Following the dismissal of Portland assistant GM Tom Penn — an exec the T-Wolves had previously sought to run their basketball operations last summer — a line in the sand has clearly been drawn between pissed off ownership and Blazers GM Kevin Pritchard, with Yahoo Sports’ Adrian Wojnarowski citing the latter’s history of “desperation and immaturity”.
When negotiations became contentious with star Brandon Roy(notes), Pritchard didn™t stand firm with the limits of ownership™s offer. What™s more, Pritchard tried to cozy up to Roy by selling the notion that it was the two of them together trying to get the contracts they deserved from owner Paul Allen. For the unparalleled resources Allen has provided Pritchard to remake the roster “ millions in dollars to purchase draft picks, packaging them in trades or stockpiling prospects overseas “ Vulcan was beyond irate that Pritchard still couldn™t present a united front when Allen decided to make a financial stand.
Pritchard would go around the NBA, and surprise peers with questions that included, œHow much do you make? before launching into diatribes about how he couldn™t understand why he was so poorly compensated in Portland, especially in comparison to McMillan.
After several days of scorched earth by his agent Warren LeGarie, sources say Pritchard is desperate to find a way to save his job. After months of listening to LeGarie tell him he™d be in great demand on the market, Pritchard is finding that might not be the truth.
Pritchard and Larry Miller doing a press thing in two hours.
I guess it’s noble of Wojnarowski to view himself as the lone voice of reason in a world of blindly following Pritchardites. But he and his sources’ apparent omniscient knowledge of Pritchard’s characterless and unjust motives is becoming a joke. His claims about Pritchard have always been so vicious that by now a personal vendetta is apparent, and his assumed closeness to the situation doubtful in my mind.