Darius Miles Saga Ends With a Whimper

In case you missed it, Memphis gave Darius Miles some playing time on Friday, cementing his un-retirement and sticking his $9 million per year salary back on Portland's books for this year and next. The story -- so fierce a week ago -- went out quietly as Miles showed there's no controversy in his presence on the floor: dude can still play.

But Yahoo!'s Adrian Wojnarowski, who has been a central actor in revealing some facts of the matter and exposing Portland's unsuccessful attempts to make Miles radioactive, gets off one final flurry of fury at Blazers GM Kevin Pritchard.

Woj's column basically lights Pritch on fire by way of flaming arrow:

For whatever hollow intimidation they used to try to stop the signing of Miles, Blazers officials understood this: They were the last people who would've wanted to go under oath about the behind-the-scenes machinations of Miles' injury retirement. Only the Blazers would've been on trial. Only they would've had to answer the most uncomfortable of questions.

From leaked drug tests and public proclamations of private medical records to trashing Miles to rival executives and daring to claim him off waivers to stash him away on the inactive list, Portland's front office acted in bad form and bad faith. Yes, the Jail Blazers lived again.

I imagine that Woj and Pritch have fought behind the scenes with regards to the vigor the writer has covered a story so embarrassing to the franchise. While Pritchard can't blast off on Wojnarowski in public, A.W. obviously has no such restraints. This is one of the most biting columns you'll ever see from a respected NBA writer.

Dave Deckard of Blazers Edge makes the point that beyond the threatening letter Portland prez Larry Miller sent during Miles' final free agency period, the Blazers have followed the rules regarding medical retirement. Does the process need to change to prevent malfeasance? Did the process fail here?

No, it didn't. The rules are in place to prevent players from being pushed into medical retirement by an overeager team, and to prevent teams from using the system to get out of an unruly contract. Miles felt that despite Portland's insistence and the agreement of some rubber-stamp doctors he could still compete in the NBA. He was right. Portland shouldn't have any salary relief for a medical retirement that's obviously wrong.

If in the future some team tries to screw a franchise that has medically retired a player, it will either be obvious or we'll find out that player shouldn't be medically retired. Any argument about teams just trying to screw Portland is irrelevant because Miles is fit to play. It seems the system worked flawlessly, really. And we'll know when a player can't perform but gets into 10 games regardless. In that case, sue away.