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“If they hadn’t done that, I would have finished my career in Portland”

In 1983 with their 14th pick the Portland Trail Blazers had a hollow nose in selecting a certain Clyde Drexler, who has become over the years the biggest legend of the franchise and made him know his best years even if he could not lead them to the title despite 2 finals and 3 consecutive conference finals between 1990 and 1992. It was in 1995, at the age of 32, that he finally left Oregon, heading for his hometown of Houston. Guest of the Posecast, he returned to this trade

“Portland is the team that drafted me while other teams didn’t select me. For me you have to be loyal. I have been in that they have been. I could have left many years before, New York offered me a lot of money. But it was the team that drafted me. The Rockets didn’t pick me, the Mavericks didn’t pick me. Several Texas teams have decided not to select me despite my impact at college (in Houston). The only reason I left Portland was because they were rebuilding. Because after all these great years I had knee injuries. And they gave up a bit too soon. So they started to rebuild and got rid of Kevin Duckworth. And I was like, ‘Wait guys, we don’t have a pivot!’ Then they started to say, ‘We have to rebuild, we need to transfer some veterans while they can still play so that we can get a counterpart.’ This is where I orchestrated this trade for Houston. But if they hadn’t done that, I would have ended my career there, out of loyalty. ” Clyde Drexler

He had arrived in a struggling Houston team after they had just won the title. She had a record of 30-17 at the time of the trade and that did not improve afterwards as with Clyde they finished the regular season with 17 wins and 18 losses for a final record of 47-35. But we know the rest, despite the seed number 6 they went on to the title.

“They were in trouble, and they couldn’t get along off the pitch and that was one of the reasons for the problem. So they knew they had to blow up the team and few would have the guts to upset the workforce of a champion team without giving them a chance to keep their title. But it was going so badly that something had to be done. So I was contacted. I was like, ‘Hey, Portland wants to rebuild and I want to fight for a title because I’m healthy and can still do what I did the previous 3-4 years. For my last years, I want to fight for the title. So going to Houston made perfect sense. I called Hakeem then I called GM and they were really interested and they said, ‘We’re gonna do this.’ It was done and with hindsight it was the best move I made. ” Clyde Drexler

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