Moving On from the Oden Era

…a similar post. I think these ideas are valid. However, I regret making the post, just because I think the timing is wrong. Blazer fans as a whole just don’t want to hear this right now. It’s kind of like surviving the sinking of the Titanic and standing around the deck of the Carpathia talking about what you are going to do on your NEXT cruise.

  Yes, these are ideas that will need to be debated and discussed. Just maybe not today.

and we have still have no proof…the proof is the product out on the floor…..Oden is not on the floor, once again…..It’s been a season that may be exposing the real truths about this team….?
  we will never be able to prove anything else using historical data on Oden…..When your not on the floor, (because of injuries), more than your on, then you have some significant evidence for being injury prone and not just bad luck. (even though it is …“bad luck”, when you play ball in the NBA you put your body on the line every day)…some survive, some don’t…but Greg’s body appears too fragile for a good long life in the NBA….all this, and the fact that Oden continues to lose valuable experience, will stall anything the Blazers may have in mind as to what there teams will look like, say 2 years from now…..

The blazers will probably let him go to another team (assuming he doesn’t come back at 100 percent….whatever that is) and he will become an all star for someone else.

We now have a big 2. I agree with pretty much everything said by the OP. NO ONE is untradeable anymore to get the player we need to round out our leaders. We can get role players later. We need a 3rd ( or honestly 2nd ) scoring option.

Also, we need to aggressively pursue our Euro players now to try and develop them, especially Joel Freeland. We have some juicy prospects over there, and need to maximize all of our assets to re-build around Roy.

Also, we can forget about any talk of firing Nate for the foreseeable future. This team needs some consistency right now, and Nate is going through the grinder with these guys. They are likely to rally around his cries for defense and hustle.

then he is done. Or when the coaches say he is done.

They ain’t said that yet. And based on initial reports, there’s no reason to think so at this time.

It’s important to base decisions on reality, of course—if Greg comes back, and is a shadow of the player he was before, or if he doesn’t come back, then it’s time to move on. But we aren’t there yet.

There is one scenario where I could see the Blazers “getting rid” of Oden at this time—(which would consist of trading him for a healthy big man of lesser talent, or for an old guy at the end of his career; NOT of waiving him, which would be stupid)—and that’s if Allen wants to put all his chips on winning a title this year, and screw the future. Boston kinda did that to land KG, and Al Jefferson has been hurt a lot since going to Minny. But I’m not sure I like those odds; and a trade for a KG-caliber player (Tim Duncan?) would probably cost more than Oden.

Otherwise, since he’s on rookie scale, his potential if he recovers is worth more to the team than the serviceable-but-unspectacular big we could probably get in a fire sale, even if the downside of keeping him is that he doesn’t come back and we end up with nothing. There are other ways to acquire serviceable-but-unspectacular bigs should we decide we want one.

The Blazers don’t need to think about getting a 3rd big piece to replace Oden for another two years. A big 2 with LMA and Roy is enough while Oden is injured, as he unfortunately is again. When Oden is healthy he puts them over the top.

Roy is 25 and Lamarcus is 24, both with July birthdays, both in their fourth year in the league. Portland has five more seasons starting in 2010-2011 until Roy hits his peak at 30 and would start to see any physical skills erode. (Contractually speaking they both have 5-year deals inked.) So if Oden returns for 2010-2011 and has a good season, as he was having this year, Blazers get five seasons with all these guys together before anyone is 30 years old.

No way this changes the Master Plan. As people were saying last year at the trade deadline frenzy of hype about a big roster move … let the cake bake.

One of the reasons I like Miller and have been such an advocate for him playing a bigger role is, he’s a 3rd option who can step aside after a couple years, because of his age and seniority in the league.

I am looking forward to seeing this team respond, and to see Miller step up. The silver lining is getting Roy to play with Miller. The future success for the Blazers depends on Roy becoming more versatile off the ball. Oden’s injury doesn’t change that, if anything we may see it develop faster because Oden is now removed from the interior, where things were getting clogged and preventing Roy from dominating in his comfort zone. I hope now they mix back in his ability to get in there and attack, with a new ability to play with Miller and create easy buckets for No. 7.

Greg got hurt his first year. Greg missed a number of games his second year. And Greg will miss the rest of this season. He is 2/3 out, at best. Therefore we should give up on him. Brilliant! Insightful! You sir must be a genius to come to such cut and dried answers. Not even Blazer Management or team doctors (specialists?) can match the way you have cut to the chase. Spock would be proud of they way you have not allowed emotion to enter into your thinking???

As hard as it may be to understand, I do have a problem with your conclusions though. I understand that GO has been hurt a lot, and I understand that he may get hurt again in the future, but big time talents like Greg only come along so often, and if we want to win a championship, he cannot be replaced. He is nearly irreplaceable.

Even if we tried, we could not just go out and pick up another GO. And I believe our odds are longer in trying to find someone else rather than sticking with our 21 year old who could still turn out to be great. Will we automatically win titles if we stick by him? No. But we will also have a long way to go, without much cap room, if we don’t.

Greg isn’t done yet. I have my doubts too. But the fat lady isn’t warming up off curtain yet.

Keep in mind how young Greg is.

it may be a bit early like a previous commenter said (for some fans) but I don’t think anyone is saying they’re still not a fan of oden. We’ll all be pulling for him to get better, its just that anything from here on out in his career will be icing on KP’s “cake.” You just can’t depend on the knees of GO going forward. Its not his fault and I hope he never gets hurt again, obviously. Its just how it is.

He has hurt his knees twice in the last 3 seasons though not as serious of injuries as oden, they were stil nothing to play with. Look at him this year he is averaging i believe 18 and 9

Don’t extend Greg Oden? Sorry, I think that’s ridiculous.

It’s like we have a lottery pick for the 2010 draft and know we’re getting Greg Oden, one year older and better. Do we just give that away?

….after missing 1 year and a half with an injury. And now we look like absolute idiots. Not only did Gilbert wind up missing yet another season (the first year into his extension), but he has come back playing very mediocre ball.

So, yeah, I would strongly advise against giving Oden an extension.

I’m gonna stick by the guy. I know when he comes back he’ll be fine & instantly make us better. Not gonna sit here and say how we should kick him to the curb because he had got unlucky and fractured his left patella. As Flynn4Blazers mentioned Bynum had similar events happen to him, now people are saying he’ll be on the all-star roster.

who says we were building around Oden in the first place? we’re a good team without him, whether or not he comes back at full strength is moot. you guys have forgotten the 5 steps of grieving, we’re supposed to be in denial and isolation! and I refuse to believe that we made the wrong pick in ‘07. where would we be with Durant? bottom of the conference with Roy and Kevin bitching at each other about who’s the star.
O
D
E
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or have you forgotten?
I’m pullin for you Greg, and I’m willing to put the championship on hold (as if we have a chance this year) to wait for you to come be the beast that you are.

Giving up way too early. Ever heard of Zydrunas Ilgauskas? Man missed 237 Games in his first five years, including two whole seasons out with injuries. The next ten years he has missed only 44 games. When he came into the NBA he was already older then Oden, and he had foot injuries, which are much worse than things like a broken kneecap or broken arm. Oden will make a recovery and we will extend him because a 22-year old center with the ability to play like a monster is extremely rare, in fact who would you recommend we trade for that could replace Oden’s numbers?

did you really think the blazers were going to win the nba championship this season?
i didnt. i thought they could challenge for WCF at best.

odens injury while bad is not nearly bad enough for me to label him injury prone, or a bust.

lets try and be positive guys, the blazers will still be decent even without oden.