They called a foul on Grant on that play…My Oh My!!! Later, the League fined Malone for the well placed elbow.

I was once spanked by a Hill aide for publishing what he’d said about an AP article
due out the next day (it did), because you don’t take away their right to annouce or not in advance of something that may or may not be published. Maybe wojo
said it was ok, but otherwise that’s bad form.

are we really just going to blame the vulacan’s every time they have a tough negotiation with someone, it’s their job to get something at the best possible price, and after they had been burned so many times in the past with bad contracts its about time they stop just handing out money and acctually negotiate.

And I agree with everything else you’re saying. However I will not be addressing a letter to the Vulcans. I won’t waste my time. If they’re were really as smart as they seem to think they are they would realize the ruthless and swift pursuit of profits resulted in the Whitsitt mentality. Typical boardroom short sightedness. That nearly destroyed the team completely. KP may be unorthodox, and his over use of the corporate buzzwords may be annoying, but you can’t argue with results. The Vulcans can go mind meld up a pole for all I care.

You are made from simple machines.
You help humans perform harder tasks by using less force.

Maybe they think KP isn’t the right GM for a contending team as compared with a rebuilding team?

This is my suspicion as well. The problem is, there’s no way to “prove it” one way or the other unless the team wins it all, and (unfortunately for KP) Paul Allen is not a patient man.

In business, sometimes a CEO is hired to get a business back on track, and then once the organization is on solid footing, he’s replaced by a new boss who will take risks and hopefully bring profit to the shareholders. I’m not saying it’s right (or that KP/Nate can’t “get the job done”) just that it’s a well-known operational cycle.

Were KP and Nate “stage 1” of Paul Allen’s plan to return to the finals? Does he have a new management team in mind to take the franchise to the next level? I don’t know, but I’m preparing myself for this possibility, because ultimately I want to see the team win another championship, and when that happens, who the GM/coach are won’t be my main focus

“Nice guys finish last” — Leo Durocher

that binds the team in PDX for awhile

We can thank Paul Allen for that building, because without it “our” Blazers would likely be playing in another city.

But we can also pan Paul Allen for his fiscal irresponsibility from 1998-2004. This was the main reason the Vulcans were brought in (by Paul’s sister, perhaps?) to protect Paul from himself, and the overspending ways of the Blazer’s organization

I’ve heard Blazer fans say for years “well, it’s not my money” when discussing player contracts, but at some point the piper has to be paid. No one will be happy when the Sugar Daddy’s free spending ways come to an end. (Except for his sister and the Vulcans, assuming they’re happy about anything that’s Blazer-related) Steve Patterson tightened the belt and his henchmen downsized the front office, much to the dismay of many fine employees who had grown accustomed to “spending Paul Allen’s money” Now there’s a recession, the owner’s portfolio has been significantly reduced and there’s a new CBA with a potential work stoppage on the horizon

Is the good ship Blazer sailing into calm waters? Or is it time to batten down the hatches?

trick question.

I disagree with out government plenty, but think riots are silly.

I’ll start:
What do you call a sunken boatload of lawers?…..
A good start.

I

f the Blazers screw up Greg’s deal and tick him (and Conley Sr) off to the point that they decide to play out his rookie contract and sign elsewhere, then we can kiss all those championship scenarios goodbye

If we want him…we can keep him

No, but they did in the 90s

Hope he doesn’t end up getting KP in hot water

Sounds like he already has. Well, KP chose his representative. He can either fire Legarie or ride it out and hope for the best. Here are a couple of quotes from Dwight’s article that I thought were interesting

And also understand that when Larry Miller is asked why Penn was fired and he says he cannot say, understand that HE CANNOT SAY. Some things like that happen in business — and when asked about specifics, they have no choice to but deny anything that could lead to an interpretation of what really happened. Often, when it comes to sudden dismissals like that one, there are serious legal repercussions if word gets out. Rather than to try to assign reasons to it, it might be better to just accept it and move on.

This is what happens with HR issues, both sides are given gag orders. You’ll get a heavy fine and/or legal action if you spil the beans. Canzano and A-Woj can poke and prod but if Penn and the Blazers are smart they’ll never let the truth see the light of day. Which leaves the rest of us to speculate, or to leave it alone. Eventually the lawyers hope it will blow over.

And I think it’s unwise of Pritchard to challenge that in any way. I even thought it was a little over the edge during training camp to go so public with the Patty Mills situation. You know what I’m talking about — he just about threw the owner under the bus when he made it known that Mills was Allen’s choice to make the roster rather than Ime Udoka. That’s getting into an area a lot of GMs wouldn’t go

A lot of Bedgers said “go ahead and let Paul Allen pick the 15th man, what harm can it do?” Then half the team went down with injuries. KP and Nate should’ve known what they were getting into when they signed on to work for a hands-on owner. Paul likes quick PGs and the team seems to be drafting 1 per season. KP and the scouts could have talked him out of it, but hey, it was the 4th pick of the day for Portland and the 55th selection overall…why not take a flier on Patty? Then Mills hurt his foot and his agent leveraged his roster spot into an NBA job in October, even though the Aussie only had a couple of days of actual on-court time in front of the Blazer coaches following the draft. Nate was not happy about the decision to keep Mills over Udoka and KP didn’t exactly hide his frustration in front of the media, either.

Is Pritchard having a little trouble getting a contract extension? I’m sure he is. So did Brandon Roy and LaMarcus Aldridge. It seems to be the way this team operates. If you’re KP, you better just accept that or move on.

To try and mess with Allen’s control of the team is so dumb a man would deserve to be fired. And I just don’t think KP is that sort of guy. Or that dumb.

The thing that’s interesting to me is that Nate hasn’t pursued a LTC, even though his W-L record has improved over the last 3-4 years. He always says it’s because he wants to prove his worth, but now I’m wondering if he realizes that he’d just be beating his head up against the wall to even ask for a multi-year extension. The interview last month where Nate said he doesn’t hang pictures in his PF office so he can stick everything in a box and be out the door in 2 minutes (when he’s dismissed) is starting to make more sense. And now I’m wondering if KP has a similar mindset, especially after what transpired with Penn last week?

when according to the reaction of the team to Penn’s firing, it really doesn’t affect them?

"This summer" = "After the playoffs, but before the draft"

Correct. Penn was not needed to scout college players (even though Tom was on the road doing this, on the owner’s dime, perhaps to round out his resume for a future GM job?) A “capologist” is most needed in staff meetings leading up to draft day, in the war room during the selection process (when deals are also being discussed) and during the free agency period in July-August. That’s 2-3 months out of the year. (And then again, near the trading deadline.)

I’m probably oversimplifying Penn’s role, but the only other thing we heard he was involved in was fundraising for St. Jude’s hospital in Memphis. I suspect this was on his own time (and on his own dime) but it’s not hard to see a potential dispute re: travel expenditures and possible conflicts of interest developing during his “down time” between draft day and the trading deadline