The 'Next' Move

Welcome to our community

Be a part of something great, join today!

Register Log in
PtldPlatypus said:
I don't think anyone believes Cronin turned down superior deals.

I think people believe that from a talent standpoint, making no deal would have been superior to this deal, and that there were ways to accomplish the same tax savings without devaluing existing assets.

I think people also believe that given nearly a week remaining before the trade deadline, there was still plenty of time to explore superior deals before settling for one with such an obvious talent deficit.

And I think people also believe (and this is purely speculation), that if this was in fact the best deal Cronin was able to come up with in trading Powell, he either doesn't have enough cachet around the league to obtain a decent offer from other GMs, or doesn't have the necessary negotiation skills to maximize value when exploring trades.
Click to expand...

good post...and the LeVert trade sure didn't help the situation. Or the news that several teams are interested in RoCo
 
PCmor7 said:
Well. yeah, if you're bad enough it's even easier to find guys to contribute. They just don't contribute to making your team a contender.
Click to expand...

So where did LeBron, Giannis, Durant, Steph, Duncan, even as recent as Ball, Ayton and Ja Morant, come from?
 
TBpup said:
So where did LeBron, Giannis, Durant, Steph, Duncan, even as recent as Ball, Ayton and Ja Morant, come from?
Click to expand...

Are you suggesting there are players on their level in this draft or free agents on their level willing to come to Portland?
 
SlyPokerCat said:
The Clippers were without their two best players. Nobody is saying Norm is a superstar. But he is a damn good 4th best player on a contending team.

He scored 28 points in 24 minutes. The loss isn't his fault.
Click to expand...
I forgot I thought it was a team sport. Yes he had good offense game but his team lost by 24 and the last run was when he was on the floor. No it wasn't all his fault I didn't say that did I but overall the clippers defense suck tonight and he was part of that defense.
 
James lamphear said:
I forgot I thought it was a team sport. Yes he had good offense game but his team lost by 24 and the last run was when he was on the floor. No it wasn't all his fault I didn't say that did I but overall the clippers defense suck tonight and he was part of that defense.
Click to expand...

Did you look at the rest of their roster? It's a dumpster fire. It's worse than ours. Norm is the best active player on that roster right now.
 
Natebishop3 said:
Did you look at the rest of their roster? It's a dumpster fire. It's worse than ours. Norm is the best active player on that roster right now.
Click to expand...
They don't have there 2 star but the rest roster still in tact except the ones they traded.
 
James lamphear said:
I forgot I thought it was a team sport. Yes he had good offense game but his team lost by 24 and the last run was when he was on the floor. No it wasn't all his fault I didn't say that did I but overall the clippers defense suck tonight and he was part of that defense.
Click to expand...
Look at the box. All Clippers starters were between -18 and -30. Norm and RoCo were -3 and -2. The Clippers team was much better when the ex-Blazers played than when they didn't. Don't make disingenuous arguments to try to denigrate players that we were fleeced for.
 
PCmor7 said:
I don't see a lot of value in this draft, personally. The best player's upside is Chris Bosh. There are a few intriguing shooting guards but a lot of other guys with higher than normal bust potential. People thinking getting a high lottery pick is going to be a great, tradeable asset might discover that it's not if no one has any interest in acquiring it.
Click to expand...
Chris Bosh is a HOFer. He was the best big man in the league when LeBron made The Decision. It's why people were pissed off so much. LeBron, Wade, and Bosh were 3 of the Top PERs in 09-10.
 
PCmor7 said:
Are you suggesting there are players on their level in this draft or free agents on their level willing to come to Portland?
Click to expand...

A team that is not a destination for top FAs can't just punt on the draft. Even in the worst year you have a better chance of getting a good player in the draft than you do signing minimum wage vets.
 
PCmor7 said:
Are you suggesting there are players on their level in this draft or free agents on their level willing to come to Portland?
Click to expand...

As before, I'm suggesting there are quality contributors in every Draft.....just have to find them. I believe the comment was about contributors, right?
 
TBpup said:
One thing that could help the last trade toward the 'next' trade, is to move Bledsoe's contract. But since he is limited to a 1-for-1 deal, what could you conceivably get for him? Another deal might be made to balance out his trade, but on it's own, he can only be traded for one other player along with picks...which we don't really have.

So who is in his range? You can get someone from around interestingly from a team standpoint, Jonas Valanciunas ($14,000,000) to interestingly player wise, Julius Randle ($21,780,000). In between are some of the following.

Tim Hardaway Jr
Danilo Gallinari
Harrison Barnes
Jeremi Grant
Jarrett Allen
Domantis Sabonis
Goran Dragic
Bojan Bogdanovic
Eric Gordon
Miles Turner
Terry Rozier
Ricky Rubio
Caris LeVert
Jonathon Isaac
Markelle Fultz
OG Anunoby
Marcus Morris
Marcus Smart
Thaddeus Young

A few of these names have been mentioned in other discussions, and perhaps with another deal, a couple of these might be available for various reasons. As long as Bledsoe's contract doesn't go the way of RLEC.
Click to expand...

