Why did the Blazers kill Rudy Fernandez?

[philsmith75]

When he came in, I thought he was going to be electric, he could shoot from way out and throw down with anyone. I thought they'd make him a real scorer, cutting off the ball. Instead, they made him Quentin Richardson/Jason Kapono, just stand there and shoot 3s. Terrible. Why???

 

[julius]

Because he murdered Steve Blake!

 

[andalusian]

Trevor Ariza killed his back.

 

[Minstrel]

To be a "real scorer" you need to have elite ball-handling skill, or at least above average for the NBA. Fernandez doesn't have that. Without that, there's a limit to what he can do. He can be set up for spot-up shots or he can be fed passes going to the hoop. The Blazers did plenty of the second in his rookie season but, as andalusian notes, the back injury he suffered seems to have affected his ability to finish at the hoop. So he mostly contributes in the first way.

 

[BLAZER PROPHET]

Trevor Ariza killed his back.

Yep. An NBA cheap shot did him in.

 

[Sug]

Teams scouted him...

 

[philsmith75]

Thanks. Just wondering. I hated to see him become a standstill shooter.

 

[MARIS61]

To be a "real scorer" you need to have elite ball-handling skill, or at least above average for the NBA. Fernandez doesn't have that.

Nonsense.

 

[Natebishop3]

Nonsense.

Care to back that up with some evidence to the contrary?

 

[jlprk]

Rudy is certainly an above-average dribbler for a SG, much better than Matthews.

At PG he's as good as Brent Barry, the 6-5 Rudy lookalike who moved from a hot-shooting starting SG to starting PG after the Sonics traded Payton for Ray Allen. Barry surprised everyone and was really, really good at PG. He dribbled carefully, hunched over, and was just as effective as Payton, which is one reason they dumped Payton. After 1 1/2 years of starting at PG, Barry became so overvalued (he was already a Rudy-like SG) that the Spurs drooled and stole him. Here is Rudy's future:

http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/b/barrybr01.html

By the way, all that happened under Coach Nate McMillan. If Nate has to start Rudy at PG, we'll do just fine.

 

[Natebishop3]

Rudy is certainly an above-average dribbler for a SG, much better than Matthews.

At PG he's as good as Brent Barry, the 6-5 Rudy lookalike who moved from a hot-shooting starting SG to starting PG after the Sonics traded Payton for Ray Allen. Barry surprised everyone and was really, really good at PG. He dribbled carefully, hunched over, and was just as effective as Payton, which is one reason they dumped Payton. After 1 1/2 years of starting at PG, Barry became so overvalued (he was already a Rudy-like SG) that the Spurs drooled and stole him. Here is Rudy's future:

http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/b/barrybr01.html

By the way, all that happened under Coach Nate McMillan. If Nate has to start Rudy at PG, we'll do just fine.

I hope you're talking about old, over the hill, almost retired Payton and not the young, dominant, couldn't be stopped Payton.

 

[jlprk]

I was, although Payton was overrated at all ages. The only reason they drafted him was because starter McMillan played like he now coaches, and Coach K.C. Jones thought he played cowardly. Then, Payton sucked his first 2 years, playing just like McMillan, possibly because of McMillan's dominating personality. The Sonics tried to dump Payton the summer after his 2nd year for Derek Harper, but the Mavericks wanted too much and wouldn't budge, for the crumby Payton.

They had to trade starter SG Ricky Pierce because Payton fought him in the locker room. Payton used to jump up at players and challenge them to fights.

Then he started to get his mind together. He became the equal of Detlef Schremph and Michael Cage and Sam Perkins, though nowhere near Shawn Kemp. Nowadays people look at stats and say he was more important than he was. Wrong, he was just one of several equals, led by Kemp. Kemp's stats were held down by foul trouble.

After Kemp left, the team got worse, and Payton had his peak. For 2 years, he could drape over the dribbler like a spider, while running alongside. As age made him lose that, his ego trips made his negatives exceed his positives. He didn't like this and he didnt like that. He exploded at teammates until management dumped him back to George Karl, who couldn't get anything out of him in Milwaukee because he sucked.

Gary Payton. Most overrated Sonic of all time. Mediocre passer and bad shooter. Ricky Pierce. Most underrated. I laugh when someone suggests Payton go into the media. He can't talk, fool! He is an unvarnished idiot! You think Outlaw talked funny? Add a personality that wants to fistfight everyone and runs away from people. To be in the media, you have to speak, and have some charm!

 

[jlprk]

Payton is a good example of my oft-repeated theme that past Blazers seemed terrible because the Oregonian publicized their squabbles and ghetto personalities so much...while papers in most NBA cities cover up such incidents as trivial. I remember the reason Ricky Pierce was traded only because years ago I was reading the Seattle NBA media closely, and chanced upon something barely mentioned in the local Seattle media only once even then, and never since. His snits against teammates were reported only temporarily, too.

If a Blazer had done the same thing, we'd still be talking about it, rekindled constantly by the local media whenever our memory for gossip begins to flag. This would transfer into frequent mentions in the national media.

 

[Denny Crane]

Gary Payton was an overrated (.466 career) shooter and passer (5 straight 20+ Pts/8 Assists seasons)?

 

[mgb]

Gary Payton was an overrated (.466 career) shooter and passer (5 straight 20+ Pts/8 Assists seasons)?

It was the players around that got him those stats.

