Assuming that you believe that Oden will recover from his most recent injury to be the dominant big man that we all expected from day one (I know that a lot of you don't believe this) how is the news that he accepted the QO good for the Blazers. It sounds like he is going to be super cautious coming back with the sole goal of showcasing his talent for potential buyers. This sounds like the worst outcome possible. My reading of Wikipedia's description of restricted free agency says that if the Blazers had NOT offered Oden the QO then he would have become a restricted free agent and the Blazers would have been able to match any offer that other teams made to him. Assuming the the Blazers still believe in Oden for the future, why didn't they do that? Am I misunderstanding RFA? If the Blazers wanted to retain Oden you'd think they would have done whatever possible to make him a RFA.

It seems like the bid price would have been much lower this year, as he's coming off of injury and a much riskier long term bet by other teams, and the Blazers at least could have chosen to match. Now, maybe he'll play well for the 20-30 games at the end of the season and will choose to start his hall of fame career eleswhere. Why in the world did the Blazers go the QO route? I guess if he turns out to be a total bust, then one year of QO is preferable to a multi-year contract. Is that what the Blazer brain trust is thinking?