If we could trade Bledsoe for any of those players it’d be a miracle!
 
Then there is this... a bleak but realistic take on the way things look from the outside. I just don't see how that deal could possibly mean that we're trying to get better, now or next season. Maybe Cronin has something up his sleeve and will shock both me and this writer for CBS Sports. Maybe by Thursday afternoon I'll have a rosy disposition about my right now shattered hopes for a title team led or at least co-led by Dame. That's not likely going to be the case though. What's likely is that we see an underwhelming to downright tragic trade involving CJ and maybe one involving Nurk. If we do see those and there is again no way that they were aimed at making us better now or next season then the front office's objective will be clear: get Dame to request a trade and grant that request to kick start a total rebuild around what you get for Dame, Ant and Nas... hopefully it will also include something we get for CJ, Nurk and/or Larry too but I'm not holding my breath.

https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/...ng-norman-powell-for-nothing-was-a-bad-start/
 
It seems to me that the Powell-RoCo dump was indicative of a change in direction from Olshey’s three guard lineup that he saddled Chauncey with. Moving Norm’s contract was always going to be difficult. RoCo was clearly not a good fit with Chauncey’s system and was going to be gone for nothing this summer anyway. Winslow isn’t the perfect 3 by any stretch of the imagination, but you could see the value of a bigger, defensive-minded wing in his debut against the Bucks. It was a shock to see two solid starters net so little in return, but I do think that I like the change in direction that the move indicates is coming. I hated the 3 guard lineup.
 
e_blazer said:
It seems to me that the Powell-RoCo dump was indicative of a change in direction from Olshey’s three guard lineup that he saddled Chauncey with. Moving Norm’s contract was always going to be difficult. RoCo was clearly not a good fit with Chauncey’s system and was going to be gone for nothing this summer anyway. Winslow isn’t the perfect 3 by any stretch of the imagination, but you could see the value of a bigger, defensive-minded wing in his debut against the Bucks. It was a shock to see two solid starters net so little in return, but I do think that I like the change in direction that the move indicates is coming. I hated the 3 guard lineup.
Click to expand...

I agree the Norm starting at SF for 35mpg lineup is not good.

The problem is the team still has Dame CJ Ant as their top 3 $ contracts between $20-50 million each all with duplicate skill sets and short comings. We can't play all three of them together either.

With Powell cheap contract he could have been the 3rd guard in a rotation with two of them and 5-10mpg sliding to SF, which on the cap also allows a big contract for a forward.

Instead we moved Norm, lost a starter for nothing and didn't solve the logjam of short guards. We still need to move one of Dame/CJ/Ant. Now if we got a useful short term or long term asset for Norm perhaps I could see the logic. Instead we got 3 scrubs earning $11 million next season. What the fuck?
 
Paul Allen don’t approve this roster. Make your next move Cronin
 
TBpup said:
As before, I'm suggesting there are quality contributors in every Draft.....just have to find them. I believe the comment was about contributors, right?
Click to expand...

If we're being precise, I think I said something to the effect of there being more players to be contributors who aren't actually good players when you are on a bad team. Then you brought up about seven Hall of Fame players, which seems a bit like moving the goalposts.

And the idea that quality contributors exist in every draft doesn't work that way in a vacuum, either. It varies from draft to draft. Oh sure, there always have been quality contributors in every draft. That's the law of averages. But there's no set quota on how many or how good.
 
oldmangrouch said:
A team that is not a destination for top FAs can't just punt on the draft. Even in the worst year you have a better chance of getting a good player in the draft than you do signing minimum wage vets.
Click to expand...

I absolutely agree with your first sentence. Except, that's not applicable to the Blazers in 2022. They weren't punting on the draft unless they somehow made it through the play-in round.

That makes your second sentence one of nuance. Is there, in this draft, a level of talent that justifies handing away two assets to move from the 10th pick to the 6th pick that in fact could have either reset the talent balance on the team or brought back better drafting opportunities in the near future?

I'd suggest the answer to that is no.
 
There some quality players in the top 10 where more likely we end up that probably could in to help us. I seen majority of the players that should go into the top 10 everyone one of them probably could in and help right away.
 
KSF-ERIC said:
Chris Bosh is a HOFer. He was the best big man in the league when LeBron made The Decision. It's why people were pissed off so much. LeBron, Wade, and Bosh were 3 of the Top PERs in 09-10.
Click to expand...

So what? What does that have to do with this year's draft?

You're telling me that trading away valuable assets with almost no return is worth a shot that we might win the lottery and then this year's top pick might reach his potential of being the next Chris Bosh.

