Blazer's Edge, a Portland Trail Blazers community

http://basketsession.com/blog-batum-jaurais-pris-evan-turner-en-1er/ I won't be able to translate the latest blog from Batum it but I can sum it up. - He's learnt about Kevin Pritchard being fired just before the draft. It's sad because he's the one who made him come to Portland. He wishes him the best and he's sure he'll find work easily. - He followed the draft with trainers, the intendant, video people and a few other people from the staff in a room close to the managers office. He's followed the NCAA this year and he liked the draft, it was homogenous. - He would have picked Evan Turner as a 1st choice. He doesn't really know why but he prefers him to John Wall, he prefers to see him play, he loves his game. It's clean he scores 20 pts but also has 6 assists while he's a 2. He was the best scorer of his conference and best passer. And he wonders what they'll do with Arenas now they have John Wall. - He would have put Wall to Philadelphia. Washington could have given a 2nd chance well a 15th chance... to Arenas who's still a big player and have Turner as the 2. And in Philly, they have a guard problem, no 2 or 3, so it would have been more logical. But that's just an opinion. - Noone in the staff agrees with him, they all repeat what they've heard on TV that he was Magic Johnson in the body of Gary Payton… But he still likes John Wall, he's really good. The only thing he doesn't like about him is his commercial, the one for Reebok. - A few picks surprised him, like Hayward in 9. He thought he would be 15th or more. And he wondered why New Jersey took Favors if they really wanted to bring Boozer or another 4. To prepare the future probably. He tought they would pick Wesley Johnson. They would have had Devin Harris, Courtney Lee, Johnson, that sounded nice. - So his personnal mock draft was Turner, Wall and Johnson for the first 3 spots. He didn't have Favors in his first 6. He has a real body, he's very interesting and has a big potential but he wouldn't see him this high. He hopes he will prove him wrong but anyways he probably doesn't give a damn about Batum's opinion and he's right ! - He's met Kevin Seraphin after the Adidas Eurocamp, he's eaten with him on sunday. He told him how the draft was running and they chatted. He thinks he has the mindset to make it. And he has the body. Apparently, he was weighted 280 pounds and 9% of fat mass. Bigs with these figures aren't common. You have to take the opportunity when there's one. - He's stopped watching the draft after Kévin Seraphin. When he left he was told Webster was traded for Ryan Gomes. In his previous blog post he said McMillan told him he was counting on Batum to be more dominant in the 5 so he thinks the trade is going the same way. - By the way Portland got 2 guards and got Babbitt. He plans to give him the french translation of his name [in french Babbitt sounds like "low cock" or like "my cock"] It's a shameful name but he has to tell him. He remembers he had a lot of fun with Alexis Ajinça [who was drafted the same year as him] about Hasheem Thabeet's name [Thabeet means"your cock" in french]. It's in the same vein of the wordplay contests he had with Ali Traoré last year [in the France team]. Alexis and him were asking him " You assume Thabeet ? ". They didn't explain the joke to him but he's translated it to O.J. Mayo so he must have told him. So the next time they play each other Thabeet will block him 15 times when Batum goes in the paint against him. You're going to see it in the stats for Memphis-Portland : Hasheem Thabeet 8 blocks, Batum 8 blocks against… - But well Babbitt will have several mandatory jokes, plus he's a rookie. When he saw Babbitt to Portland he told himself " You can't do that to me. You're lucky Alexis Ajinça isn't with me. " But he really was hoping Kevin would come to Portland. Everybody in Portland was really behind him, but Portland only had the 22nd pick.