Simmons proposal I like

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mook said:
I'm not sold on trading LMA, but I think I can be.
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I really dont want to but I am beginning to wonder if our best player is the one that will hold us back from taking the next step. In others words aside from dumb luck or some Olshey miracle the more I look at it the more I wonder how we are going to get there with what we have to work with now. Ive said before I wish we really really knew where LMA's head is at with this. It would make things so much easier to decide.
 
I'm completely, 100% sold on the idea of trading LMA - have been for years. But I wasn't sold on this CLE trade until now. I honestly don't know enough about Thompson to know what to expect from him - but the fact that he's young and has trade value is essentially icing on the cake: Oladipo plus another one or two prospects AND the additional cap space which would allow us to really flesh out the roster.

Even if you think that replacing LMA with Thompson/Oladipo/+ will make us worse in the short term, keeping him and adding a middling Center won't make us substantially better next season.

There's just so much talent and parity at the PF position that you can take a "lesser" player and still get essentially the same results. Cash in while the value is high. Certainly we'd be have far more assets for future trades by swapping one asset for three. This season we really suffered because we had nothing worth trading.
 
Reep said:
Cleveland trades Thompson, #1 and #19 for Aldridge.
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Does Cleveland have a first round pick next year? That would seal it for me. I'd love to get as many 2014 first round picks as possible.

Either way, it isn't just Thompson, #1 (McLemore? Oladipo?), and #19.

It's also (probably) next year's first round pick (top 13 protected), because we'd probably lose a lot of games. For example, if they drafted Noel, they could park him for half the season if they want due to his injury. (Although the wind tells me we'd be better off with McLemore or Oladipo as actual players).

Plus, Portland would have a boat load of cap room this year, and the ability to float that cap room for next year (my preference), and would still have all it's existing picks.

As a long-term plan, such a move would rebuild the Blazers faster than plugging along incrementally IMO. It is basically what OKC did when they had something like 3 top 4 picks in 3 years (I forget the specifics).
 
I'm not as opposed to trading LMA as I used to be and this isn't a bad deal (I don't think its a home run deal like Melo's or Williams) but it doesn't knock my socks off.
We don't have to draft Noels at 1 ,infact with our record I wouldn't go near him, but none of the other candidates really feel like a franchise player which you expect to get with a top pick. Add in that I'm not high on TT, I would look at him as a trade asset and not as a future part of the Blazers long term. We might be able to package TT and another pick to move up and or trade for a better player.
If we can increase our capspace replacing LMA with another premium PFs on the market is possible but we will be one of a bunch of teams after them and none of them demand a double like LMA does.
Id rather we pass on this deal because I'd like to fix the bench get a starting C and see what happens. We will be able to get a good deal for LMA at next years deadline or next summer.


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BBert said:
As a long-term plan, such a move would rebuild the Blazers faster than plugging along incrementally IMO.
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Yup - this is what swayed me from "maybe" to "yes". If done I would also look into the possibility of trading the #1 down a few spots in order to add yet another asset. I'm not sure what that'd look like, but the idea would be to have whatever pick is necessary to get Oladipo. Then also have the #10 and #19. Perhaps package some 2nd rounders with the #19 to move that up a few spots? Then have Thompson and cap space to sign two quality players. Definitely seems like we'd be a better team right off the bat, with far more flexibility to make additional moves once we take stock of what we have and what we need. It would also be a lot more realistic to trade for a good Center if we had all those pieces.
 
I'm on the side of being opposed to trade LA for draft picks. Yes it clears up cap space and the tam can aquire a big name FA. But Blazers already have cap space to go after that would rather have LA, high priced FA and remaining squad than high priced free agent, couple of youngsters with potential and remaining squad.

LA is in the peak of his career now. Either trade him for a proven player (all star seems like equal value) or keep in as part of a team to go into the playoffs, IMO
 
Part of me thinks do it. Any opportunity to have an young back court like Lillard/Olapido
or Lillard/McLemore, along with our wings (Batum/Wes) is worth it.

