Trading Wallace

For the past several months I've been convinced that the Blazers needed to trade Rasheed Wallace. But I feel a little bit more conflicted about it now. Although there's no question his behavior is often a distraction, my problem has always been more with his play. I hate seing a power forward with as as good a turn around jump shot and solid defensive post skills as Wallace perrenially parking himself out by the 3-point line. He also has been bad about not calling for the ball enough. But with the emergence of Zach Randolph as a regular 20+ points-per-game scorer, it's created a better niche for Rasheed. He doesn't have to carry the scoring load all the time. He can pick and choose his opportunities to take over the offense, which is what Wallace prefers--only now we'll still have a post presence looking to score. And it's also worth noting that while Wallace still gets definitely more technicals than the average NBA player, we are now a couple of years removed from when that problem was at its apex. Although Portland surely isn't done making moves, either this season or over the offseason, I think Randolph and Darius Miles give the Blazers a good young nucleus, and the trio of Wallace, Stoudamire and Anderson provide a nice foundation of veterans. Dale Davis to me is expendable, but I also think we should keep another constant source of trade rumors, Ruben Patterson. His heightened oncourt energy are so often a real boon to the team, and can't be measured in Patterson's mediocre statistics. He also plays superb defense. Ah, if only John Nash were reading this weblog. Or anyone!

Comments

[Christa]

If the team is so great then why can't they win?

[Brian]

Fair enough. I'm not sure what they need. I just
think that Randolph and Wallace make a good
combo. I think whatever we do or don't do, though, the Blazers will play better once the trading deadline passes and all this uncertainty is over.

[Evan]

Well, now that they have traded Wallace. What do you think of it? Personally, I think it was a terrible trade. Right as the team was on a roll and have won 8 of their last 10, they had to go out and ruin it. Also, what do you think of the Blazers playoff chances now? I think they are pretty slim.

[Brian]

The bottom line with the Wallace trade for me is that Rasheed told the Blazers he had no intention of re-signing with the team after becoming an unrestricted free agent at the end of this season. So we had to trade him if we expected to get anything in return. I like that we did that instead of trying to sign a free agent this season -- unless it had been Kobe, who I'd love us to have despite his legal problems. But having said that, I'm still a little sorry to see Rasheed go. His teammates have repeatedly said what a rock Rasheed was in the locker room, and no one can deny how talented he was. I also think he was finally starting to mature a little bit. His technical fouls were way down from previous years, for example, and before the trade he was really playing well. So Rasheed's time as a Blazer will always be kind of a Shakespearean tragedy to me, especially when you figure in Game 7 of the 2000 Western Conference Finals. But I think Shareef Abdur-Raheem and Theo Ratliff represent a good return on Wallace. Both are really talented. The only problem is that Abdur-Raheem's best position is power forward, which Zach Randolph also plays. To answer your question, though, Evan, I think it's 50-50 on whether we'll make the playoffs this year, but who cares anyway? Aside from the pride of tying the longest streak of NBA playoff appearances, it would have done us little good to simply lose in the first round again. I'd rather see us get a good draft pick. (Sorry for being so long-winded.)