The Enigmatic Problem Named Greg Oden

After this contract, Oden is a restricted free agent. After his next contract, he is unrestricted. So the perfect contract is one where the Blazers have Oden longterm, but at their option.

I see a minimum 3-year deal, with a year four option.

The tough thing is deciding fair value. Oden would not want to undercut himself, and the Blazers would not want to guarantee money to someone so injury prone.

Good Luck, Rich!

There are 4 scenarios outlining this in my opinion, as follows:

1. Greg becomes significantly injured again (God forbid). In this scenario, the “wait and see” approach is lifted. It’s obvious to everyone that he is badly injury-prone, and cannot be counted on as a viable piece of the future line-up. The team management will continue to build through trade, free-agency or draft towards a consistent big man presence, that looks beyond Oden, because they will have to. So the contract for him is a moot point in the very large sense. He won’t get good trade value or big restricted offers that we can or cannot deal with.

2. Greg is a 70 game player (or so), realtively injury free and dominates, as was initially expected. With the other (healthy) weapons the Blazers possess, the team goes deep into the playoffs, and gels around him as center. The contract here is a moot point. You sign him to a big long term deal (probably after the season is over, so you can see how he does in the playoffs). No other team possessing this force would do otherwise. Any restricted offers are pretty obviously matched by the Blazers. Game On!

3. Greg stays healthy, but his production including fouls, post-injury mobilty, and statistcal effectivenes shows a moderate presence on the floor, but not really a game changer. In essence he’s a role player. The contract here is relatively moot also. No other team knows him better than our management does: medical issues, BBIQ, team chemistry issues, personality issues. We are likely to take an offer in trade, or let him be lost to retsricted free agency IF the chips are there in the first case, or too much in the second case. Again the Blazers management will have a full evaluaution package together at this point, and may have already been looking at building around other options in the middle, or dual options in the middle. Only makes sense.

4. Greg shows SOME injury proneness, but dominates when he is healthy. This is, IMO, the hardest scenario to evaluate of all. But I think the same thinking applies here, as in scenarion #3. You have the inside scoop on him, if someone wants to take on the issues, for what looks now to be a very regularly injury-prone player, you evaluate the trade-offs, benefits, costs, etc. and make an informed decision. In this scenario you would have already, during the season, been looking at trades of some sort anyway, because Greg would have been out a fair amount. So I think it’s a moot point as well. No team is going to lock down their future on a player at that position that can only be on the floor half the time.

In any event, I believe the Blazers only long term need (after this summers’ aquisitions) is a strong back-up/future project at center. In other words, a young Pryz, 7’0", plus size, with weight. All the other positions look pretty good. So, they may try to find this kid in the future. If Oden turns out to be fine, great! If not, you’re working toward the future still, and have options.

give him a 3-4 year deal, with a guaranteed base salary of around $6-7M. That way he’s getting paid, but if he doesn’t pan out we’re not paying out the nose for him could even buy him out for a reasonable amount

Then, the rest of the money is incentive-based. If he plays X amount of games, he gets $. If he makes the All-Star team, leads the league in blocks, etc., he gets $. Long story short – if he’s healthy and performs, he gets paid like one of the best big men in the league. If he doesn’t, he gets paid like an average player.

The bottom line of the whole Oden contract situation can be expressed in 2 concepts:

1) Oden’s potential is too great to lose him in free agency or to have contract issues

If he’s healthy, he’s one of the top bigs in the league and instantly makes us a title contender. Without him, we are just an average, pretty good squad. You can’t let his deal or expire or let another team have a shot at him. You have to lock him up, and hope he delivers. His potential is too great, and our team’s success is too linked to his, to proceed otherwise

2) Paul Allen is our owner – we can overpay or leave some money on the table to try and hit a home run

One of the luxuries of having one of the richest owners in the league is that, while it’s still important to be financially responsible, we can overpay players and take chances on guys in pursuit of a championships. A contract for Oden would qualify as the latter. I made the same argument for Wesley Matthews – if the guy can help us win a title – pay him and get him here. How much do you think Paul Allen cares about $6-10M a year if we’re winning titles?

Roy, LMA, and Batum are not going to win a championship or even be a contender without Greg Oden.

So unless the Blazers are certain that Oden will not be an impact player (due to injury) they MUST re-sign him to a long term contract (at least 4 years with probably another team option year). There is no other option (unless some team offers us a superstar in trade for him – which is very unlikely).

