No, it’s not just an NBA general manager, either. All of them. They’re second-guessed constantly. Every decision can turn into one that could cost you your job. It’s a big part of why a lot of them are paid a million bucks a year.

Is Kevin Pritchard in jeopardy of being fired? I’m not sure. I don’t think it’s imminent. But it shouldn’t be surprising that he’s the subject of a ton of second guessing. Heck, you’ve seen it constantly in the comment section of this blog. The toughest part of KP’s job is that nobody is 100 percent perfect when it comes to drafting players. There is always something there for the critics.

You can go back and find all kinds of miserable draft-day mistakes on the resume of Jerry West, Geoff Petrie, Jerry Krause, Donnie Walsh — any of them. It’s the nature of the beast.

And I can also tell you that any general manager who passes over the likes of Michael Jordan, or Larry Bird, or, yes Kevin Durant, is going to have to live with that for a long, long time — no matter the circumstances.

You think Pritchard himself isn’t tormented by that draft? Sure, at the time, most people would have done the same thing he did. Greg Oden was the right pick for this team. I would have done it and just about all of the league’s other GMs would have done it. But Pritchard is probably lying awake nights wondering if he couldn’t have had just a little better medical insight, or have taken a little more time, or talked to a few more people before making that pick. I have always assumed that he got Paul Allen’s buy-in before making that pick, and if he didn’t it was a huge mistake.

That was Bob Whitsitt’s genius, I understand. He always got Allen to buy in before a major move. Then if it backfired, you turn around and say, “Hey, too bad — WE made a mistake.” But never, “I made a mistake.” In the case of Oden vs. Durant, I’d have been tempted to make sure Allen — ever a draft nut — saw every workout in person or on tape and then invite him to make the choice.

As fans, a lot of you are uncomfortable seeing Durant become a great player. But you think it bothers you? I can’t imagine what it’s doing to KP. I mean, that Oklahoma City box score popping up three or four times a week with Durant scoring 35 points must drive Pritchard crazy — just as he knows the guy is going to be one of the best three or four players in the league for the next decade.

He knows, too, he’d have been better served by making some use of Raef LaFrentz’s expiring contract last season, too. And not have gone so all-in publicly on Hedo Turkoglu last summer. And every GM worth his salt cares so much about doing a good job that when things don’t go right, he tortures himself.

And then, of course, he has to watch his right-hand man, Tom Penn, get the pink slip at a very odd time. Was that firing a message to Pritchard? Honestly, I still don’t think so. There are indications that Penn’s dismissal had more to do with HR issues — the kind of things that happen in any office. If that’s the case, I feel bad for Penn. I hope the story never gets out as to what really happened and I wish him all the luck in the world finding his way back in the league.

I think Pritchard’s issues are his own. And I think it’s really not unlike what every GM faces. Man, it’s a tough job. And the alligators in suits are nipping at your toes constantly, ready to second-guess everything you do. Often, they’re guys who have no clue what you do.

At the same time, they’re always falling in love with some wizard on the business side who they’re crediting for all the financial success of the franchise. I’ve seen it for years.

But you know what, you can have all your little two-for-one hot dog nights, all your little bobblehead promotions, all the civic contributions and all those little charity deals you want… until your team is winning basketball games, guys, you got nothing. Zip. And that’s what matters to a franchise.

At this point, Paul Allen ought to have connected those dots. He knows that. But you just never know in that organization. Strange things happen — and sometimes without warning.

Being a general manager anywhere in any sport is difficult. And being a general manager for the Trail Blazers is one of sport’s toughest jobs.

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Greg Oden, Kevin Durant, Kevin Pritchard, Paul Allen, Portland Trail Blazers, Tom Penn

Seriously, what did you give up to bring the second-leading rebounder in the league here? Not all that much. Camby is Joel Przybilla with a foul-line jumper.

You could now make a case that the Trail Blazers have a chance to make a little noise in the playoffs. Now don’t go thinking they’re going to win a title or something, but they could end up being a tough out.

Camby solves a real big problem on defense and the boards and if Brandon Roy is healthy, this team can win a series, depending on matchups. And it’s a team you couldn’t say that about prior to this deal. Basically, two teams traded players who don’t fit their long-term future — and Portland came away with a big advantage.

But what about the future? Well, it isn’t likely Camby will stay — just as it wasn’t likely Blake or Outlaw would be around next season. But let’s just say Camby fits real well here. That he becomes an overnight success.

