Paul Allen Says Trail Blazers Have "Moved On", Ready to Rebuild

Portland Trail Blazers owner Paul Allen addressed assembled media members following today's team practice. Oregonian beat writer Joe Freeman has posted the transcript. Here are some highlights:

On whether the team rues the departure of forward LaMarcus Aldridge...

...in the end, he chose to go a different direction and now it's a new day. We've moved on and I think you can feel the excitement and the energy in the gym now.

On going through yet another rebuild...

It's always a transition. I'm always trying to figure out how many times we've done a rebuild here. I think three. But you guys will probably correct me on that, I'm sure. I probably, more than a lot of owners, enjoy seeing young players develop. Always have. Always will.

On committing to Damian Lillard...

Dame is both and extraordinarily talented player and a quality individual. So when you make those big financial commitments, you need to have both those aspects there. I think if you see the work he's done in the community and so forth, he's just a completely well rounded player and he's still got room to grow in all aspects.

On a potential work stoppage with the new CBA negotiations...

That is so hard to predict and I'm sure if I did predict it, I'd get fined. So I'm not going to try to predict. Clearly the league and the players are doing very well financially with these new contracts. So there are ongoing discussions but I can't comment any further than that.

There's plenty more and it's worth a read.