Blazers begin rebuilding with strong trade deadline

Gerald Wallace's days are done in Portland.

By Matt Scotton

The NBA trade deadline is one of those days that every NBA fan circles on their calendar.  People sit and wait to see if their teams made that deal everyone has been talking about; or if one comes out of no where and catches everyone off guard.  Many Trail Blazer fans felt a great array of emotions on Thursday, March 15, 2012.

Leading up to the deadline all you heard about the Blazers was there was a ton of interest in Jamal Crawford or that the Blazers were trying to find a new home for Raymond Felton.  When 3 P.M. ET rolled around, Crawford and Felton were still wearing Blazer uniforms and it was Gerald Wallace and Marcus Camby who had been traded.  Gerald Wallace was traded to the Nets for a protected first round pick, Mehmet Okur, and Shawne Williams.  Marcus Camby was traded to the Rockets for Jonny Flynn and Hasheem Thabeet.  The Blazers also cut Greg Oden and Chris Johnson.

The Gerald Wallace trade was more about the draft pick than the players they got in return.  The draft pick from the Nets is protected up to the third spot in the draft. This means that if the Nets get pick one through three in the lottery the pick would defer to the Nets and Portland would get their pick next year.  In next year’s draft it is only protected for picks one and two.  Both of the players they received have contracts that end this year and are out with injuries for the rest of this season.  Williams’s contract has a player option after this year and the Blazers are trying to buy him out of his contract.

A lot of fans were sad to see Wallace go and a lot of people wanted to know why Portland brought him in last year just to trade him this year.  Last year he is what the Blazers needed to make that final push to the playoffs.  This year things were not going as they would have liked and they wanted to build for the future.  They got what could be a great draft pick in this year’s draft.  He also had a player option in his contract for next year and they were afraid he might take it.  Portland wants as much cap space as possible for this coming free agency.  A lot of the Blazers’ contracts are up after this year, and that’s the way the front office wants it so they can concentrate on rebuilding.

Jonny Flynn could be Portland's backup PG.

Sending Marcus Camby to Houston was a little surprising, but could end up working out.  The Blazers added another draft pick to their arsenal.  It is a second round pick and usually those are no good for the NBA draft, but this year is an extremely deep draft and maybe they can find a diamond in the ruff.  The players they got aren’t considered great, but their contracts are up after this year.  They basically will have about a 20 game audition for making their case why they deserve to stay with the team.  Thabeet won’t make a huge contribution, but keep an eye on Flynn.  In the right system he could blossom into a decent point guard.  Flynn had a decent rookie year, but Minnesota was running more of a triangle offense.  This does not suit his skill set as well.  He’s more of a pick and roll type point guard, which is something interim coach Kaleb Canales. Check back for more on the coaching situation later.

The Blazers are going to have a lot of cap space this off season, so expect them to try and make some moves.  Chad Buchanan expects the Blazers to have between $15 million and $20 million depending on whom they draft.  These moves look bad to some people, but they are planning for the future.  The Blazers have the opportunity to get two top 15 draft picks in the deepest draft since 2003.  Watch out for Jonny Flynn to challenge Nolan Smith for the backup point guard spot.