Well, in that case, I wouldn’t be surprised — even though right now it seems a longshot — if Portland wouldn’t have the means (that means Paul Allen’s possible willingness to spend money) to keep him here. But that’s a question for a few months from now.

For right now, I think this deal provides an opportunity to be excited about the playoffs. I would caution fans not to fall in love with Camby, because odds are, he won’t be back next year. But in the short term, he ought to be just the ticket.

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Joel Przybilla, Kevin Pritchard, Marcus Camby, Paul Allen, Portland Trail Blazers

I was talking to a friend of mine in the NBA the other day and asked him about the possibility of his team making a deal with the Portland Trail Blazers.

“They aren’t easy to deal with,” he said. “They have a pretty high opinion of their own players. I think they think they have 15 all-stars over there. But take a look back, they don’t make a lot of trades. And I think that’s because they just can’t bring themselves to let go of their guys. And they can’t find what they think is value in a trade because they’ve overvalued their own guys so much.”

Maybe so. Or maybe they’re paralyzed with fear that they’re going to prematurely give up on the wrong young player. The specter of Jermaine O’Neal is still hanging over this franchise. You move the wrong young player and he goes somewhere else and becomes a star, well, you pay for that wrong move for seasons to come.

But I’ll tell you something else. To blame Kevin Pritchard for all this may not be correct. I’m just not sure how much authority he has. Certainly he’s authorized to take the blame from everyone when something goes wrong — that’s what comes with being general manager. He also gets credit for what goes well, of course.

But on a franchise where an owner, Paul Allen, loves the game and considers himself an expert, an owner, by the way, who loves his coach, Mr. Sonic, Nate McMillan — I’m not sure Pritchard always gets his way. I think there have been times when McMillan, with the support of his owner, has been able to kill deals. There have been times when Allen has killed deals — or made draft choices. We know that, don’t we?

It’s not just the Blazers, either. There are a whole lot of teams constructed this way. Owners write the checks and have their say. Coaches often carry a lot of weight with owners. It’s the way it works.

I ask you to remember that the next time you’re tempted to blame Pritchard for anything and everything that happens to this franchise. He’s not the only decision maker — he’s just the one out front taking the heat for it.

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Nate McMillan, Paul Allen, Portland Trail Blazers

Allen, who said he was just back from a vacation, was at Sunday night’s game against the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Rose Garden and was interviewed briefly, as he walked out of the arena after the game. He is fighting non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, more than a quarter-century after beating Hodgkin’s disease.

Given what he’s dealing with, the owner of the Portland Trail Blazers seemed very upbeat. He said the chemotherapy treatments are “going well” and that he begins another round of them Monday.

He said at this point he’s “two-thirds of the way through” the prescribed chemo treatment.

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Paul Allen, Portland Trail Blazers

Wasn’t going to write about this but Blazers Edge did and True Hoop picked it up so I guess I will share it.

The Trail Blazer owner caught me by surprise with his walk down the hallway outside of the Portland locker room Tuesday night after the game.

It was a tough loss for him, sure, but the battle he’s waging against cancer certainly puts it all in perspective. The baseball cap he was wearing was probably hiding some hair loss from his chemotherapy treatments.

I haven’t seen him in quite a while and when I saw him, I held out my hand. He took it heartily and had a warm smile. “I’m going with your hair style,” he said, referring to my current head shave.

I laughed and he was gone. Man, I’m in the best health (I think, I hope) that I’ve been in for a long, long time but I don’t know if I could manage a smile as warm as Paul’s.

Wish I could do more, Paul, but you’re in our prayers.

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Paul Allen

For the last couple of years, and this season, the Trail Blazers are sort of on simmer. You know, let’s let the team mature, grow up, gain experience — come together. Let them grow and hey, they aren’t going to win a title this season, anyway, right? No rush. No mistakes.

Well, I got to thinking about it. The owner, Paul Allen, is now undergoing treatment for cancer. What if he comes to some sort of realization about how fragile life is? About how much time he might have left? I mean, even when you beat cancer, it forces you to come to grips with the brevity of your time on the planet.

What if he decides he’d like to turn the Trail Blazer heat up from simmer to boil? What if he wants to try to get to that NBA Finals — and a championship –  a little sooner than the current plan? I don’t think that’s too out of the box to contemplate, is it?

If Paul were to do that, how would Kevin Pritchard go about making it happen? There are some expiring contracts that could be dealt, there are some moves that could be made. Would a blockbuster trade have to be made?  Granted, it would force a few issues — but is it doable? How could it be done?

