I'd like to go over a few items. There have been a few blogs that have vanished or gone off to lala land, and so I wanted to go over a few key items important to me.

1. Draft night moves and did we really get an awesome deal
2. KP and ethics
3. Firing Nate
4. The myth of the golden gut
   

Draft Night Moves and KP

One of the radio personalities brought up the point that he (don't remember which one on 95.5 the game) had higher expectations of draft day and asked if getting excited just because KP told them it was good.

I wanted to add my two cents here and question others as to what they thought.

Do people like trades just because KP tells them it's a good trade?

I think this is definitely possible. KP has earned our trust as a fan base and I think we could snag almost any player, and if KP tells us that the player is good, then a large majority of us will be come excited.

That said, Bayless has always been listed as a very good player and a top three or four talent. With the draft pick we had, it's INCREDIBLE we snagged him, but will he pan out?

I had also expected more activity and MAJOR moves.

Was this move as good as the hype or were expectations for more?

To be honest, I was expecting more. The move itself was EXCELLENT from two stand points:

1.  We gave up NOTHING that we didn't need to give up anyway.
2.  We got the most we could get from the draft without giving up any major pieces.

However, I have now dropped my win expectation down to 46-48 from 50-52. The reason being is that we... got... YOUNGER!!!

My initial response was "DANG IT!!! ANOTHER YEAR WE'RE BUILDING AND POSSIBLY NOT MAKING THE PLAY-OFFS!!!

I was upset. I really expected a move for Harris. He's young and would have provided experience. He was perfect for us. I'm ready for the blazers to make their move this year and that trade would have greatly helped us.

Instead we have another young guy who needs to learn the game and learn his place and who may not work out. It's always possible because rookies are unknowns.

So, that said, is Bayless worth keeping or should we trade again for Harris?

If you're only goal is to win this year and have a reasonable chance of winning in the years to come, then I say yes. If your goal is to create a dynasty over the next 10-15 years, then I say probably not.  You take the higher risk/higher return to ensure that no team can tweak their team and beat the blazers.  Consider it an insurance policy against injury to other stars.

Bayless is supposed to have a HIGH ceiling. If he reaches his potential (and likely will with the blazers), then he's worth it. There IS risk that he doesn't and then the blazers look pretty dumb for not going after Harris.

KP and ethics

Did KP break a gentleman's promise with other teams and did he tell Charlotte to draft DJ for him?

We can't really answer this because we were not there.

Is it okay to do break your word?

I'm going with a definite no here.  It's not ethical and it strongly showcases that you're not a trust worthy person.  I would actually turn in my blazer fan card if this were the case.  There are SO many people in business that do what it takes to win in the short term and don't care who lose just so they win.  I could and would never support a company or team like that.  In my opinion it's a bad cultural trait to take on.

There were people in various threads brushing it off, but it's not a little thing.  That is major and I don't care how much I like someone, I'm not going to excuse behavior like that.  In all honesty, it's really making me ponder the election this year as well and which direction (if any) I'll be going.

Now, KP didn't have a deal in place, but mislead... still a little dirty, but if a GM is going to be stupid enough to do something like that, then it's their own fault.

Firing Nate

If the Blazers do not improve next year, should Nate be fired?

I looked around for this post but could not find it.   My response is WHAT???

We've just taken on a young point guard  WHY in the WORLD would we fire Nate?  Why do we even need a scape goat if something doesn't go well?

Our team is still young and we'll still be inconsistent at times.  We're STILL in the learning phase guys!  I'll be disappointed if we don't continue improving and win 46-48 games, but I won't be calling for anyones head.  I won't even be concerned if we come out at 41 again.  I don't think that's entirely unexpected when you have a young team and get rid of some of the leadership (jack, jones).  Management is tempering expectations and does not believe that we'll make the play-offs.  With that in mind, they may make decisions to see what they have instead of flat out trying to win.

I see soooo many teams have knee jerk reactions like firing coach after a bad season and it doesn't work for me.  Some teams have major injuries to key players, the team has a losing season, and the answer?  Fire the coach?  What good does that do you?  You can only do so much with what you have.

Additionally... Nate is constantly learning and improving!  He is sometimes slow to change, but I suspect this is because he wants to see if something is a fluke or if it really works.  It's possible he's doing this because he knows he's learning as is the team and he has the luxury right now to experiment.   Or maybe he's just slow to learn.  Either way he constantly gets better.

Additionally, no team improves MORE after a timeout.  That shows good coaching.

In my mind Nate should be fired if:

1. He loses the team so they don't follow him.
2. If he shows that he's reached the limits of his ability and can't continue to learn, improve, and get the team over the championship hump.  (This takes a few years and includes a team that is healthy AND has experience).
   
3. He does something completely immoral
4. He is destroying the culture
   

The myth of the golden gut

Okay, this drives me NUT!!!

Paul Allen stated, in an interview, that KP has the golden gut.  This drives me nuts because he DOESNT have a golden gut.  That's like saying that basketball players succeed just because they have natural talent.

The fact is that KP AND basketball players put in hours and HOURS of hard work.  KP's success comes from planning, developing a system to evaluate talent, and sticking to that system.

Calling it the golden gut is false, misleading, and worships KP without recognizing the hard work he AND his team are putting into it.

The End

That's really all i have on this one.  I just wanted to point it out.  The man works hard, works smart, and makes decisions that are generally good ones with his team.

Hope you enjoyed the reading, it wasn't too much of a rehash, and you didn't mind that I clumped everything up into one post because I couldn't find all the posts and because I'm sure you wouldn't want four more posts to bump the old ones off.