The Portland Trail Blazers will be extremely busy this summer trying to keep their free agents from leaving. Wesley Matthews, Arron Afflalo and the biggest of all, LaMarcus Aldridge. Reports came out last week that told us that LaMarcus had told Portland he will not be returning and even though that may be true, the Blazers GM will try his best to stop that from happening.
According to Mike Tokito of the Oregonian:
After all the recent reports that LaMarcus Aldridge was not going to return to the Trail Blazers, general manager Neil Olshey – in one of his regular telephone conversations with the All-Star power forward – asked Aldridge about it.
“I actually asked him how would you like me to address it,” Olshey said. “He said, ‘Just say it’s not true. You and I know where we’re at right now.’” …
“It was misreported, it’s not true,” Olshey said. “I can tell you he has not informed anybody in this organization his intention not to return to this team.” …
“We’ve always known that LaMarcus is going to have a robust free agent market,” he said. “It was a market we were going to compete in. It’s a market we’re still planning to compete in. But in no way has he given us any indication that he’s not returning to the Trail Blazers.”
He seems confident with his statement so I’m going to take his word for it. But whether or not Aldridge has told them he is going to stay or leave, he is going to leave. The Trail Blazers are in no way on a spiral upwards in the NBA. If anything, with all the free agent contributors they’re about to lose, it looks like the Blazers might end up at the end of the Western Conference again. Once thing I Know for sure is that LaMarcus Aldridge will not be making his decision anytime soon, because he needs to wait for Kevin Love to make his decision. Aldridge has stated before that if Love leaves, Cleveland will be a destination for him as well. Once love makes his decision, dominos will start to fall. Love has hinted to the Cavaliers he will be returning so Aldridge will look to Dallas, San Antonio and Los Angeles as his top suitors this free agency summer for now.
