With the benefit of hindsight, what the TrailBlazers should have done is:

1 – Pick Barkley, not Jordan
2 – Get Sabonis to join the team earlier

That would have been optimal.

Najee just read the book. Apparently you are a bit confused about my responses to you. The points I proposed which are in QUOTES come from people either involved or who covered the league at that time. Therefore not hindsight. Some of my interpretation of those thoughts and quotes are hindsight which I acknowledged, but certainly not all or the majority of them. I gave who said the quote and the source to support my arguments therefore it’s something you can check it out. All you have done was given your opinion (i.e. “at that time, Sampson was more polished and considered to have an even higher upside than Olajuwon” whereas I have read a considerable amount from NBA people that refutes the 2nd part of this statement) all you do is fall back on “I was alive at the time.” Sorry that’s not enough credibility for me to just take your word for it without sources. Who are you? You say you followed the NBA – Where you directly involved with the NBA in 1984? Sportswriter? Reporter? NBA scout or executive? The information I provided comes directly from someone “alive” and on the inside of the NBA during that time. The quotes I provided are from executives making the decisions leading up to that draft. I will take their word for it over the casual fan which includes both YOU (I am assuming since you haven’t said otherwise) and I.

All you have effectively done was claim your points as fact and mine being incorrect when yours have been merely opinion with very little if any support
(A Kentucky website with an obvious bias). I never claimed my interpretation of the book Tip-Off and quotes provided have been anything but that, my interpretation and opinion. I have also entertained your arguments and agreed with many of them. But, at this point it’s getting a bit tired hearing you claim authority just because you were old enough to follow the NBA as a fan in the 80’s. Maybe if you read the book you will see where I am coming from (or not), but until then let’s not waste either of our time anymore.

Thank you for all the comments!

Point 1: About the Mark Aguirre trade, I assume there is more to that proposal because no reasonable GM would trade a 24-year-old Aguirre straight-up for the No. 3 pick in the draft. Still, it doesn’t negate the fact that Chicago entertained and solicited several offers to trade the pick — and given that Michael Jordan was considered a given choice at No. 3 overall, Chicago also didn’t consider Jordan the slam-dunk pick you want him to be.

Your Point 2 about the Patrick Ewing angle makes no sense, because he declared he was staying at Georgetown way before the ‘84 draft was held. Portland and Chicago knew quite some time in advance where they were going to pick and (in the case of Portland) who they were going to pick.

Also, if Rod Thorn was so sure about selecting Jordan was the No. 3 overall pick, why entertain offers from several teams for the same pick? Especially if Jordan was expected to be such a huge impact player?

Point 3: “There was a little known rumor in the Texas papers that Houston’s coach Bill Fitch (who talked to Dean Smith at length about MJ and praised Jordan generously in the media) was trying to get Houston to offer Ralph Sampson to Chicago for Jordan.”

Again, this doesn’t make one bit of sense. Why would Houston offer to make a trade (Sampson for the rights to Jordan) WHEN THE TEAM COULD HAVE PICKED JORDAN OUTRIGHT with the No. 1 overall pick?!? Let me guess — your hindsight allows you to see that Sampson would develop knee problems that would destroy his career.

This is what kills your arguments — because you have no appreciation or insight of following the NBA during the 1980s that allowed you to see what was going on as it unfolded, you’re relying purely on hindsight. Sampson was a much more polished product than Hakeem Olajuwon was at that point. If Houston wanted Jordan, it could have drafted Jordan and paired him with Sampson (at that time, Sampson was more polished and considered to have an even higher upside than Olajuwon). Without that appreciation of context, I really cannot see how anyone can make an argument about something with which they have no appreciation.

Portland drafting Sam Bowie wasn’t seen as a blunder in 1984 and it didn’t become a topic of discussion until some Mike Greenberg-type casual fans started these comments years later. Detroit drafting Darko Milicic over Carmelo Anthony was a blunder, IMO, because there were questions about Milicic’s playing ability before the draft and immediately afterwards.

People didn’t blast drafting Bowie then or immediately until the out-of-context casual fans started in. Moreover, it wasn’t anything that came close to wrecking Portland’s franchise (unless you call 19 straight playoff appearances, four Western Conference finals appearances and two NBA Finals appearances since 1984 “wrecking a franchise”).

#1 I never questioned the deals you proposed to me. Those deals are entirely different proposals then the one I am referring to. Just because you never heard of this deal doesn’t mean it wasn’t something that happened, there has to be hundreds of deals that get proposed during a NBA season that we don’t hear about because we aren’t insiders.

Rod Thorn after meeting with Mel Turbin and Bowie:
“Bowie was very sharp, thorn said. Turbin was not quite as sharp.” “Past experience, and a sudden surge of caution, greatly benefited Thorn. Despite the fine impression that Bowie had made, Thorn wanted no part of him because of what happened to the injury-prone Lester….In Thorn’s mind, the choice was really between Jordan and Perkins, and Thorn just wasn’t all that impressed with Perkins.” Source: Tip-Off by Filip Bondy (The other major point of these post was to highlight this book with is fantastic. It is 100% about this draft, the players and parties involved and gives a subjective and factual account by an insider present during the 1984 draft.)

