The Trail Blazers are deeper, better and more equipped for the NBA playoffs. So says Neil Olshey, the team's President of Basketball Operations, who traded for Arron Afflalo and Alonzo Gee Thursday morning, a few hours before the NBA trade deadline passed.

Olshey dissected what the additions will bring to the Blazers, how the pair of players will impact the team's tight-knit chemistry, the chances Afflalo will stay in Portland beyond this season and more during an interview with reporters at the team's practice facility in Tualatin. Here's a transcript of his interview:

General thoughts on the trade:

"We've been working on it for a couple of weeks. We had a specific need. We felt like we needed a veteran presence off our bench on the wing. We have really good young talented guys still here, like Allen (Crabbe) and CJ (McCollum). But the playoff push we're trying to make, it requires veterans and it requires guys that have been battle-tested through the playoffs. Arron and I go back a long way to Los Angeles from the time he was a high school player at UCLA. I worked him out in his summers when he got traded to Denver ... so I know he can help us. We had a very specific set of criteria for anybody that we were going to acquire and Arron met every single criteria that we had established. I think our veteran players are happy to add him. It gives us a better chance to win at a higher level. And that's the goal this year. We're in a win-now mode. We've got a window here. We want to keep this group together. But in order to do that, we've got to prove to the veterans that are here that we're willing to acquire players that will impact our chances to win at a high level."

Skill-wise, what's the biggest thing Afflalo brings?

"Arron's a basketball player. He plays both ends of the floor. He's got a post game. He makes threes. He can catch and shoot. He's got a midrange game. He's a tough defender. I think his defensive numbers will look even better in our system. Knowing how he's been (used) at different points in his career for the coaches he's played, scheme-wise, I think what we do will complement his toughness and ability to move his feet. So he's going to impact both ends of the court."

Have you spoken to Afflalo? If so, what are his thoughts on coming off the bench and having a reduced role?

"He's fine. Arron and I spoke this morning and he wants to win. And that's all he cares about right now. He was in a rebuilding situation in Orlando and it's been a tough year in Denver. It just hasn't gone they way they anticipated. So for Arron to get a chance this late in the season to go to a team that was in the second round of the playoffs last year, with players he respects, a system that will complement his skill-set, and the ability to win at a high level, that's all that matters. He's going to get minutes. I think we all realize at a certain point, as you get older in the league, when you have a chance to win, that trumps whether or not you're the first one to run out of the tunnel or not."

Can you speak to the fact that he can be a free agent this summer? Did that weigh on decision to trade for him?

"We want to win. Not everybody's contract is going to be the perfect contract relative to a long-term decision. That's why we moved the draft pick out to 2016. No matter what, it does not impact us this year in terms of our business. We'll address Arron's contract situation later. But we've strategically planned to have budget flexibility this summer to keep this group together while adding other pieces. We're going to be fine. If this works out and we can keep all of them, we'll be in a position to do that."

How do you like the team overall now?

"I love the team. I loved it this morning at 5 a.m. when I came to the office. And I loved it at 6 when we agreed to trade for Arron Afflalo. We felt like we weren't really where we needed to be a year ago, but we were closer that we were. And I think we're closer still now. Some of the guys in the media want to talk about how wide open the West is. The west is actually closed. OK. Everybody looks at the fact that there's no clear No. 1 as that it's open. It's not. You're going to have a situation where you're going to have four teams that are going to go home after the first round of the playoffs thinking they should have been in the Western Conference championship. And that's just a reality of how tough our conference is. It was incumbent upon us, knowing that, to make the roster better when we had the opportunity. And we spent the last couple weeks trying to generate opportunities to improve our depth, get guys in here that have played in big games, that will complement our veterans and add to our culture. And we basically honed in on Arron."

Was it tough giving away the players you traded?