More interesting, how would YOU do it?

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Paul Allen, Portland Trail Blazers

This franchise can take injuries and defections at just about every position but one — at the very top. There is no other owner out there like Paul Allen.

I remember telling someone this summer, every time this man sets foot in the Rose Garden he ought to get a standing ovation. He’s been that important not only to this franchise but this city. Do you really think Portland would have built a new arena unless he paid for it? Really? I don’t. No way.

The city of Portland would either be still trying to tweak and “renovate” Memorial Coliseum — or the team would be long gone to Memphis or somewhere else by now.

Do you think any other owner would be willing to lose the millions and millions of dollars Paul Allen has lost on the Trail Blazers? I don’t think so. The realities of owning a team in a small market haven’t been a problem here for years. We’re so spoiled here that fans and media take it for granted. I have for years.

Allen treats this franchise as if it’s located in New York or Los Angeles, spending what it takes to win and knowing the bottom line is going to be scary. He’s tightened his belt at times, but who doesn’t? It still hasn’t deterred him from trying to make this the best franchise in the NBA.

He just wants to win. God love him for that. And God bless him in his fight against non-Hodgkins lymphoma.

My first reaction upon hearing the news that he’s fighting cancer again was pretty much what I wrote at the start of this post. I worry about who would own this team if he doesn’t. I can’t imagine the next owner being willing to subsidize the franchise the way he has.

I think that’s a natural knee-jerk reaction a lot of us had. But what I’m thinking about now is the man I’ve now been acquainted with for nearly two decades. A quiet, hard-to-get-to-know guy who keeps to himself and doesn’t reveal much. I’ve tweaked him in print and on the air countless times, without him ever complaining or whining or even acknowledging it.

But to watch, through his tenure as the team’s owner, what he’s put in to this town, both financially and emotionally, has been amazing.  He doesn’t ask for kudos or credit, but there ought to be a statue of him in the courtyard of the Rose Quarter.  Someday, the arena should bear his name.

I’m reminding you, he’s a special guy. Sure, he’s made mistakes and we’ve criticized him for them. But I also think we’ve taken him for granted for too long in Portland. Without him, I just don’t know where we’d be as a sports town — but it would be a lot less than what we are now.

Good luck, Paul. Beat this thing. Your team has a long run ahead but for it to reach its potential, you’ve really gotta be here running the show.

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Tags: city of Portland, Memorial Coliseum, Paul Allen, Portland Trail Blazers, Rose Garden, Rose Quarter

Geesh, enough about the 15th roster spot. Kevin Pritchard and Nate McMillan got to pick the first 14 players, isn’t it OK if Paul Allen, who is picking up the tab for all this frivolity, is allowed to choose No. 15?

The more I think about it, keeping Patty Mills is the better long-term play anyway. A year from now, he may have some value — either as a player or as a trade piece. A whole lot of people I respect a lot believe the kid can play. And given the roster logjam, it doesn’t hurt to have a guy around who isn’t ready to play.

It’s kind of funny, though, I thought it was Minnesota that was supposed to have the obsession with point guards?

I mentioned yesterday that I thought having so many players is hurting Portland’s preparation for the upcoming season. I firmly believe that to be true.

But I wouldn’t want that to be construed as thinking the Blazers won’t eventually find themselves. I believe they will but it may be quite a few games into the regular season.

I’ve seen good teams muddle through the exhibition season and then take off as soon as the real games start. It’s hard to motivate veteran players for exhibition games. I don’t think it’s going to be easy for this bunch. There are too many young players trying to figure out where they belong in the league.

But it’s going to happen for them. It might take a month — maybe even two. It might take an injury or two to thin the roster down. But there is too much talent here to expect the team to struggle for more than about 25 games.

And while it’s so easy to look at the offense and find fault, it’s still the defense that’s the most troubling. The Blazers so far have not improved at all from last season on the defensive end of the floor. And to get anywhere, they’ve got to tighten up — a lot. What we’ve seen so far just isn’t anywhere close to as good as they’ll need to get past the first round of the playoffs.

That’s why I expect Nic Batum and Greg Oden in the starting lineup when the season starts. They’re solid at the defensive end. And if that happens, the real intrigue will be as Oden introduces the New Greg to the real referees, assuming they’re back by then. He needs to start getting respect from those guys. If he does, the Blazers will be changed a great deal.

For the better.

