Blazers worst nightmare come true

I would have gone with PREGO personally. It’s the better sauce.

ohhhh what is that on his lip?
yuckkko

Roy=Durant
Aldridge>Green
Oden & Batum>>>Westbrook & Harden…………………………we win, i aint worried, the only thing okc represents is a Blazers victim for 10+ years

Interesting assumption. Personally, I don’t see it: I think you’re caught up in the flavor of the month hype. I like Durant, Green, Westbrook, & Harden. Four talented young hoopsters, not doubt. But with both squads healthy, I think the Blazers are still far superior—tough and polished, even.

Now, if the Thunder keep drafting great young talent, the rivalry will probably get very interesting. But then again, chemistry is a fragile thing, and should the Thunder draft a highly touted big, he may expect to get the ball. All of a sudden, your flavor of the month is underachieving.

In any case, as things stand, the Blazers are still at least a season ahead. They just got bit by the injury bug this season. Next season might be the Thunder’s turn. Do you think they’ll fare as well as the Blazers have should their players start going down in waves?

You have me mistaken.

In that he will likely never win a title as the leader of a team.

you had me with your first statement about them making the obvious choice at #2, but to say Oden can change a game more than KD can is just flat out ridiculous and I’m one of Oden’s biggest fans.

KD is literally doing things that have NEVER been done before and is making a strong case for MVP of the league. Oden is a HUGE question mark. He has, at times, looked dominant, but only at times when he’s 1) not in foul trouble and 2) not hurt.

of course they were not presented with the choice. I bet they choose Oden if they had to make that choice. They did not, their choice was an obvious no brainer.

I like our team, I like the players on it. A good reveiw of our training and medical, staff, policy and procedures and then I would be completely happy with the organization as well.

OKC will be good with Durrant, Portland will be good without Oden. Portland will be great with Oden, there is no certainty that OKC will be great with Durrant. Durrant is OKC cornerstone player, like Roy is ours, the who makes better decisions debate won’t be settled until one or the other team starts winning titles.

But here’s a quick rundown of what Presti’s done since his hiring in 2007.

The smart moves:

• After getting the second pick, decided to blow up the team rather than try to contend with Allen/Lewis/Durant.
• Traded Ray Allen for the 5th pick (Jeff Green), Delonte West and Wally World’s expiring contract. Jeff Green’s value is debatable, but it’s increasingly clear that after the top 3, that was a pretty bad draft class. The only player the Sonics should have picked over Green that would have made any sense is Joakim Noah, but only because Noah is his hitting his 90% projectile.
• Somehow convinced Otis Smith to sign and trade for Rashard Lewis when everyone knew the Sonics weren’t resigning him. Turned the resulting trade exemption into Kurt Thomas’ expiring contract and two late first round picks. Then traded Thomas mid-season for another late first round pick. With these three first round picks, one was used to draft Serge Ibaka. Another was traded for Thabo Sefolosha. The third is in this year’s draft. Of all Presti’s achievements, this is the one that impresses me the most; he turned a player the Sonic’s were not going to resign into Serge Ibaka, Thabo Sefolosha and who knows what else.
• Traded Chris Wilcox for Tyson Chandler, a deal considered to be downright thievery. Then had the cajones to rescind the trade based on the advice of his doctors, a decision that no one OKC fan now regrets. This allowed Presti to preserve the cap space to trade for Sefolosha and Eric Maynor.
• Trusted Scott Brooks enough to stick with him after PJ Carlisimo’s firing.
• Westbrook was considered a reach for the 4th pick. It now looks like he may very well turn out to be a better player than that draft’s number one pick and rookie of the year.

Value neutral moves:

• Nenad Krstic is an average center signed to a reasonable deal. The problem is he’s a horrible fit for this club because Jeff Green is undersized for a power forward. Nenad’s team defense and positioning is actually quite solid. It’s the one on one defense where he (and Green) get destroyed, as seen in Denver two nights ago. The team plays much better when Green is paired with either Collison or Ibaka.
• Eric Maynor was a classic lopsided trade salary dump. At the time I thought it was genius, but Maynor has been less than impressive the last couple months. I’m beginning to wonder if OKC couldn’t have gotten more for their cap space.
• James Harden is a solid defender, and if he ever learns to finish at the rim he’s going to be a great rotation player, a good 4th starter on a championship team. After a slow start from range, Harden’s gotten more comfortable shooting the 3. Evans is a fantastic player and, empirically, much better than Harden obviously. But he’d be a nightmare on this team next to Westbrook. Curry was and is my preference, but I’m the first to admit that if Harden regains his court vision (which he had in college and the start of the season but which has strangely disappeared as the season has progressed) and can learn to finish at the rim, I’d consider the difference between him and Curry a wash at worst due to Harden’s superior defense.

Bad moves:

• The Mullens pick baffled me. I was pissed when OKC didn’t draft Blair, then intrigued about Beaubois, then pissed about Mullens. I don’t think he’ll ever pan out; I’m hoping he proves me wrong.
• Trading Carl Landry to the Rockets for cash. Presti obviously missed the ball completely on this one. To be fair, though, so did pretty much every other team.
• That’s pretty much it. Any other misstep is so minor that I can’t even recall it.

Bottom line is that the Thunder hasn’t made a fatal pick like Thabeet or Robert Swfit. They’ve drafted productive players and exploited cap-stressed teams.

Well done.

How could OKC know Evans would be available to them the following year? The PG handles the ball every single play and is therefore more important. A quality center is more rare, but a quality PG is more valuable. While I thought Westbrook was drafted too high because of his age, the WC is more conducive to PG play.

Harden’s stock shot up in workouts. Strange that would be enough to put you ahead of Evans. He could easily put up better numbers on a team as bad as Sactown. He is more then a role player, just not yet. Seems like OKC could have swapped picks and got Harden + another pick.

As far as Jeff Green goes that was just a case of getting the best player. I’ll take Green over Noah anyday. Jeff Green could still get better, Noah has limited skills.

isn’t exactly nothing. As of now you would have to say Thundersonics blew it by selecting Ibaka over George Hill and Batuminator succeeding two picks.

Suns got a huge trade exception that went unused (lux. tax) and 2nd rounder (overseas)

The only trade I can recall that was more lopsided is the Nuggs dumping Camby for a 2nd rounder.

6 degrees of seperation, Blazers style

39% fg
check his game log. if he’s reliable then so is most of our roster.

at a certain point if someone firmly believes something strongly enough, “facts” can be found or fabricated to support the conclusion.

if you believe in that core so much, i hope you’re willing to show yourself when they fold to accept your steaming heaping serving of crow.

“kobe is awesome” again. At least not up in here.

If you’re looking for substance in a Kevin Durant/Greg Oden thread, then you’re looking in the wrong place.

It held true tonight: Denver 119 – OKC 90.

it doesn’t even look like one… It does look like it has some gangster tats on its back legs thought

is that u?

wade
kobe
lebron
bosh
gasol

You guys do realize that situation would put Jerry Buss about 50 billion dollars over the cap right/

I really liked that Nic wasn’t just standing out at the corners tonight, lots of off the ball movement. He didn’t have a great night, but you could see the energy when they put the foot on the gas to overcome that slow start in the first quarter. There were a couple offensive sets in the first ¼ where the ball movement was unbelievable –looked like the end of last year.