 

[jlprk]

Selfish ballhog. The Oregonian would have driven him out of here, had he been a Blazer for one year. Talk about unlikeable.

 

[BrianFromWA]

I would say that any critique of Gary Payton that doesn't mention being the only PG ever to win DPoY and a record 9-time All-Defense team is missing something important.

And a player with two separate 350+ games consecutive streaks would be held in high esteem by this franchise, I expect.

 

[jlprk]

Except that since he would have been the first JailBlazer, locals wouldn't have put up with him for 350 games. He'd have been gone. In the power vacuum of post-Kemp, post-Whitsitt Seattle, he was King of the Roost and lorded over his teammates. But in Portland, a more talented team, players wouldn't have tolerated him when he snitted at them like a witch.

 

[BrianFromWA]

so you're telling me that a team starting GP, Sheed and Scottie Pippen wouldn't have been a title contender? That GP's "rule the roost" mentality would've cause the O to sabotage the team?

Pippen won 6 rings with Jordan bashing him left and right in practice.

 

[jlprk]

What was different? The Blazers were a title contender without Payton and with rule the roost Sheed, and the paper still got the city to blow up the team. The paper couldn't care less whether we had a winner or a loser, only their farmer boy moralisms count.

But at least those players liked each other, even if the paper didn't. With Payton's persona replacing Sheed's as the team's dominant paradigm, it would have been a lot worse, giving the paper even more incendiary ammo to divide and conquer the town.

 

[Minstrel]

What was different? The Blazers were a title contender without Payton and with rule the roost Sheed

What would have been different is that they would have been an even better title contender. Maybe they don't blow a 15 point lead in the fourth quarter with Payton. Personally, I'd have to say that Payton, Pippen and Sheed would have been the nucleus of a pretty amazing defensive team.

and the paper still got the city to blow up the team.

The Paper loved them until they began disappointing on the court. They were still a winner, in terms of being a well above .500 team, but they were no longer a serious title contender.

 

[jlprk]

What would have been different is that they would have been an even better title contender.

What I meant was, what would have been different about the Oregonian disliking the team. The paper didn't base their dislike on wins, so Payton creating a few extra wins wouldn't have changed their opinion. But Payton would have made the locker room more discordant, which is what the paper cared about.

Payton didn't create as many wins as his stats might indicate. As soon as Wally Walker fired Karl, the Sonics dropped from about .700 to barely over .500.

 

[Minstrel]

What I meant was, what would have been different about the Oregonian disliking the team. The paper didn't base their dislike on wins, so Payton creating a few extra wins wouldn't have changed their opinion.

I tend to disagree. The "character matters" crusade began after the Blazers had fallen from contender status to one-and-done. At that point, the paper focused on incidents involving Sheed, Stoudamire and Wells rather than what on-court value the team still possessed.

 

[Webster's Dictionary]

What was different? The Blazers were a title contender without Payton and with rule the roost Sheed, and the paper still got the city to blow up the team. The paper couldn't care less whether we had a winner or a loser, only their farmer boy moralisms count.

But at least those players liked each other, even if the paper didn't. With Payton's persona replacing Sheed's as the team's dominant paradigm, it would have been a lot worse, giving the paper even more incendiary ammo to divide and conquer the town.

I'm sorry, but if the Blazers won a championship or two, no one would ever care that they were the Jailblazers. Shoot, we'd just embrace it like Raiders fans do. It was the fact that the team failed, then began to squabble itself apart that allowed the O to jump all over them and ride them all the way to the ground. If we win game 7 in 2000 and then the finals, then Brian Grant re-signs, we have a lot more years with the "Jail blazers" and no one cares.

If GP came here and won championships, no one would give a rat's left nut whether he had squabbles with team mates or got into trouble. Now if he came in and tore the team apart (which I highly doubt, at least not for a long while) then people would be up in arms.

 

[jlprk]

Payton never won championships. In fact, he was just one among equals on the good Karl teams. Only after Karl and Kemp left, did Payton take charge. That's when his occasional unbearablility became frequent. And when the .700 years ended immediately.

He was a good player, like Andre Miller, but you couldn't count on his shooting, like Miller. I'd rather have Miller. In mouth activity, they are opposites.

Yap yap yap yap yap......all...game.....long.....dissing guy he's guarding...

after the game, goes into locker room....

Yap yap yap yap yap......dissing teammates....

makes rare public appearance, forced by sponsor to promote his own product.....

painful fearful silence....leaves early....autograph-seeking kids crying.....

(He escaped a mall appearance and "Home, James!"-ed his limo driver out of Bellingham, Washington, and the local paper actually ran an editorial against him. He did that all over the state.)

 

[Nikolokolus]

Payton never won championships. In fact, he was just one among equals on the good Karl teams. Only after Karl and Kemp left, did Payton take charge. That's when his occasional unbearablility became frequent. And when the .700 years ended immediately.

He was a good player, like Andre Miller, but you couldn't count on his shooting, like Miller. I'd rather have Miller. In mouth activity, they are opposites.

Yap yap yap yap yap......all...game.....long.....dissing guy he's guarding...

after the game, goes into locker room....

Yap yap yap yap yap......dissing teammates....

makes rare public appearance, forced by sponsor to promote his own product.....

painful fearful silence....leaves early....autograph-seeking kids crying.....

(He escaped a mall appearance and "Home, James!"-ed his limo driver out of Bellingham, Washington, and the local paper actually ran an editorial against him. He did that all over the state.)

Yeah, I loved him too.