Part of what makes the NBA off season so intriguing is the constant rumor mill that surrounds the draft, free agency and trades in general. While every major sports league faces roster changes, rumors and the like, basketball stands apart from baseball and football (for the most part) in that a single player coming to a team can immediately transform a mediocre team into a contender. The twelve man roster is an intricate puzzle comprised of roles, style, chemistry, system etc. As fans, the fantasy aspect of compiling our own "perfect" rosters is almost as exciting as the games themselves. That is why you see entire websites dedicated to rumors, the pontificating of fantasy trade scenarios and player comparisons. Since this element of the NBA is so addicting to fans, the media cannot help but to fan the flames by publishing rumors based on un-corroborated sources. As we saw around the trade deadline and the draft (many times involving the Blazers) trades would be reported to be on the verge of completion, but  as we would later find out, these same trades had not actually been discussed. Some of this false information was probably floated by an agent, but it seems likely that many of these rumors originated from sloppy or false reporting.

    Today I was almost a party to spreading an entirely false rumor throughout the media, but thanks to corroboration and correct journalism, the rumor was squashed before it was able to threaten anyone's credibility: I was answering the phones at 95.5 the Game when a caller relayed to me that his cousin, who lived in Indiana, had just heard on the local sports station that the Blazers were discussing a deal that would send Rudy and Martell and likely a first to Indiana for Danny Granger. Upon hearing this, my first thought was "please be real!" so I relayed this information to Jay Allen. The first thing he did upon hearing this was call the Pacer's beat reporter, the two major Indianapolis radio stations and someone within the Pacer's organization. All of our sources replied that this move had not been discussed between the two teams, so we just let the story die without any mention of it on the air. In hindsight, it was a pretty mundane occurrence for a major new outlet, but the whole situation opened my eyes to the realities of sports reporting. In today's blog driven, instantaneous sport's news world, I could easily have seen that rumor blown up to the point where people would actually have been disappointed it didn't happen When you work in the sport's media world, especially if you are covering a certain team, you can be led to jump the gun on rumors for two major reasons:

1. You are a fan of a team. In the instance of this imaginary Granger story, my wishful thinking propelled me to want to get this on the air ASAP, as if by putting this information out in the world would increase the likely hood of the deal actually going down. This also applies to the local media wanting to appease the fans. How much more excited would we be about the Blazers (considering it were possible) if Jason Quick reported a rumor that had us going after CP3 or Lebron.

2. Expediency. They don't give out awards for breaking stories in the NBA but it sometimes seems that media outlets feel a certain competitiveness when pursuing rumors or breaking news. This tendency could lead to someone like Sam Smith or others to throw caution to the wind while throwing out trade scenarios.

That post went longer than expected. I just wanted to shed some light on the machinery of the NBA rumor mill, and hopefully increase awareness to the possibility that rumors reported by even the most credible organizations could be pure fallacy.

Commence Rambling:

I love Bayless but I  think he is the odd man out after the Miller signing. Many people believed that in order to obtain an upgrade at PG, Blake would be included in some sort of Sign and Trade deal, but now that we see that Miller was signed straight up it appears that Blake and Miller will be our primary PG options. This doesn't mean that Blake won't be the PG inevitably traded, or that Bayless will either, but it is likely that the Blazer brass are concentrating on entering the championship window now rather than later. As we saw with Boston, when a team is gearing up for a championship they tend to sacrifice sustained "goodness" for immediate greatness. While Blake is still on this roster,I think it is safe to say that the Front Office believes that in order to reach championship status we have to rely heavily on Veteran stability rather than the unfullfilled promise of Bayless' raw talent. We can't play out this season with talented (read: valuable) players like Outlaw and Bayless rotting away on the bench, while we could parlay those assets in a consolidating move that could elevate our status to elite. Quality over Quantity. I suspect Bayless, Trout and possibly some other assets will be moved for an upgrade at SF and possibly a backup PF (although I think that role will be filled by lower priced veteran).

One trend in the NBA drafting process that has troubled me over the last 4-5 drafts is the tendency of
NBA teams to draft unproven, young players on the assumption that due to these player's youth they have a higher potential ceiling than a player who spent all 4 years in college. Brandon Roy should have been the #1 pick in the 2006 draft (thank God he wasn't), but since he was older than Barngani, Aldridge, Foye and Morrison, we were led to believe that his maximum growth potential as an NBA player would be stunted in comparison because of his age.

    I think  a this  drafting folly is perfectly exemplified by Dante Cunninghams projected draft position as well as his actualized draft position. Here are his point totals from year to year: 2.2/8.7/10.4/16.1. It should be noted that he played essentially the same amount of minutes between his junior and senior season while increasing his point output by 6 per game. These  numbers indicate that Dante's skills are rising at an upward trajectory, suggesting that his ceiling is not limited by his chronological handicap. As we saw from last nights game (I know, I know. Take summer league games worth a grain of salt) Dante brings three crucial elements to the game: skilled midrange shooting, the ability to move without the ball, hustle (defense, O rebounding). These three particular attributes are usually not associated with one-and-doners. 

    One final point. Always side with success. Cunningham led an overmatched team to the final four. When in doubt draft a winner.

For the sake of brevity, the essential point of this post is thus: Dante Cunningham was a steal at 33. I expect him to be a valuable asset off the bench for years to come.

Edit: I didn't have nearly enough time to fully flesh out my point. I will either attach an addendum or create a new post on this topic shortly.