Blazers bad-mouthing Miles

[greenwise]

It seems the Miles case is still open:


"While the Celtics have been praising Darius Miles, two NBA general managers said the Blazers have been bad-mouthing the free agent forward to potential suitors (...)

"He can still play and he also hasn't played in two years, so you have to understand that he will get better," one NBA GM said. "Too bad Portland is putting out bad information that he is not a good kid. Anything and everything they can say bad they are. It's too bad. He's a nice kid with a bad injury who has fought back. Right now, he's still an NBA player and he's going to get better. He's going to improve. It will be a smart pick-up for someone."

http://www.boston.com/sports/basketball/articles/2008/10/26/big_rebound_on_tap/?page=2

I understand Portland's point of view but I don't think they are playing clean.

[Roy Hobbs]

I don't necessarily think Portland is doing the right thing, either.  However, who do you think has a better conception of whether or not Miles is a "good kid" -- the Blazers, or some random GM off of another team?

Also, if this GM is so sure that Miles can "still play" and will be a "smart pickup", why doesn't he sign Miles to his team?

[greenwise]

I don't necessarily think Portland is doing the right thing, either.  However, who do you think has a better conception of whether or not Miles is a "good kid" -- the Blazers, or some random GM off of another team?

Also, if this GM is so sure that Miles can "still play" and will be a "smart pickup", why doesn't he sign Miles to his team?

Yes, i handn't really thought about it. Sure thing the Blazers must know better than anybody. The thing is, are they telling the truth, or are they just selling lies in order to have a better economic situation?

[Roy Hobbs]

The thing is, are they telling the truth, or are they just selling lies in order to have a better economic situation?

Probably a little of both.  While still playing for Portland -- before their was any economic incentive -- there were numerous reports that Miles was a bad character guy, both in the locker room and out.  He's also had multiple independent doctors label his injury as career-ending.  He's out of shape, needed to take banned pills to get his weight under control, and has been questioned in the past for his work ethic.

I wonder, then, to what extent Portland has to make up anything.  Miles' legitimate history raises enough red flags.  Still, though, they have a clear economic incentive for Miles not to sign and play for another team, so I can see why people would be concerned.

[moiso]

I'm sure the blazers didn't have to make anything up.  The guy was a horrible teammate while he was there.  And I bet his knee injury was declared career ending due to Miles being lackadaisical in his rehab for 2 years.

[Cman]

Yes he had a bad reputation while in Portland.  To be fair, though, two extra points: (1) most of the big name players on the Blazers during Miles' tenure there as a player  had a bad rep (Sheed, Randolph, Q. Woods, Nick Van Exel, Bonzi Wells, Jeff McInnis, Ruben Patterson).  Some of those players have been able to turn their acts around after leaving the Blazers.  (2) By all accounts Miles showed up in Boston ready to work and tried hard.  Physically, though, he just can't do it because of the injury.

I am not trying to stick up for Miles.  I just hope he catches on somewhere and is able to play again because it looks to me like he has turned a corner.  He could just as easily accept his pay check and stop playing, but he has decided he wants to keep playing despite the odds and kudos to him for that.

[Finkelskyhook]

If they were praising Miles after forking out 10s of millions to him for sitting, I'd be more skeptical of that.

[greg683x]

In my opinion, not a real professional move by the Blazers

I really dont think this makes the Blazers an unclassy organization on their part or anything, I think all this is more out of frustration than anything else.  The team is finally starting to shake the whole "Jail-Blazers" reputation that it had for what? nearly a decade now, and just when they think their turning a new leaf, a shadow or whatever you wanna call it from that era is coming back to potentially handcuff the team from finally becoming a positive franchise.

Maybe Im making more out of it, but if I were a member of the Blazers front office and this was going on I'd just feel like my legs were in quicksand when trying to shake the luck the teams had with players over the past several years.

[NoraG1]

In my opinion, not a real professional move by the Blazers

I really dont think this makes the Blazers an unclassy organization on their part or anything, I think all this is more out of frustration than anything else.  The team is finally starting to shake the whole "Jail-Blazers" reputation that it had for what? nearly a decade now, and just when they think their turning a new leaf, a shadow or whatever you wanna call it from that era is coming back to potentially handcuff the team from finally becoming a positive franchise.

Maybe Im making more out of it, but if I were a member of the Blazers front office and this was going on I'd just feel like my legs were in quicksand when trying to shake the luck the teams had with players over the past several years.

Well, the only one to blame is the Blazers for giving Miles the contract. Now they should honor it. By badmouthing Miles they are drawing attention to themelves and they look anything but classy. They have no right to bad mouth him to other teams. At the time Portland was known for having quite a few cancers on the team. That is nobodys fault but the Blazers. Why should they be left off the hook for it? This looks like it should be looked into by the players union or something.

