FanShot

Those were the days: Blazers happy press release they extended John Nash

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"We are very pleased to announce that John Nash will continue to be the General Manager of the Trail Blazers organization," said team President Steve Patterson. "In his role, John is the chief architect of our club. We recognize that this is a very important offseason for our franchise and John gives us the continuity that will help us achieve the vision for our basketball team. We are excited about the young core of our team and they achieved tremendous growth and gained invaluable experience this past season. As we evaluate every possible opportunity to complement what we have started, I am confident that John’s leadership on the basketball operations side of our organization will allow us to successfully turn our team around." While with the Trail Blazers, Nash engineered the trade with Atlanta for Theo Ratliff and Shareef Abdur-Rahim and a draft-night deal with New Jersey that netted Viktor Khryapa. He was instrumental in drafting Sebastian Telfair, Sergei Monia and Ha Seung Jin in 2004, and was also responsible for the free agent signing of center Joel Przybilla, who finished the season as the NBA’s 7th leading shot blocker." This was four years ago. Emphases mine. See link for full press release including pictures. The ONLY really good player mentioned for whose acquisition he was responsible: Joel. Bonus points for the players who were at least helpful to acquire Roy and LaMarcus in 2006. Happy trails John and Steve.