Dame has every right to be doing what he is doing. But, Portland has absolutely no obligation, legally or ethically, to fulfill the request of a guy with 4 years left on his deal who wants a trade to one, and only one team, especially when that team has relatively little to offer in return. It'll be interesting to see who blinks first.
Again, the base case is Miami but to me the most important detail is that this is the Blazers. I know every NBA fanbase thinks its the best (even the LIFO Heat fans) but Portland is truly amongst the tops imo. That town is absolutely crazy for their basketball team. Unfortunately most NBA players don't share that assessment and everyone, including Dame/Goodwin understands this. This is why the odds of a not-Miami deal have to be higher here.
I don't know, seems like he is doing fine. He wants to go to Miami, most of the NBA world now thinks he's going to Miami, and Miami is one of the few teams that makes a ton of sense. Most likely, Miami started with a lowball offer and Blazers are hoping to drive up the price.
Miami's max offer is a lowball offer (assuming Butler and Bam are off the table). There isn't a ton to negotiate between Miami and Portland, Miami is in no place to hold anything out of this deal since their pieces are so "meh".
The one risk on Dame’s side is he drove the price so far down Portland decides he can stay home if he doesn’t revise his list. Does Miami have a single young asset to offer? Not sure how much trade value Herro has at his contract. I’m sure teams will want him, but they aren’t going to give up a good young player.
Co-sign. Lillard is free to do whatever he wants. Likewise, NBA fans are free to find his actions out of the norm, over the line, and distasteful.
I'm not a huge fan of the offer, but Miami's best offer, which they won't make, is not that bad.
When can Jaquez be traded? Regardless, it’s not a very inspiring package though I guess it has some upside down the road.
30 days for Jacquez.... I think he's what they hold back honestly though, he's more of a ready soon rookie than a high upside rookie.
I'm irrationally high on Jaquez, was hoping he'd fall to the C's. I'll be interested to see where his 3 PT% ends up in the pros, only 33% at UCLA.
Seriously. When can they trade the Grant contract ....
I wonder if any hit to Dame's reputation lasts longer than a few weeks or months (or even longer than a day after the eventual trade happens). I'm trying to think of examples of other stars who made public trade demands to specific teams, and other than Anthony Davis, I'm drawing a blank. AD's reputation has certainly tanked since that trade demand, but that's mostly because of his on court deficiencies (and inability to actually stay on the court).
I think his reputation will be fine, but I think the Blazers' reputation, if they hold out, will be totally fine too.
But this also implies that Portland wants a real return for him, so I don't think that it follows that they'll just send him to Miami for nothing.
Although the Jerami Grant contract kind of goes against that thinking. Just gave $160M to a guy who turns 30 in March, which feels like a move you only do if you're trying to keep Dame happy. Some mixed messages by the front office here. I wonder if they were caught off guard a little bit by the trade request.
Maybe not being stars yet, but we have a decentish history of draft stars forcing trades away from or in some cases, to, certain franchises. Kobe Bryant somewhat famously maneuvered the draft to get to that Charlotte slot where the trade to L.A. specifically would be made, John Elway refused to play for Baltimore and forced a trade out West, similarly Eli made it pretty clear he wouldn't play for San Diego and forced his way to New York. I think the general reaction was some resentment from fans of the team being moved away from but nothing that really stuck in terms of overall reputation or legacy.
Yeah, I imagine one of two things was going on within Portland:
Yeah, if this were a 3 year deal, I'd be fine with it for Portland but 5 years kind of sucks for them. He's still a productive player so this could be another Tobias Harris situation where the guy is "overpaid" but still produces something. And you do need some vet leadership on a team full of really young players, especially if you're sending Lillard away at some point.
Right, but I'm just pointing out that it's not like this trade request came out of nowhere, and it's not even like he's a hypocrite. The Blazers front office has been begging for it since last season, if not earlier. Dame wanting to go to a specific team is a different matter, but also one that I'd argue is entirely expected since no player of his stature would just say "Send me anywhere, I want to make sure that you're okay." This is all part of a negotiation, but it's between three parties now instead of just two. All top players advocate for certain destinations.
Not really mixed messages b/c they wanted to hang onto the asset instead of letting him go for nothing. They have to do something with their cap space. Teams are no longer able to just sit on it in the new CBA. If it's not Jerami Grant, it's an expiring contract, and then next offseason they have to fill that cap space again (and would have a hard time doing so in FA).
FWIW, I think that getting to your desired location without even allowing a bidding war is a status thing. I have nothing against Dame whatsoever, and he's not alone in this. It's a "bigtime" thing to flip the switch and end up where you want.
It seems like Dame is thinking the opposite - his incentive is to make the trade package as small as possible, so the team he goes to hasn't gutted its assets to get him and can still compete.