That's like a millionaire giving away all of his money to buy one lottery ticket that, if it hits, would make him a billionaire. It's not sensible.
 
James lamphear said:
There some quality players in the top 10 where more likely we end up that probably could in to help us. I seen majority of the players that should go into the top 10 everyone one of them probably could in and help right away.
Click to expand...

We disagree on the quality and potential of these players.

I also think, unless you pretty much completely clean out the Blazers roster, you've further depleted Portland's chances at getting a player who can contribute immediately because almost all of them are 6-3 to 6-5 shooting or combo guards. Now, if you want to trade Dame and draft one of those guys because you have needs at every position and can afford to take absolutely the best player available, then I'm on board with your thinking. If you want the team to keep Dame and Ant and Nas and Keon Johnson, then all of a sudden the window for any of those players to step in and contribute meaningfully and grow is significantly diminished.
 
The other thing to consider that I've kind of brushed on in some of these posts is the potential value of say the sixth pick vs. the 10th pick as a trading chip.

Of course, I find that negligible, certainly not enough to justify the Powell/RoCo trade, the reason being that, as others have agreed, this isn't a deep draft and the one area where it has some value is about a half-dozen or so combo guards that figure to go between 4-16 and have little to differentiate between them.

Supply and demand depreciate the value of a pick between 6-10 in this particular draft.
 
Late to the party here, because this place has been a freaking loony bin since the trade, but one of the things I find interesting that folks aren't talking about is the timing of it... Regardless of your feelings on the haul (I tend to think Joe was short at least an asset), the fact that he made the deal a week early makes me think there has to be a "next move", otherwise why settle on losing a trade with another week to negotiate?

It's a head-scratcher, to be honest, but those who argue that Cronin used "no logic" in the move are themselves, not being logical. He's a 15-year vet in the industry who's scratching and clawing for his once-in-a-lifetime job. We may not appreciate his logic, or see the whole picture, but to just pretend that he's some NBA exec Manchurian candidate making decisions with no strategic thought is just silly... The question is what was that logic?

The one (and, frankly, only) theory I keep coming back to is leverage in another deal, specifically, a CJ deal. It stands to reason that our big haul was always going to come from moving CJ. It also stands to reason, that the offseason is likely the time where you're going to have maximum suitors for him, and thus maximum negotiating leverage. Is it possible that a team, say NO, was lowballing us for CJ and Cronin's leverage chip was holding him until the offseason? If true, prior to the trade, that team could've been trying to leverage us being in "no-man's land" with Ant, CJ, Norm and Powell. By trading Roco and Powell, Cronin makes it clear that we're all-in on youth and tanking. It's Cronin not blinking in a game of chicken.

I believe there's a strategy in place, and that Dame has been bought in (because, come on, no interim-GM wanting the gig is going to do anything without his star's approval), but this is really the only scenario I can think of that feels like it might make some sense... If Cronin came up an asset short in one trade but is able to leverage an additional asset in another, you could at least see how that could be...
 
glazeduck said:
Late to the party here, because this place has been a freaking loony bin since the trade, but one of the things I find interesting that folks aren't talking about is the timing of it... Regardless of your feelings on the haul (I tend to think Joe was short at least an asset), the fact that he made the deal a week early makes me think there has to be a "next move", otherwise why settle on losing a trade with another week to negotiate?

It's a head-scratcher, to be honest, but those who argue that Cronin used "no logic" in the move are themselves, not being logical. He's a 15-year vet in the industry who's scratching and clawing for his once-in-a-lifetime job. We may not appreciate his logic, or see the whole picture, but to just pretend that he's some NBA exec Manchurian candidate making decisions with no strategic thought is just silly... The question is what was that logic?

The one (and, frankly, only) theory I keep coming back to is leverage in another deal, specifically, a CJ deal. It stands to reason that our big haul was always going to come from moving CJ. It also stands to reason, that the offseason is likely the time where you're going to have maximum suitors for him, and thus maximum negotiating leverage. Is it possible that a team, say NO, was lowballing us for CJ and Cronin's leverage chip was holding him until the offseason? If true, prior to the trade, that team could've been trying to leverage us being in "no-man's land" with Ant, CJ, Norm and Powell. By trading Roco and Powell, Cronin makes it clear that we're all-in on youth and tanking. It's Cronin not blinking in a game of chicken.

I believe there's a strategy in place, and that Dame has been bought in (because, come on, no interim-GM wanting the gig is going to do anything without his star's approval), but this is really the only scenario I can think of that feels like it might make some sense... If Cronin came up an asset short in one trade but is able to leverage an additional asset in another, you could at least see how that could be...
Click to expand...

if there’s some kind of unique asset that we got in the clippers trade—an asset that we only got in order to a very specific follow up move—it makes no sense to do this deal “early” without the other deal in place to execute immediately afterward.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Users who are viewing this thread

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