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Ime Udoka, Jarron Collins, Kevin Pritchard, Nate McMillan, Patty Mills, Paul Allen, Portland Trail Blazers

Merritt Paulson is trying to get a ballpark. He’s trying to see if some community in this area is willing to build a real baseball stadium in a public-private partnership. You realize, perhaps, that the ONLY stadium or arena of any size that this area’s ever built with public funds is Memorial Coliseum — which was done about a half century ago.

The Rose Garden, PGE Park (Multnomah Stadium when it was built), Vaughn Street Ballpark — all were done privately. My point is, we’re kind of due, aren’t we, to do some sort of arena or ballpark?

Anyway, Paulson, who had no connections here, moved into the area when he bought the Portland Beavers and Timbers and is in love with owning pro sports franchises. He’s been villified, made fun of and derided because he’s asked the public to help fund a ballpark that IT will own.

He’s willing to pour millions of his own money into this operation. Millions. And for anyone who thinks he’s got a great chance of even earning all that money back, well, you’re nuts. I just don’t think it pencils out. The fact is, he’s a wealthy guy who loves owning and operating a sports franchise.

Just like Paul Allen.

But Paul’s taken a lot of hits over the years, too. Yet the contributions the Trail Blazers have made to this community are too many to count. Seriously, with all of our job and economic problems here, the constant rain and the idiocy of some of our politicians, it’s the only thing a lot of people find themselves feeling good about when they pick up the morning paper.

And you know what? Paul has lost tens hundreds of millions on the Trail Blazers. Can you imagine? It’s never been a profitable operation. The people of Portland owe him a standing ovation every time he walks to his seat in that arena. Has he made mistakes? Of course, and we’ve always called him out on them. But on balance, Paul Allen has been GREAT for the city of Portland.

Traditionally, we’ve not had wealthy people who live in our area step up to own franchises. The closest I can come is Harry Glickman, but he wasn’t rich enough to own the team — he just was farsighted and creative enough to put a group together that had enough financial clout to buy a team in the NBA.

I think Merritt Paulson is trying very hard to be great for the Portland area, too. Certainly, to anyone who believes he’s here to make his fortune is sadly mistaken. If they think that ballpark in Beaverton is going to benefit only Paulson, they’re seriously deluded.

That ballpark will be a gathering place and a focal point for Beaverton that the city has never had. An identity and a soul. Just wait. What really bothers me is the whole political side to this. Some people don’t like Paulson’s father, Hank, the former secretary of the treasury, so they don’t like his kid. I mean, man, the guy was a REPUBLICAN — which is pretty much always a crime around these parts. And man, he’s from the EAST COAST! How terrible.

All I’m saying is that we ought to be thankful that people like Paul Allen and Merritt Paulson have chosen Portland as the home for their teams. Nobody around here is wealthy enough or willing enough to do it.

And we’re better off for what they’ve done.

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Tags: arenas, ballparks, Beaverton, Dwight Jaynes, Merritt Paulson, Paul Allen, Portland

Johnny Ludden at Yahoo sports has a nice piece with Gregg Popovich talking about the Spurs’ upgrades this summer. “Pop” talks about knowing that to stay competitive, the Spurs needed to add to their mix. And they knew, too, it was going to be expensive:

The Spurs will pay for that right. For years, the franchise had remained, in Popovich’s words, “frugal.” In those rare seasons when the Spurs crossed the luxury-tax threshold, they did so only modestly. This season, their $80 million payroll could rank among the five highest in the NBA. If it isn’t reduced by season’s end, they will pay close to another $10 million in tax – a stunning jump for one of the league’s smallest markets.

“We’ve always wanted to compete, and the environment in the NBA allowed a team like us to do so,” Popovich said. “If you wanted to work at having a shot at winning the championship and still be under the tax, it could be done.

“But the way the talent has shifted in the league, it’s almost impossible to do that now.”

Indeed, the gap between the haves and have-nots is expanding rapidly in the NBA. A league that has always prided itself on a salary-cap system that allowed all teams at least a chance to compete, is falling prey to the economy — where a great many of the small-market teams, or the teams with owners in failing outside businesses, are big sellers rather than buyers.

And the day is coming soon when Portland’s going to be facing big luxury-tax decisions, too. In the past, it hasn’t bothered Paul Allen one bit. It will be interesting to see, moving forward, if any of that has changed.

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Gregg Popovich, Johnny Ludden, NBA luxury tax, Paul Allen, Portland Trail Blazers, San Antonio Spurs