[nickagneta]

All I know is if Danny Ainge could bad mouth a former player amongst his peers so that he could save $9 million off of the next two years' salary cap, I would hope that he would do it.

Nice or not nice. Gentlemanly or not, its business. Portland has $18 million of salary cap space riding on Miles not playing 10 games of basketball either this season or next. It is management's job there to do what they can to discourage other teams from signing him.

So what do they do? Well, in Miles' case they tell stories about some of his less than best moments. Are they lying? NO. Are they helping Miles? NO. Is it a nice thing to do, depends on how you view things. But, Portland is doing the right thing for Portland, and for that I personally won't criticize them. It's what I would want Ainge to do in a similar circumstance.

[moiso]

Before a GM drafts or trades for a player of course they do a background check.  This is common sense.  So of course a GM would contact any conections on Portland for their input.  And the Porland people answered honestly.  What is the problem here?  It's not as if Portland is going out of their way to hurt Miles.  I'm a registered nurse and if I apply for a new job, the first thing they will do is contact the hospital I work at now to see what kind of employee that I am.  That the Blazers have financial interest is irrelevant.  And it's just a matter of time before someone signs the guy anyway, regardless of what Portland says.  I'm sure they didn't give Ainge glowing reviews of Miles, either, but he took the chance anyway.

[Chris]

All I know is if Danny Ainge could bad mouth a former player amongst his peers so that he could save $9 million off of the next two years' salary cap, I would hope that he would do it.

Nice or not nice. Gentlemanly or not, its business. Portland has $18 million of salary cap space riding on Miles not playing 10 games of basketball either this season or next. It is management's job there to do what they can to discourage other teams from signing him.

So what do they do? Well, in Miles' case they tell stories about some of his less than best moments. Are they lying? NO. Are they helping Miles? NO. Is it a nice thing to do, depends on how you view things. But, Portland is doing the right thing for Portland, and for that I personally won't criticize them. It's what I would want Ainge to do in a similar circumstance.

My concern wouldn't be about being nice or gentlemanly...this is business.  However a big part of the business is building strong relationships with agents.  If a GM is going out of their way to try to torpedo a players chances to catch on with another team, then it is going to rub some agents the wrong way (Miles agent works for SFX, the second biggest agency in the NBA). 

Now, if they were just answering questions, that is one thing.  But if they are actively trying to spread rumors, then I would imagine the agent would become aware of this, and it definitely does not help build goodwill with that GM or management for the future.

[cordobes]

All I know is if Danny Ainge could bad mouth a former player amongst his peers so that he could save $9 million off of the next two years' salary cap, I would hope that he would do it.

Nice or not nice. Gentlemanly or not, its business. Portland has $18 million of salary cap space riding on Miles not playing 10 games of basketball either this season or next. It is management's job there to do what they can to discourage other teams from signing him.

So what do they do? Well, in Miles' case they tell stories about some of his less than best moments. Are they lying? NO. Are they helping Miles? NO. Is it a nice thing to do, depends on how you view things. But, Portland is doing the right thing for Portland, and for that I personally won't criticize them. It's what I would want Ainge to do in a similar circumstance.

My concern wouldn't be about being nice or gentlemanly...this is business.  However a big part of the business is building strong relationships with agents.  If a GM is going out of their way to try to torpedo a players chances to catch on with another team, then it is going to rub some agents the wrong way (Miles agent works for SFX, the second biggest agency in the NBA). 

Now, if they were just answering questions, that is one thing.  But if they are actively trying to spread rumors, then I would imagine the agent would become aware of this, and it definitely does not help build goodwill with that GM or management for the future.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_ethics

Other than that, I agree with what you say. If they are answering questions truthfully, nothing to see here. If not, it's a rather disturbing behavior.

[nickagneta]

As I said, as long as they are not lying about anything, what exactly is the harm in informing other GM's about the experiences that the Portland Trail Blazers franchise has had with Darius Miles? I don't see anything unethical about that.

As for the forging of long lasting trustworthy relationships with agents, well, we are talking about dealing with a notoriously unscrupulous and at times unethical group of people. Jeffrey Wechsler doesn't exactly carry a Who's Who list of the NBA's elite talent.

I believe that whole part of the business is way overblown. Agents never seem to have a problem of negotiating in their client's, and only their clients, best interest, often playing GMs off one another and using them to simply extract more money out of a team. Really, how often does an agent sign a player into a situation and for a contract that he KNOWS WITHOUT A DOUBT that his client will never be able to fulfill.

Agents and GMs and even the players aren't naive and don't know what goes on. And my guess here is that if Pritchard has full support of his owner to do what is necessary to ensure that Miles past is known widely throughout the league.

[moiso]

If Bird called Ainge for opinion on Mark Blount I would hope Ainge would do a little "bad mouthing!"