On Monday, Mo Williams agreed to sign with the Minnesota Timberwolves for one year after one effective season with the Portland Trail Blazers.
After doing so, he expressed feelings of gratitude towards the fans and the Blazers organization for giving him the opportunity to play for them.
Apparently, though, the backup point guard had to deal with some heckling fans about his time in Portland, and he decided to address those particular folks in a quick string of tweets:
All the blazers fans that’s bashing me for leaving don’t have a clue what’s going on. If Portland trailblazers wanted to sign Mo (1/2)
— Mo Williams (@mowilliams) July 30, 2014
Williams, in all retrospect, they could have. That’s gone be my 1st n last addressing that. Its a business people (2/2)
— Mo Williams (@mowilliams) July 30, 2014
So this is an interesting issue that Williams is bringing up, given that there never was any talk of friction between him and the Blazers.
There is no question that the team could have used him again in the upcoming season – their thin bench was a huge issue two seasons ago and Williams helped fix that very issue last season – but Steve Blake was signed to a two-year deal worth $4.2 million a few weeks ago. The signing essentially meant the Blazers would let Williams walk.
Blake was undoubtedly cheaper, but he is simply not someone who can provide an offensive spark off the bench the way Williams can, so the decision to go with Blake over a player that the team apparently could have kept seems curious at best.
That Williams is willing to go as far as to publicly announce the team had the opportunity to keep him makes it clear that there was a bit of a sour end to the relationship.
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James Park is the chief blogger and deputy editor of Sheridan Hoops. Follow him on twitter @SheridanBlog.
All the advanced stats – “win shares”, WARP, adjusted true plus/minus, etc. – showed that Mo had an overall negative effect on both defense. Very few rotation players in the league rated so badly. If you have any belief in those stats, it was simply addition by subtraction. And the current Blazers staff does believe in advanced stats.
Meant to say both offense and defense
Mo’s short tenure in Portland was mixed. He is one of the streakiest players in the league – once every 3-4 games he would shoot the lights out – but there were far too many games where he was a liability, particularly on the defensive end. I wish him luck, but the Blazers upgraded their backup point with Steve Blake’s 3rd stint in P-town.
U obviously no nothing bout basketball if u think Blake is an upgrade over MO!!!
Steve Blake is a much more well rounded player than Mo, and he plays a little thing called defense.
Mo Williams has a history with many teams on “sour grapes” There was the physical altercation with Vinny Del Negro when he was with Clippers. He was then traded to the Jazz. Injuries once again plagued as he only played 46 games and shot 38%fg% avg 13ppg. During this time he demanded he should start over Trey Burke, 2013 he promptly signed with Trailblazers , His stats continued to decline at 9.7ppg, 4 asst, shooting 41%fg% 3P% 36%. His defense was atrocious. He played 74games. He got into war of words with local media outlets specifically Dwight Jaynes. Within the organization he was sliding away from his backup Pg role. It was clear he had to move on. At age31 he finds himself on a younger team with Minnesota.
U sure do know a lot bout MO huh!!!