But on the other hand if we can get that stud SG while still keeping LMA then that is even better. Actually that is way better because you need his threat to post up to open the lanes for the guards.

The cap space is intriguing, but who could we get that we can't get now? Not a big Josh Smith fan unless he played alongside LMA. No one else is worth the extra cap space we gain.

I honestly go back and forth on this one. I am interested in following the Shabazz workouts. If (and that is a big if) he shows improvement in these workouts, he could turn out to be that stud SG. He still had a decent year in college. 1st team all pac 12 and and co-freshman of the year.
 
Treaty_of_Batum said:
I'm on the side of being opposed to trade LA for draft picks. Yes it clears up cap space and the tam can aquire a big name FA. But Blazers already have cap space to go after that would rather have LA, high priced FA and remaining squad than high priced free agent, couple of youngsters with potential and remaining squad.

LA is in the peak of his career now. Either trade him for a proven player (all star seems like equal value) or keep in as part of a team to go into the playoffs, IMO
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This is the funny part with the trade ideas. It's all for draft picks and young players that won't be anything more than solid contributors. The Nerlens Noel trade ideas make me want to throw up. He's not a franchise player at all.

Aldridge/#10 pick/FA is better than any trade suggested in this thread by far. Why? Because the Blazers have the star player. 2-3 solid players don't make up for one star. The Blazers would get those 2-3 solid players and then guess what...they would need to find at least another cornerstone piece to go with Lillard, most likely two. That's just a backasswords way of thinking.

If you trade Aldridge it has to be for a player that is proven and has the potential to be as good as Aldridge and has already flashed it. Thompson is not even close to being that guy.
 
BrianFromWA said:
Would you rather have the "supposed potential" that UTH got for Deron and DEN got for Melo, or the "supposed potential" that TOR got for Bosh and CLE got for LBJ?
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Why does it have to be one of those two? Can't a 3rd option be keeping LMA? Bosh was clearly gone because they couldn't put a decent roster around him, and he had stars in his eyes and talked of teaming up with other players. Carmelo wanted to play in NY and made that clear. Deron was polite publicly, but am sure told Utah of his intentions to not stick around. We don't know what LMA has said privately to Olshey, so won't speculate on going the Deron route. He hasn't talked about leaving like Carmelo, so no real reason to go that route. I don't see why it's out of the realm of possibility he sticks around if we can put talent around him, which we have already begun with Lillard, as well as Batum as a good fitting piece.
 
Treaty_of_Batum said:
LA is in the peak of his career now. Either trade him for a proven player (all star seems like equal value) or keep in as part of a team to go into the playoffs, IMO
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Why would another team give us the same level of player as Aldridge?

Another team looking to acquire Aldridge would either need depth at a position where they could afford to move an all-star-level guy OR they would have other assets they value less than we do because of organizational time frames.

I like Aldridge, but I don't think that this team is going anywhere in the next year or two, and it would be more interesting to me as a fan to do a deal like this one with Cleveland. There are few guarantees in the NBA, and it's possible that the Blazers could be making a huge mistake in trading their best player for potential (in the form of young players and cap space) but I think it's more likely that we'll be stuck in mediocrity for the next few years, and I'd rather go big or go home.

Ed O.
 
I really like LMA, but he turns 28 in a month. The window to win with him is 3 years or so.

Ideally, you pair him with a strong rebounding SF and C, neither of which the team really has.

The Blazers could instantly become an up and coming young team, with a championship window that coincides with Wade maybe retiring and LeBron and Bosh turning 31 in 3 years.

The #1 should be ROY, giving the Blazers back-to-back winners.

Thompson is not bad at all for a 21 year old player.

The other picks and cap space make for good bargaining chips.

Maybe you use the $5M savings to resign JJ. Now the deal looks like a 1st, Thompson, more picks, and JJ for LMA.

Draft Lillard's back court mate. Go get a legitimate C. Overnight you have a solid starting 5 with Wes to backup SG and SF and Thompson rounding out the bigs rotation.

