Anyone notice how much better the PG position has been in Blake’s absence? Yes, the 3 pt shooting and spreading the floor has been less than desirable. However; man up D, P and R D (with Bayless), offensive pace, etc.. are all better. Seems the young competition at PG has been good for this team. I used to think we needed a PG upgrade. Blake’s injury has proven his worth, but has also shown how important depth is and how deep they can go.

I like LMA and think is one of our future big 3. No way he goes or we try to upgrade PF. That leaves SF and Batum is the reason we wont be trading for a SF. That and the fact that Martell (our most moveable piece at this point) has little value with his injury.

A move with frye/diagu, RLEC and sergio/martell/outlaw would not surprise me. However; I think KP likes his chips and wants to see what their 1st playoff appearance will be like “as is”.

This team has chemistry, youth, some experience, loads of potential and complimentary players. Starters and back ups level each other out and as team defense grows so will their winning %. I doubt KP shakes em up this year. If a trade does happen it will be a role player and not a starter.

But I think Raef’s contract is far more valuable ina trade than letting it run out for cap space.

So, I think we trade it.

My idea: RLEC, Blake, and Diogu to Chicago for Hinrich and Larry Hughes.

This entices chicago because they get some good value back for Hinrich, as well as the opportunity to dump Larry Hughes 13 or so million off their books for next year.

We do this because it gives us a tradable asset next year (basically, RLEC ‘09 turns into LHEC ’10), and also gives us Hinrich. (BTW, I don’t even think Larry Hughes would play… but I guess he could…)

I think, when you look and see that our offensive efficiency has been top 3 in the league all season, while our defensive effeciency is towards the bottom of the league, it is obvious that what we need to improve is defense. I think swapping Hinrich for Blake would improve our team defense drastically, and give us more experience the PG position (that is, being a defensive leader, like Brandon mentioned he wanted, and brings playoff experience).

Plus, even though we entice CHicago to do this by the money they save with RLEC and with getting rid of Hughes, Hughes still onyl has one more year left on his contract, and it could still potentially be traded before the trade deadline next year if we want to make another move—or if we dont, then we just let it run out, no big deal, and we still ended up with Hinrich.

Is because we allow more points per possession than any other playoff team, as it stands right now.

We just flat outscore people right now, but we’re young, and when the other team ramps it up and disrupts us a bit, we need to be able to disrupt them as well. We just cannot do that right now.

The cap space won’t mean that much this summer. There will be 7-8 teams well under the cap and poor free-agent market. Teams looking to do a salary dump are going to look past the Blazers to Memphis, OKC or a non-contending team.

If we trade RLEC for someone of value, we can then bundle players this summer for who we want or draft picks. My guess is if we let RLEC run out we won’t do much other than trade a small piece for a small piece i.e Rodriguez for a backup PF or something like that.

Even though I have a man crush on Gerald Wallace after the Richardson trade I doubt he is going anywhere. Therefore the Blazers likeliest trade IMO is with Indiana for Danny Granger and two of their horrendous contracts.

They have 4 deals of 8 mil+ and 3 MLE deals with only two of those deals coming off their books (Nesterovich and Daniels if they don’t choose to pick up his option) and Granger’s max extension picks up next year essentially resulting in a net gain of just over 5 million coming off the Pacers books in their big contracts. They have little ones of the 3 mil and under variety that expire but looking at it it’s doubtful they get under the cap till 2011 the season after the big free agent rush.

They’re in the cellar attendance wise and I would imagine they’re losing money in a really bad economic situation.

All of this suggests to me that if we wanted Granger we could have him for the price of taking Jamaal Tinsley and Troy Murphy (or Dunleavy). RLEC, Rudy, Travis, Channing and Sergio works in the trade machine, although I don’t have a firm grip on how Granger’s Poison Pill contract could complicate things (perhaps requiring the inclusion of Memphis for salary dumping purposes).

I for one like the team as it is this year. I think any major moves should be done in the off season. While Salmons sounds decent, what do we do with 4 small forwards? Three if you count travis as a PF. If we got Salmons, the someone else would leave this year or oevr the summer.

Maybe though, if we get Salmons, then Channing would be the one to go so Travis would be the back-up PF? Still pretty thick at SF and an eventually deal would likely be needed.

I don’t know about next year, but maybe that early Bayless will replace Blake. Then there is the solid notion that the guys will get better as they player together longer and develop individually as well. For these reasons, I think sitting tight makes more sense until this summer.

like a trade for a good role player like Maxiell. Or we could swing for the fences; do a swap of LMA for Tayshaun Prince and a sign and trade of our chips for David Lee. Prince and Lee would be a once in a generation upgrade. Think about that lineup. Either way we’re in good shape for the future. A succession of good role players every two or three years would be fine with me.