They can be trade facilitators like the Spurs, Thunder, etc. and pick up future assets using their cap space. I like Grant as a player so I don't think the contract is too big of a deal in the short-term. We'll see what happens with it.
Why wouldn’t they make that offer? It’s still not even a good offer, what exactly are they holding back for?
The theory is that if Miami is the only team at the table with Portland, then they don't have to throw all of the pieces in. They're going to be as stingy as they can get away with. It'll be up to Portland to play hardball here. Just because their guy asked out and demanded Miami doesn't remove all of their leverage, even if Riley is acting like it.
I think we saw this offseason that being facilitators isn't as valuable now. The Thunder only got to move up two spots for taking on 33 million of Davis Bertans and didn't get much for taking on Oladipo. The Spurs did much better in the Grant trade (I don't know how they got an unprotected swap from the Mavs - great work) but a better way to get future assets is to trade a real player, like Jerami Grant, to a team in need.
There is no downside to Portland for playing hardball on the return. Lillard's leverage is limited when it comes to forcing a trade to a preferred destination for peanuts. Morey held out against trading Simmons (and Maxey) for peanuts despite everyone here and in the media saying he had to accept whatever he could get off the scrap pile. And Lillard >>>> Simmons when it comes to trade value.
Problem is that Harris is still a good starter whereas Grant is probably a misplaced rotation guy.
Well one, it makes them incredibly inflexible going forward, but two... you only need to pay enough to beat the other offers on the table, and so far.... doesn't sound like there are any.
I would add that Caleb Martin would need to be included for it to truly be Miami’s best offer. Portland could easily move him to a third team for a pick.
I think one problem is that teams won't make a real offer until Dame's stance softens.
Exactly. Why is he so stuck on Miami outside of the obvious warm living conditions and friendship with Bam? Butler is 33 years old and Adebayo is up-and-down performance wise in the postseason. Two of their top depth guys in Vincent and Strus just left. W/r/t Boston, he's friends with Tatum who's the better player. A three headed monster of Tatum, Lillard, and Porzingis would be better than what Miami can offer(provided JB goes in the deal) in terms of a chance to win a title. Is he that brainwashed on "Heat culture"?
Not to derail too much but I think the 3PT % with Jaquez is just about how high his upside is.
I don't think the offers from Philly and Boston will be so much better than Miami's that Portland will take that kind of hard line stance. Why poison the well if there is a chance they keep him?
I mean, he gets to play in a city he wants to live in, he gets the most money he can, he plays with his friends. If winning were what really drove him he'd have had a wildly different career. Some guys all they care about is rings, Dame is very much not that guy.
He may also think that a team with him, Butler, and Bam is good enough to return to the NBA Finals or even win the trophy. After all, the Heat have made the Finals twice in the past 4 seasons now. Doubtful he sniffs the Finals if he stays in the West.
Lots of assumptions baked into that statement. Like for starters, whether he's not interested in any particular city. He could be interested only in Miami because they were in the Finals last year. We know nothing. We do know that Miami is negotiating and currently Portland is unwilling to accept what Miami is offering (or the deal would be done). So increasing pressure on the Portland FO by going on record that "it's Miami only" is the obvious play, whether he actually cares that much about Florida taxes or Jimmy Butler or whatever. It's all fucking guesswork at this point except that he's trying to force a deal to Miami currently. Durant, a far more important player, ended up in Phoenix. George, a comparable player in his day to Dame, took a destination he didn't want too.
This
Oh Miami is also a contender for sure... but if all you wanted to do was win your list wouldn't be "just Miami", you;d have Boston, likely PHI, MIL, DEN, probably a few others as well.
Yeah Miami isn't some big mystery. Winning also is a major, major part of it. The key piece that would be traded to Portland played all of 19 minutes this postseason, and they still made the finals. Dame/Butler/Bam is a tremendously well rounded trio - all three are willing and competent passers, 2/3 are all-NBA level defenders and 2/3 are excellent in crunch time. They've got an excellent coach and have proven that they are capable of turning leftovers into playoff rotation players (and even if most of the decent FAs are gone now, they'll have their pick of the buyout market later this year). It's obviously not ideal for your two best players to be 33 and 34, but despite some missing games, those two aren't exactly Kawhi Leonard and Paul George. Everyone had Miami pegged as the obvious beneficiary of a Lillard trade well before he demanded to be traded there.
Well, POR doesn't see him as the key piece, but beyond being kind of misleading (injury obviously) they already lost the guys with the #4 and #5 minutes played in the playoffs to FA, and likely would be trading some combination of 3,6,7 also lost #9. So they're going to be missing a good chunk of the playoff rotation. Of course it offsets that to have 3 no-doubt all-stars.