Go make playoffs and get some experience.
 
Aldridge has a game that will age nicely.

6-11. Great length. Nice jumper. Good post moves. Unblockable shot. Doesn't really rely on his athleticism.

He'll be a great player to have for another 5-6 years.
 
Kind of surprising how acceptable the idea of trading Aldridge has become to many here. Makes me wonder if this will happen this summer. When you consider all the variables already mentioned, the fact that he's our most valuable trade asset (outside of the virtually untouchable Lillard), and Olshey looking to put his imprint on this team, it may be much more likely than I'd thought.

And then there's the whole LeBron thing. A team looking to elevate its immediate potential in order to lure LeBron could do a lot worse than trade young assets for Aldridge.
 
Denny Crane said:
Now the deal looks like a 1st, Thompson, more picks, and JJ for LMA.
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And that's a very decent haul. Just looking at stats through the lens of per36 (as I said earlier, I'm not familiar with Thompson's game), there are only a few categories that differ significantly from LMA (otherwise they're nearly identical): Rebounds, FT%, and PPG (and APG to an extent). Thompson is the better rebounder, LMA shoots FTs better, and LMA shoots more so he scores more (essentially identical FG% though). I included Hickson in the comparison just because:
http://www.basketball-reference.com...013&p2=thomptr01&y2=2013&p3=hicksjj01&y3=2013

Given that Lillard, Wes, Nic and Hickson all sport better eFG% than LMA, I think we should be fine with the 7ppg difference between LMA and Tristan. Also, Tristan's FG% and FT% both improved by 5% from his first year to his second year. Is that a demonstration that he's working on his shot and improving? Or does it just show that he wasn't as confident/comfortable as a rookie?
 
Denny Crane said:
Now the deal looks like a 1st, Thompson, more picks, and JJ for LMA.
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I've always hated when people add your own assets into a deal as if you're gaining something you never had with it.
 
Let me know when Thompson commands double teams because it's too hard to stop him 1 on 1 and becomes the focus of the defense.

FG%'s are not equal.

Bringing up eFG% is stupid because Aldridge doesn't shoot 3's while Nic/Wes/Lillard shoot a ton of them
 
RR7 said:
I've always hated when people add your own assets into a deal as if you're gaining something you never had with it.
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If you keep LMA, you're letting JJ walk.

So you really would be getting him. He's a Free Agent, not your asset.
 
Denny Crane said:
If you keep LMA, you're letting JJ walk.

So you really would be getting him. He's a Free Agent, not your asset.
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We have the bird rights yo pay him whatever he want. He can most certainly walk, and I hope he does. But if we want him, we can make an offer to him regardless of who is here. Trading LMA doesn't all of a sudden make him ours. Offering him a bigger contract than everyone else does. And that doesn't change with the rest of our roster.
 
RR7 said:
I've always hated when people add your own assets into a deal as if you're gaining something you never had with it.
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Plug in anyone you want - Hickson was just an example, and represents the increased cap space which should be enough to sign two solid players, or one solid player and make an uneven trade.
 
blue9 said:
Plug in anyone you want - Hickson was just an example, and represents the increased cap space which should be enough to sign two solid players, or one solid player and make an uneven trade.
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It was more an aside to this discussion, and not entirely meant to single out Denny. You see others do it, I dunno, maybe sort of a pet peeve. It's one thing to say here is the potential finished roster in its entirety, and another, IMO, to say, oh, it's kind of like you also traded for your own asset.
 
SLAM: You're under contract for two more years. There have been rumors that the Cavs might float, say, Tristan Thompson and the No. 1 pick for you. How do you feel about your future in Portland?

LA: You know, as of now I'm here and we have a great team. I'm here now and we have a team that can definitely get better next year and we have cap room so we can bring in players. So I'm definitely here, and we'll see what happens.
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Wow, I'm drugged to the hills and not thinking clearly, but wow
 
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