to win just enough to keep some semblance of interest in the games by folks who buy tickets. Every one of the available young guys who are keepers got playing time. Not sure I could have watched many more minutes by Scoot. He was in danger of being the high assist guy for the Nets.
 
There was a lot of truth in that article and that is what hurts being a die hard fan cause like they say ... the truth hurts. Now maybe it was a tad off maybe they used the whole Ayton thing as a reason to make a scathing piece on the Blazers but again a good portion of it was true. If your a fan that thinks it is not then you have let your fandom rule your common sense and that is a you problem and I hope you can remove your head from Cronin's ass cause it has to be up there to think there is not some truth to the article. I will continue to be a fan even if Cronin and maybe Jody do jack shit and let a coach who know nothing run this team into a losing record and not get the proper growth from the young players and that is crap.
 
Oh well. Not exactly shocking.
 
GrandpaBlaze said:
https://deadspin.com/deandre-ayton-portland-trailblazers-ice-nba-lillard-1851176409
Click to expand...
Tough to argue with a lot of it. Though I don't think there was a better offer out there for Dame.

We honestly got more than I thought we would.

Otherwise it's really tough to disagree with much of it.

Ayton likely couldn't make it to practice. It's not worth dying over.

And Sharpe has missed some time, but he's not 100%.

It's not wrong, it's just got a rough tone to it.

But nobody is getting better with this coaching staff than they'd be getting on their own.
 
Last edited:
Whyachi said:
Deadspin must be Nets fans.
Click to expand...
ha! I might be right... the Deadspin company works out of Chicago (who Portland refuses to give them an owed 1st rounder for Larry Nance), and Deadspin's original affiliation is based out of New York City.
 
wizenheimer said:
I'm a little confused myself about what the Blazers are trying to "accomplish"

last night the veteran combo of Ant-Grant-Brogdon averaged 35 minutes between the three. They were the only 3 players that played 30 minutes or more. They took 58 of Portland's 86 shots (67%). That secured a meaningless win that might actually hurt their lottery chances

I know the argument could be the Blazers were trying to enhance the value of those three players, especially Grant & Brogdon, but I don't buy that for a second. All 30 teams know who those 3 players are and what they can and can not do.

At this point, I have no desire to watch a game where those 3 players dominate the offense and take more than 2/3rds of the shots
Click to expand...

Exactly.

Especially when in the previous game against Phoenix, we saw:

19-year-old (youngest player on the roster), 6'7", 7'2" wingspan Rayan Rupert shoot 4-5, 3-3 on 3-pointers score 11 points with 5 rebounds in 14 minutes.

Kris Murray play 37 minutes and finally hit some 3-pointers, scoring 13 points on 5-9 shooting.

Jabari Walker score 11 points on 4-6 shooting.

Scoot Henderson play 40 minutes.



After watching this game ...

upload_2024-1-18_17-13-10.png


This game was a downer.


upload_2024-1-18_17-14-30.png
 
If the Wizards beat the Knicks tonight, will Deadspin write a hit piece on DC ??
 
Bif said:
I think Cronin is just smarter than the person that wrote this thread. I saw on the Internet that there is this eighth grade class in Ohio that are elite players. Whether or not they continue to develop as hard to determine, but those eighth grade players will be eligible when the 2028, 2029, 2030 draft happens.
I grew up watching the Lakers and saw two older players that they traded for future draft choices, turned out to be the first picks in their respective years, 1980 and 1982, Magic Johnson and James Worthy. They won five rings in the 1980s. Obtaining potential lottery picks is the way to build your team not trading for somebody else’s max player that they’re trying to get rid of. I’m glad they traded Dame and got something for him. As much as I hate Boston, Danny traded two old players to New Jersey, and drafted Tatum and Brown.
Also, those of you who want to fire Chauncey Billups are idiots. I think he’s doing a great job with this young group.
Some people like the Phoenix method, trade every draft pick for the next six years. Let’s see how that works out for them in a few years. I like the Oklahoma City method, they have so much ammunition now to load up in the draft. Let’s see five years from now who’s better off?
Click to expand...
The OKC method of trading their all-star for arguably the best PG in the league right now?

You’ve got quite high hopes for Camara or Ayton for that to be the case.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Users who are viewing this thread

Total: 1 (members: 0, guests: 1)
Back
Top