LaMarcus Aldridge Could Inevitably Become Available Soon

for a player like LMA i think we'd send parsons and Jones or Morris and Jones

 

Jones? No. Not enough offensive skills. He could become a very nice roleplayer though, possibly better than Patterson.

D-Mo? Maybe. It depends how he develops.

 

You forgot Omerun Asik he is on of the untouchables too...

 

Josh Smith's problem is his brain. He has Asik-level D and rebounding but doesn't know his limitations, if we got him he'd just clank mid-range J after mid-range J.

LMA played like Bosh 2.0 last year but has totally regressed this year, perhaps he's having Deron William-itis and is just mailing it in due to the lack of direction of the franchise.

One thing I would be extremely wary of though is his myriad of injuries mentioned in the article...stuff like "bad back" tend to be chronic, and I would only expect injuries like that to get worse, not better, over time *cough**tmac*lowry*cough*.

Ultimately I would say pass, we got more than enough time to wait around.

 

Demarcus Cousins would fit also

 

Yes the Blazers will ask for the Moon, but an important factor here is the small amount of teams that could offer them what they want(young talent, picks), and still have the cap space to absorb Aldridge's salary.

That would leave the Cav's, Suns, Hawks, Mavs, and the Rockets as the teams that would be best suited to take on Aldridge's salary without giving the Blazers back a large salary player back in return.

-The Cav's are an interesting team that might be willing to part with a future first & Tristan Thompson for Aldridge. The lure of playing next to Kyrie Irving could be interesting enough for LaMarcus to be excited about moving to Cleveland.

-The Suns.... I really dont see the assets other than picks they might be able to give. They probably have zero young talent that Portland would be interested in though.

-The Mavs.... ehhh.... possibly some picks to give, but very little in the way of young sought after talent. Unless they are somehow high on Mayo who is on his way to putting up the numbers this season he needs to be extremely overpaid on his next contract.

-The Hawks.... Swapping Aldridge for Josh Smith sort of seems like a lateral downgrade(if that can even be the case). They have the cap space, and the picks, but again.... where's the young talent?

-The Rockets seem to be in as good of a position as anyone to trade for Aldridge if he in fact does go on the market. They have the cap space to take on his contract without moving anything more than expirings. They might have some talent in D-Mo, Morris, or Jones that could interest Portland.

However, one or more of these guys are going to have to have a coming out party in the next 2 months to really garnish that interest. If not, Parsons is surely to be included in any deal for Aldridge. Portland will surely insist that he is involved in the deal even if it means he is going to a 3rd team in a move to get Portland a potential lottery pick. If Portland consults LaMarcus on his personal opinion on where he would rather play it has to be Houston. I think he would welcome the trade to play next to another star player in Harden and instantly make Houston a playoff contender.

If you are Morey, you have to make the move, even if it means moving Parsons in the deal. I love Parsons as much as anyone on this team, but if they are serious about becoming a contender with bringing in a #2 player alongside Harden, its quite evident that Parsons will have to get moved. Still, Morey has to do it. The decision is easy, and Aldridge is that good to make that kind of move.

 

i would move TJ, 2Pat, Morris, Douglas + picks (even Lin if have to) for LA. with that our line up looks good.

Lin / Douglas
Harden / Cook
Parson / Delfino
LA / Dmo
Asik / Smith

 

Of course YOU would move those guys, but what would Portland demand. More than likely if YOU want to move those players, then their trade stock isnt as high as the guy YOU dont want to move. If the Rockets are going to make a play for a secondary star, a valuable piece of the Rockets (at that time) is going to need to be moved to get the deal done.

If you want a secondary star, and that deal was going down today, Asik, and/or Parsons are sure to be demanded in the deal.

 

That first poster on the link....hope the Blazers GM isn't as deluded.

 

I could not agree more with you. but the thing would be. think about it why would they want parsons when they have batum. the only one person i think would help them out is Asik. and i dont think Rockets will trade Asik for LA. and maybe Por, wants to trade LA so they want a fresh start with their younger team. that could be something they want to do. so these are what i m think the reason y they would trade him

1. Wants to re-build chemistry with Young team
2. mayeb Tank and then use them for next year for Howard.
3. or they have ppl on the next years draft they want to take a shot at.

what you guys think???

