Blazers Tried to Hide Darius Miles

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Another day, another cannonball lobbed at Portland. Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! supplies it again, revealing that before threatening to sue any team that signed Darius Miles the Blazers attempted to claim the forward off waivers.

Had Portland been successful, the team would have been on the hook for the rest of his league minimum salary for 2008-09. But the benefit would come in stashing Miles on the bench and keeping him from Games 9 and 10, games that would (err, will) halve Portland's summer cap space.

The general attitude regarding the Blazers outside of Portland could hardly seem more spiteful right now; these trinkets just add a layer of cement to the already-firming belief Kevin Pritchard and friends are borderline meglomaniacs who think the rest of the league is filled with rubes and pushovers. Lesson learned, hopefully; the league may have stood down with Clay Bennett bull-whipped Seattle, but you start acting like you're bigger than the collective bargaining agreement and the fight will come back to you.

Every Portland columnist and fan can keep yelping that Pritchard will still "Pritch-slap" the league this summer. But every day a new desperation emerges from Pritchard's being. This cap space meant a lot of him, and he's petrified.

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

1-13-2009 @ 11:34AM

EricL said...

Isn't it a smart move to try and sign Miles? Not only is this story now boring, your beating it like a dead baby. This blog is starting to feel like ESPN's coverage of the Dallas Cowboys. Miles isn't TO or Pacman, he is an underachieving lottery pick who is a shell of his former athleticism. While the blazers may have signed him to an awful contract they did sign him in good health and back then he was a physical freak. THIS IS BORING AND YOU'RE BETTER THAN THIS ZILLER.

1-13-2009 @ 11:35AM

Ziller said...

Miles is an important story, as it affects the league's rules on medical retirement and Portland's cap space.

I don't expect Blazers fans to be happy that the story is getting so much attention, because it reflects poorly on Blazers management. But because you're not happy about the story doesn't mean it's not important for the league as a whole.

1-13-2009 @ 11:46AM

I enjoy reading your stuff. I just feel like this story has lost it's momentum. Is there another possible twist or turn it can take? Miles will play his 10 games, he goes back on the cap.
Also when I read your coverage it smacks of something personal. Are you a big D. Miles fan? Were you spurned by the Blazers? Also, I am making some assumptions here, when GM's are dealing with each other don't they both think they are smarter than the other guy. People are upset about Pritchard's "smugness" but really doesn't that come down to being outsmarted or out scouted? All these GM's have to believe they are the smartest guy in the room.

1-13-2009 @ 12:05PM

Kevin said...

Gotta agree with Eric on this one, let's stop acting like it's some huge injustice to the universe if Darius Miles doesn't play in an NBA game ever again (especially since it looks like he will and it's almost certain that the money will be going back on the Blazers books now). Should he get the chance to play and were the Blazers wrong? Yes, I think you and 8,000 other writers covered that in one of the 30,000 posts about this topic in the past 2 weeks. We get it, let's move on. For the record, I am not a Blazers fan either, I am a Warriors fan so you can forget about the apologist angle.

1-13-2009 @ 12:18PM

MC Welk said...

Have to disagree with Eric and Kevin. Keep it coming …

1-13-2009 @ 12:43PM

Mike said...

No one is talking about the examiner who deemed Miles' injury career-ending. No one. I wanna know where he fits into all this.

1-13-2009 @ 12:57PM

henryclemente said...

Funny, you rarely see anyone comment about the ridiculous amounts of coverage players' personal lives get, but an organization continually attempts one unethical tactic after another to rid themselves of cap space on a salary they owe (something that affects actual NBA operations), and people are begging for the coverage to stop?!? Insane.

1-13-2009 @ 2:05PM

instant35 said...

How can you not post a story about this ridiculous action by the Blazers? When a team attempts to obtain a player so they can not play him and avoid paying the luxury tax, I definitely want to know. I've never heard of a team doing anything like this before.

The ironic thing is that signing a player to stash him on the bench so they could avoid paying the luxury tax is probably a breach of their fiduciary duties as a joint venture (if there even is such a thing).

1-13-2009 @ 2:35PM

Also, anyone else think this might hurt the Blazers with signing free agents? If I were a rival GM with a comparable offer, I'd definitely mention that if you sign with the Blazers, they will resort to any tactic imaginable to prevent them from losing cap space and paying a luxury tax in the future.

1-13-2009 @ 2:59PM

Darius Miles = Hero said...

I don't agree with the way the Blazers have handled this from beginning to end either. They shouldn't have tried the whole retirement thing to begin with but that's easy to say with 20/20 hindsight in my corner. Whatever "doctor" they had examine him (who was approved by the League and the player's association mind you) obviously screwed it up big time, though it would hardly be the first time a doctor acquiesced to the wishes of a team if that ended up being the case. The email to the other teams was just plain idiotic, though I can't fault them for trying to pick him up off waivers to freeze him...why the hell not? That is capitalism folks, love it or hate it, that is the system we live under and money constantly drives people to do stupid things (See: Economic Crisis)

With that being said though, the irony is not lost on me that Darius Miles of all people would be a rallying symbol. He who took his talent and life in the NBA for granted and squandered his entire career (to this point), and wasn't even serious about rehabbing his knee when it initially became injured. So he was fine without rehabbing when he was getting paid millions to not play basketball but now suddenly he is this poor tragic figure when the notion of his basketball mortality sets in?