Contract Options Under the Current CBA

1) The Blazers can extend Oden by Nov 1 (as they did with Roy and LMA last year). I doubt the Blazers will make any acceptable (to Oden) offer by Nov 1. That was a bigger possibility until we learned that Oden is likely not going to be ready to go 100% in the October preseason games. It seems like a slimmer possibility now.

2) If the Blazers don’t resign GO by Nov 1 they must make him a one year Qualifying Offer ($8,788,681) to prevent him from becoming an unrestricted free-agent (the worse possible thing that could happen). If he decides he wants out of Portland for some reason he can sign the qualifying offer, play one additional year (2011-12) with the Blazers, and then he becomes an unrestricted free-agent. This has very rarely happened, but it is the nightmare scenario for the Blazers. It seems even more unlikely for GO. Because of his injury history he will probably want a long term contract and not risk a one-year qualifying offer.

3) The Blazers can also make what is called an additional Maximum Qualifying Offer. That is a 6-year guaranteed, maximum salary offer. It is doubtful the Blazers would make such an offer considering Greg’s injury history.

4) If GO doesn’t sign a Qualifying Offer he becomes a Restricted Free Agent on July 1. The Blazers can continue to negotiate a new contract with GO, or he can sign an offer sheet with another team. The Blazers can match any offer sheet, so that isn’t anything to worry about unless the offer sheet is for fewer years than the Blazers would want. The offer sheet contract must be for at least 2 years, but GO will almost certainly not take less than 4 years.

The one major unknown in this process is that option 4 starts on July 1, and therefore will actually be under the terms of a new CBA. The new CBA could change the process of Restricted Free Agency, and even eliminate it altogether. However, it unlikely that a new CBA would suddenly make all pending free-agents unrestricted. There would probably be some grandfather clause that would apply to players in Oden’s situation that are caught in the transition between CBA’s. Nevertheless, no one can really say now that will happen, so that could be a reason for the Blazers to try to get Oden extended before Nov 1. The new CBA will also probably limit maximum salaries (at all levels of experience in the league) so that could be a reason for Oden to want to get an extension done before Nov 1. So perhaps there is still a chance something will get done by Nov 1.

What if it isn’t readily apparent (my last two scenarios)…he’s always injured 50% of the time, but great when healthy…or he’s marginalized due to post-injury limitations, healthy but not the same?

Without reviewing him this year…objectively…how can a reasonable assessment be made. Most people in any corporation would be reviewed before handing them a major contract. My point is there are 3 scenarios vs. 1 scenario that are potentially problematic. Is it possible that Cho will NOT consider Oden’s issues after this season’ results…Wouldn’t that be foolish?

It just seems that too many people are willing to sign up here without this season’s WATERSHED results.

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Offer him contracts until we get to one he’ll take. and be done with it.

so far, all of his injuries have been disconnected. It’s not like Greg keeps fracturing the same foot bone over again like certain centers like big Z, Yao and Bill Walton.

You can’t let Greg become a restricted free agent. Greg has not earned a max contract or anything near a max contract. But if he plays well this year (we hope), then it is almost inevitable that a team well under the cap would throw a ridiculous contract at him and dare Cho to match. If we gets injured again, then the injury-prone bust label will stick like glue and will probably not get much interest (which is the worst outcome we can imagine).

I assume that the gist of this post is to argue if Greg deserves a reasonable contract. I think so. Portland has invested too much in Greg to give up on him so soon. The worst outcome would be let Greg become a restricted free agent, match a large offer and have an average Greg on the books for far more than had he signed an extension. If he becomes the next Bill Russell, then it doesn’t matter how much we pay him – he’ll be a bargain.

You have to sign him to a multi year deal, injuries or not.

about a third of the time he’s been here. So half of a max contract is fair when you consider he’s been paid millions to rehab.

I think 40-50 million for 5 years is fair.

It’s a risk, but if I were Portland GM, there is no way I give Oden an extenstion until he has shown that he can stay on the court. I’d let it ride, knowing that Portland can match any offer. Now, if he comes back this year strong, and stays on the court..then maybe think about it before the season ends.

If they sign him to any sort of extension before he comes back from his latest injury, that’s throwing good money after bad…and exacerbating the mistake made when Portland drafted him in the first place. I like the kid, and feel bad for the rotten luck he’s had, but in retrospect drafting him over KD was a mistake. Anyone who says different is simply not reality based