 

I'll pass on the 6'11 Patterson. :grin:

Seriously though, dude is 27yrs old, 28 next year and is starting to have back trouble. BIG RED FLAG. On just that alone I'd pass on Aldridge. Not even considering the ridiculous offer Portland would want for Aldridge.

 

lamarcus aldridge has houston written all over him.

 

Rockets should NOT give up Parsons for him. Agreed we should go after him though. Might have to give up DMo, which would hurt. Totally willing to give them PPatt or Morris + TD, Cook, etc.

 

Which pushes it...

Parsons the player alone isn't even that valuable. His contract is what makes him really valuable.
Harden, Asik and LMA would be nice start to build a team, but you'd most likely need another player who at least All-Star "caliber", never mind the right role players to fill out the roster. With Parsons you already have a great role player on the cheap for more than 2 years, which makes it much more easy to fill out the roster from a cap perspective alone.

I think in any LMA you need a 3rd and perhaps even 4th team. It would help to get our '13 first from ATL back. Maybe something with Morris going to ATL and our 1st going to POR. Then we also could trade our '15 1st (we can do so right now, but it wouldn't have as much value with the chance of getting pushed back each year).
A team like CLE might also make some sense, because they own a ton of draft picks and have cap space to take on salary. They also have the least travel miles, so maybe they would take a chance on Royce White for the Heat 1st.

Maybe something like this http://espn.go.com/nba/tradeMachine?tradeId=czdusbd with our 2013 (from ATL) and 2015 1st going to POR and the MIA 2013 1st (from CLE) going to POR as well.

 

Parsons could be the cornerstone if a 3-way with another team is needed to get LMA.

 

You dont think the Rockets would trade Asik for LaMarcus Aldridge(possibly the 2nd best true PF in the game). Do you know who the Rockets GM is??? This guy would trade his unborn son for a star player.

I love Asik and Parsons, but you get a star player going into his prime any way you can get them. Especially when they have 3 seasons left on their deal and they are only 27 years old.

I do think Asik is important to this team one way or another. Defensively... he is the Rockets. However, he isn't a star player. You make the deal all day every day if you have to. Hopefully, in this case the Blazers wont demand him in the deal.

Even though the Blazers have Batum, they would probably still find a way to either move Parsons for a first round pick in a 3 team deal, or demand him anyways to move later. Trust me, they would want Parsons or the value that he holds as an asset.

 

All good points in a potential deal, but Paul Allen just doesn't seem the type that would go lightly on his demands. If for some reason they want Parsons, Morey might have to bite the bullet on that one to get LA in Houston. Sure he is worth fighting to keep, but to get a star player.... you know the rest of the story here.

I do hope the Rockets find ways to be creative in getting 1st round picks to keep their core together. Dont get me wrong here. They have have something special here, and those players are important players to fill in the gaps in the roster I agree.

Something like this could work, but all Im saying is that if for some reason Morey can get the Blazer to the trading table, the first names and the last names the Blazers are going to mention are going to be Omer and Chandler's unless someone else really steps up their game in the coming weeks to bring up their trade value.

 

http://www.hoopdata.com/player.aspx?name=LaMarcus+Aldridge
http://hoopdata.com/shotstats.aspx


Look at his "shot locations." This season, an incredible 10 out of 18.4 of his FGA per game came from 16-23 feet, which is not only the highest by far in his career, but also the highest by far among all players in the NBA.


In fact, no other player takes more than 5.9 from that distance.

His attempts at the rim and from the 3-9 feet distance are both way down compared to other seasons. This may be a matter of his injuries or a matter of the team's offense having him taking these 16-23ft shots (there is also a matter of small sample size, still early in the season). He shot a much lower # (and proportion) of shots from this distance in other years, but this number was still high compared to other players (last year his % of shots taken from 16-23 ft was comparable to Scola's).

Just thinking about this in the context of our discussion regarding the Rockets considering "in between shots" to be inefficient, I would think that the Rockets will utilize him differently than Terry Stotts has done this year.

 

This+. Yes, you can have too many scorers on a team. At some point, you get a diminishing return when you add more scorers. However, you can never get worst on team defense by adding more defenders.