Portland has always been rumored to be a team interested in acquiring Hedo.

dun, dun, dunnnnn!

(which is basically me covering my ears saying ‘I can’t heaaaaar you!’) Doing my best not to stress until I need to haha.

Turkoglu would be a good fit for us. His signing would make a lot of Blazer fans happy. And it might be possible to open up enough room to get him, but it would take a lot of finagling and trading to do it. It just sounds too complicated to get enough space to make it realistic. We’ll be lucky to clear $6 million in cap space without renouncing valuable players. Sure, none of them are as good as Turkoglu, but we have to renounce them before July 1st. And signings can’t happen until the moratorium ends. I don’t see Portland taking that kind of risk. That, and few teams are willing to take on salary right now, ruling out most trade possibilities.

At this point, I’ve heard so many rumors that Portland has been involved in that I’ve come to the conclusion that I’ll believe it when I see it. Portland has some cap space this offseason, a lot of young talent, some roster congestion, an owner who isn’t afraid to spend money, even in this economic climate and a GM whom Phoenix GM Steve Kerr once called the man who calls up most often. Rumors are bound to be started. And Portland has been finding its way into a lot of them lately.

Portland will probably do something. But with as many possibilities as exist, nailing down the one before it happens is highly improbable.

And congratulations on the NBA Finals appearance. Hope we get to have one (and preferably more) soon.

As T Darkstar said, Portland has to do some maneuvering to make a run at Hedo Turkoglu. Orlando doesn’t have to do that, it just has to offer Turk money. There are less obstacles for the Magic. It’s about the paper.

Blazer fan here… i think it’s a ruse.

In the Blazer high-low zone offense, the small forward is the weakside cornerman and Brandon Roy is the ballside wing who initiates the offense. Turkoglu’s skill set doesn’t fit what we need… his skills would be wasted standing in the corner.

Add in to that the fact that Orlando can sign him easier… I don’t see it happening.

One of my good buddies is a die-hard Magic fan but he always hates on Hedo. He says that he usually vanishes in the playoffs, this year being the exception. Would any of the rest of you agree with that?

Where Blazers Fans happen.

:p

Sorry for taking over your post.

No not really, but I think you should not be worried.

From what I have seen, Hedo had one good year last year and by some accounts this year statistically, it seems that he has not had as good a year shooting. He seems to be a good playmaker for his position, can create his own shot, and is clutch, right? That is why he is so valuable to you guys and around the league, the fact that he can get a good shot for himself and can convert in crunch time.

To me it seems that he and Roy have very similar games, both crafty and somehow find a way to get their shots off and can hit in the clutch.

Now Hedo is good, but in our offense we need the SF to play lockdown D and hit 3pters to open the court for Roy, LMA and Oden (soon). While Hedo is good at 3s, I would imagine that you would agree that he is far from a lockdown D’er.

Lastly Hedo is clutch, no denying it, but so is Roy and no offense, if it was game 7 of the finals vs the Cle., 10 seconds to go I would want the ball in the hands of Roy, not Hedo. Personal preference of course being a Blazer fan, but you see my point. Add in the fact that Roy is due a max contract extension, figure $10m for Hedo, and 11-14m for LMA and that is almost $40m for only 3 players.

I like Hedo and think he is a god player but the price is too much for us and I for one am very happy with Batum as our starting SF, as are KP and Nate. Word on the street is that KP had a deal for Gerald Wallace on the table but Cha wanted Batum in the deal and KP said no way. Take it for what its worth, but Batum will be here for a while and we need to do as much as we can to further his development and adding Hedo would be very expensive and would leave no time for Nic to develop.

Rest easy, Orlandians(?) you do not have to worry about us Blazers.

These 6 days are my most crazed: trade rumors galore, 87 pct nonsensical, 9 pct plausible fiction, 3 pct true but dead, 1 pct in play.

I would put this into “plausible fiction”. Pritchard and friends said they make over 200 mock drafts, discuss ca. 100 NBA players who might be attractive, etc. One of the best free agents in the 2009 pool is bound to come up in a few of these scenarios, with a few calls exchanged. Hedo would help to answer some questions at small forward the Blazers have (with Nic Batum developing in his shadow), but probably it won’t happen. At the last deadline the Blazers had talks about Danny Granger, Gerald Wallace, Vince Carter, Richard Jefferson, …

They’re on between $48m and $51m next season according to figures I’ve seen (depends on who’s hit performance escalations this season), so if it falls to arround the alleged projected level of $57.3m, the Blazers can clear enough by either not putting the qualifying offer to Frye, or renouncing Outlaw.

That will give them enough to offer Hedo an average $10m a year, although if they have a lot of performance escalations they may have to backload it slightly.

It would be an offense built more like the Lakers, with a lot of shot creation coming from position other than the 1. With a player like Bayless, this could be a godsend, allowing him to play off the ball more, or allowing them to play a shooter at the 1 kind of like we did with JJ for a stint in the finals.

If this happens, it will be a S&T, and I’ll take back Rudy Fernandez por favor

.. just goes to show you how confident or naive I am in thinking Hedo will stay.