"Nate and myself had a long dinner and was absolutely convinced he was part of Blazers fabric going forward"
"He's an ironman... he makes everyone around him better... reminds me a little bit of Avery Johnson"
"We wanted to keep this 54 win team together and just add to it. Get some experience. Andre's been in big games.
"i don't see many moves. there could be smaller free agent signings... we really like [our roster]... good depth at every position."
"We were impressed with his leadereship ability."
"I would call this [signing] a Plan C."
"Andre was terrific. He knew our team. He knew how he could help our team. He seemed like a coach. Nate and him hit it off in the first five minutes. I got out of the conversation."
"He's more of a team defender now than he has ever been before. He's able to send guys to their weaknesses. Quite frankly, we've got some big guys that really defend the paint and do a good job on the boards. We think he's going to be fine there."
"We can say it's a 3 year deal. As he gets older it's important he understands his role."
"Nate felt great about the meeting. One of the things we do is debate pretty hard, the merit of each deal. Nate was fully on board with this and you can tell the chemistry they had in the dinner we had."
"He just has that basketball savvy and knowledge that young guys need to see. He can make Greg Oden better. He can make Nicolas Batum, he can get shots for Rudy Fernandez, Brandon, LaMarcus. He said all that in the meeting. He couldn't have said it any better."
"His leadership is something we'll lean upon."
"I know we'll be a better team throughout the season and hopefully into the playoffs."
In response to a question about Bayless's role: "It's going to be competitive at every position. Nate has been pretty demonstrative in that. Good competition leads to better play."
"There's going to be competition at that point guard position. I'm not saying Andre is going to be the starter. I didn't say that. Nate didn't say that in the meeting."
