"A large buyout in Fernandez's contract became a deterrent to teams at that point. After the 20th pick, rookies that year would make less than $1 million in their first season, making it less cost effective for Fernandez to pay his buyout (NBA teams can only pay $500,000) and come to the NBA immediately. He was more likely to wait a year or more until his buyout was reduced. So any team looking for immediate help would likely avoid drafting Fernandez at that point because of that possibility. The Blazers, though, were in no rush. They drafted Fernandez knowing that it would be at least a year to grab him. But there was at least one other team ready to pick Fernandez and wait on him: Houston, which was drafting 26th. "We know Houston had the next pick," Pritchard said, "and they would've taken him."" http://www.columbian.com/article/20080922/BLOGS05/809229947/-1/blazerbanter Just 2 more picks and we could have had him......sigh.
i thought this was well known by a lot of people here....oh well we got aaron brooks instead and landry in that draft so it was a good draft imo given what we had to work with.
hmmmmm.......would if I told you we could have Michael Jordan as well......would you like to go on about that while your at it..........me neither. A point guard would be nice though, you're right.
The Blazers stole Roy from us the year before they stole Rudy from us so it's not that shocking. It's their way of getting us back for stealing Clyde to get our 2nd Championship.
the trail blazers snatched up roy from the rox too. freaking pritchard. If it hadnt been for him Morey would be the ruler of the NBA GM world... I guess they will share the throne for now. There should be no doubt that these two gms are running circles around the rest of the league.
This is old news but it's funny you would mention it the day after he arrived in Portland from Spain. A very enthusiastic crowd greeted him at the airport and at the press conference with Pritchard and McMillan. I didn't think Rudy would have much of an impact this season but his Olympic performance makes me wonder. I still think Oden and Bayless will be bigger impact players as rookies on the Blazers than Rudy. I sure wish we would have gotten him instead of AB.
Aww c'mon, given Paul Allen's wide open wallet to work with, they're sort of on par. But the two of them are just on a whole other level compared to other GMs in the league; this might start the rivalry of a life time, like Paul versus Deron... KP vs DM, hmmm...
At least we've always wanted the right people... I hope Les never lets go of Daryl. It's great having this feeling of absolute confidence when you have top-tier management. You know they'll make the right decisions most of time, and the team will only get better. Take a look around the league, and you'll see the likes of Atlanta, Minnesota and the Knicks, staples of bad management, and we all know that results in perennial mediocrity or simply, suckiness.
Without Dennis Lindsey, Dean Cooper, and Gianluca Pascucci it's a whole new set of new people looking at the draft.
Forget Rudy.. I think he's a good player, but he wouldn't fit with our team. We are good where we stand with our team right now as far as the roster goes.