"It wasn't easy. I can tell you. Victor Claver has been a consummate professional since he's been here. He helped us when he could. He played a limited role. I know Thomas Robinson was disappointed. He played significant minutes on a playoff team last year. We brought in Chris (Kaman) and with Meyers (Leonard's) emergence and the way Joel (Freeland) had played prior to injuries, he maybe didn't get the opportunities he expected. I think Will Barton is going to have a huge finish in Denver. Will Barton keeps getting better and better. He's probably improved as much as a person over the last 2-1/2 years, in terms of maturity, as much as any player I've been around. He's gotten stronger, his game is more refined. Like I said, it just comes down to, when you walk into a playoff series and you can have a multi-year vet that's been on 57-win playoff teams and competed on the highest level, you can't pass up that opportunity when you're trying to win. It's one of the things about our league; you can't be a development team and a winning team. They're not always independent of one another, but they're more independent than people would like to admit."

Can you detail the parameters of the draft pick you're sending Denver?

"The way the pick works is this: In 2016, if our pick is in the lottery, we retain it. If it's outside the lottery, it goes to Denver. If they don't get the pick, we move to 2017, once again lottery-protected. If it's not conveyed, it just converts to our 2018 second (round pick) and our 2019 second."

What does Alonzo Gee bring to the team?

"Nobody's really talking about that, but I think anybody that watched our game at Denver (saw) the impact he can have on the defensive end of the court. We really felt like we wanted to make sure Alonzo was included in the deal. Because we were losing an athlete and an open-floor player like Will. Alonzo is unique. We have a lot of highly skilled guys that make shots on our team. But he guards three positions, he's an NBA-caliber athlete, he's a tough kid, he's excited about being here and having a chance to compete. He hasn't been to the playoffs before, so he's excited about that opportunity. We'll see. He's going to get a chance. Having a guy who's an elite defender when you get into a playoff series, it's just a nice luxury to have. And it adds even more depth on our perimeter."

One of the downsides of the trade is the potential impact on your team chemistry. How do you see Afflalo fitting in, what are his personality traits?

"Arron is a gamer. He actually reminds me a lot of Wesley (Matthews). They're both guys -- Arron went later in the draft that he thought. He wasn't as heralded coming out of UCLA. He kind of got into a grit-and-grind team with Detroit. He played his role and then got to Denver and really made his bones. His path isn't that much different than Wes, even though he was officially a first-round pick. But he's a classy kid. He competes. He's about winning. He knows how to win. He's a guy that's overachieved probably, based on some physical tools, not unlike Wes. We've talked a lot about this with Wesley lately, he came into the league as a non-shooter, and now here he is leading the league in made three-pointers. Arron is the same way. Arron wasn't an elite shooter coming out of UCLA. But he's worked on that. His ball-handling has improved. His defense. We wouldn't have brought him in if we didn't think he would immediately assimilate to our culture. And that was the first criteria on our board, making sure that there would be no dissention among the current players based on who we would bring from the outside. And like I said, that's why we had a short list. It wasn't a big list that we were willing to bring in and indoctrinate into our culture, knowing our guys would embrace them."

Did you speak to LaMarcus Aldridge and Damian Lillard and others on the team about Afflalo?

"I can't look that dumb, can I? (laughs) Of course. LaMarcus and I discussed it. Dame and I discussed it. We brought up names, guys we like, guys we should add to the roster. We had talked to all our guys this morning and wanted to make sure that it was somebody they felt would help us. So this is not unique. I did this in Los Angeles too. They're the ones that are going to share the floor with the guys we bring in. So they're going to know better than us, at times, who's going to help them win games and who isn't and who's going to work in our locker room and who isn't. I can tell you when we add players via trade like this, especially when we're going to give up an asset, they aren't done in a front office vacuum. The coaching staff is a part of this decision, our players are a part of this decision. The background intel and research that we did. All that goes into it to make sure the guys we bring in are going to be embraced when they get here."

If you're in a win-now mode, how does this trade stack the team in the Western Conference standings?

"I don't know. I've talked about this. I don't know if the standings this year are as important as being healthy and how you're playing at the time. We've played better basketball since (Robin Lopez) came back. I think we've added some depth in terms of guys that now have a body of work they may not have gotten if not for the injuries. So I think Terry (Stotts) has more confidence the later he gets into the rotation. But, like I said, record is record. At some point, once the playoffs start, it just becomes a number. And clearly you'd like to try to get home court advantage and win the division and those are our goals. But I do think with the injuries we've battled through, I think everybody being at their peak, being 100 percent and getting Arron into the mix and getting our chemistry going forward over the next 29 games, is going to be as valuable as what our seeding is."

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