#2 I never said the Bulls didn’t want a big man. In fact since the day Thorn arrived in Chicago he preached the “big men win championships” mantra from day 1. The two bigs Chi and the rest of the league really cared about where Hakeem and Ewing (who stayed in school) Had Ewing declared who knows how far Bowie would have dropped. Portland had to sell themselves on Bowie once the coin flip didn’t fall in their favor because they were dying for Hakeem, not Bowie. Oh and Portland loved Jordan, but like I already said history and their current situation dictated they take Bowie (again the point of the post was to make that known). The trade talks for Sikma, Carroll and Rollins all support that the fact that Chi wanted a big man. But don’t mistake that as them having a real interest in Bowie, they wanted Hakeem or Ewing. In fact, once the Bulls were set on Jordan Thorn went to Stu Inman to make sure Portland was taking Bowie because if they changed their mind and took Jordan the Bulls had no back-up plan. They didn’t want Bowie or Perkins, and even more so than Jordan, NO ONE could have known what Charles Barkley was getting ready to do in the NBA.

The fact that these other deals didn’t go down and Thorn ended up keeping the #3 pick supports another line of thinking for me. 1. If these other teams were entertaining and proposing trades to move their centerpiece big men for Jordan what does that say about Jordan’s perceived value? Like I said it’s impossible to predict what he went on to do, but to me that sounds like genuine belief he was an impact, franchise changing player that would help a team win right away. 2. A large reason Thorn didn’t go forward with these trades was because just about the entire NBA, if not the entire league, loved Jordan in this draft and Thorn felt that in the months and weeks leading up to the draft. He thought if people are willing to make these deals and are so high on Jordan he must be the right pick and just strengthened their choice to take him. Oh and this choice to take Jordan was made fairly early, the trade talks came after, obviously nothing developed which suggest no deal was close enough to being done or good enough to make it happen.

Oh also on your Houston point above. Houston loved Jordan as well. There was a little known rumor in the Texas papers that Houston’s coach Bill Fitch (who talked to Dean Smith at length about MJ and praised Jordan generously in the media) was trying to get Houston to offer Ralph Sampson to Chicago for Jordan. This basically would have created Shaq and Kobe, before Shaq and Kobe. Rod Thorn caught wind of this and would have made that deal without blinking, Sampson was ROY how could he not. Phone calls were never made either way and the deal fizzled away in history, but the deal made more sense than having two 7-footers playing at the same time. Again proof people were obsessed with size back then.

Interesting article from the Kentucky faithful. We can go at this forever and I really have little interest in doing so. Agree to disagree.

That’s incorrect. Chicago INITIATED the trade talks between the three-way deal involving the Los Angeles Clippers and Dallas. In the proposed deal, Chicago would have gotten Terry Cummings and James Donaldson (Mark Aguirre wasn’t even part of the discussion) while Dallas would have given up Rolando Blackman and Jay Vincent to the Clippers. It would have been the Mavs who got the No. 3 overall pick.

“Also, the Bulls wanted no part of Sam Bowie and would have been devastated if Portland snatched Jordan and left Bowie for the Bulls. And I wonder other than Portland, who else was high on Bowie? If Portland doesn’t take Bowie, how far does he drop?”

Again, incorrect. Chicago wanted one of the two top big men in the draft, in this case Bowie or Hakeem Olajuwon. The fact the Bulls didn’t get one of the first two picks in the ‘84 draft is the reason the Bulls were entertaining offers from the likes of Seattle (Jack Sikma), Golden State (Joe Barry Carroll), Atlanta (Tree Rollins) and the three-way deal with the Clippers.

Here is an article dealing with the same topic (that also uses quotes from the Chicago Tribune discussing the Bulls’ trade options):

http://www.bigbluehistory.net/bb/bowie.html

And I quote from the post if you even read it “In hindsight the correct move for Inman and the Trailblazers was to sign & trade Jim Paxson and Clyde Drexler for a center rather than pass on the greatest player in the history of the NBA.” Therefore I acknowledged it was hindsight accurately reiterating the same “ridiculous proposal” made by a major party involved Coach Ramsay.

And like I said, the Chicago attempts to trade the #3 pick not only suggests that people didn’t expect Jordan to be Jordan, it also serves as evidence of the drafting and player philosophy that teams had back then which in my opinion put a bit too much weight on big men. Tree Rollins at no point in his career was of equal value of a #3, whether you were drafting Jordan, Perkins, Barkley or Stockton.

Don’t mistake my comments about Bowie being “pretty good” or “marginal” as me believing he was a bad player. Darko, isn’t very good at all and not even worth mentioning in the same conversation as Bowie. My point is he was a good college player for 2 years. After the injury whether he was cleared by doctors or not his risk factors went up. And I am less convinced of his potential to be a great NBA big man than you are. We can simply agree to disagree.

So basically yes Jordan was player of the year twice like I said. I know the difference and that is why I didn’t included consensus designation in that reply to you, I did in a previous comment above referring only to ‘84. But the point still remains, why pass on the consensus best player in college basketball the season before that draft for a player coming off a leg injury – that was at best considered of equal caliber with MJ? No need to answer, I gave 5 good reasons in the post which was the point of it.

Also, I agree it would be impossible to predict a college player to be considered one of the greatest ever, but I also think around the league and especially in the Bulls camp they believe Jordan would be an impact, franchise changing player immediately. I will pull some quotes that reinforce this thought. I know they passed on a trade from Dallas for All-Star Mark Aguirre (29ppg, 6 boards in ‘83-’84) valuing Jordan more than the proven scoring commodity Aguirre. That says a lot to me about the expectations Rob Thorn and the Dallas organization had for Michael Jordan.

Also, the Bulls wanted no part of Sam Bowie and would have been devastated if Portland snatched Jordan and left Bowie for the Bulls. And I wonder other than Portland, who else was high on Bowie? If Portland doesn’t take Bowie, how far does he drop?

Michael Jordan was NOT a two-time college basketball player of the year (at least, not consensus). Jordan was I believe the Sporting News player of the year in 1982-83 but Ralph Sampson took all the major hardware that season. Jordan was the consensus player of the year in 1983-84.