Forgive me, but I just can't spin the company line. Not with the Trail Blazers failing to re-sign their best player, not with clumsy plans melting like a popsicle on the pavement, not with an assistant coach turned into a scapegoat and the general manager's news conferences turning into one-man acts.

GM Neil Olshey gave another grand performance on Thursday. In 55 minutes he peddled hope and the future. It's what you do when you don't have a present or even much of a past to sell publicly. Olshey sold the notion Thursday that this front office drove a quick turn-around once before, that in just 12 short months the Blazers went from 33 victories to 54 victories, forgetting that in just 12 short days that same front office got blitzed by the league's contenders.

Damian Lillard is part of the near future. I also like a couple of the young players Portland picked up in the fray, especially Ed Davis, who was the Lakers best player on some nights last season. But in its current form, this is an undermanned roster and asking the public to place blind trust in management after they've eroded so much of it feels ridiculous.

Need to see more. Need to see better. Get back to us when you've built another winner.

Not all of this pitch-man act is Olshey's fault. He's just become the latest face doing the selling. Bob Whitsitt became John Nash became Steve Patterson became Kevin Pritchard became Rich Cho, then acting GM Chad Buchanan and finally, the seat in front of the microphone went to Olshey.

What the organization doesn't realize is that the public hangover and frustration in the wake of the decision to go young this summer isn't just about losing Aldridge. I mean, it stinks. But the real frustration stems from fans being told to have patience when they've already demonstrated so much of it over the years.

Olshey is the franchise's seventh general manager since 2002. After Whitsitt left in the summer of 2003 Paul Allen and right-hand friend Bert Kolde called a news conference in the Rose Room of the arena, preaching a change of culture.

Nash was hired and preached patience and rebuilding. When Nash was fired, Patterson sold youth and patience. After that, Pritchard sold culture. Then, Cho again sold patience, pointing to the Oklahoma City Thunder as the blue print. When that all blew up (because Allen didn't like Cho's personality?!?), Buchanan assumed the hot seat, but not really with any clout because ownership wanted the seat for itself. Then, Olshey showed up and most of us liked him because at least he could talk it and seemed like the kind of cat who could talk circles around Allen and the Vulcans. Now, that talk is all we get anymore.

This was once a great NBA franchise led by inspired men like founder Harry Glickman, coach Jack Ramsay and forward Maurice Lucas. Those men cared. They fought. And they made a city believe. Nobody had to sell anyone. Those who were here talk with wide eyes about the conviction the organization oozed.

A parade was eventually planned up Broadway, causing grown men to climb street signs and lamp posts while celebrating a championship. But somewhere along the line, over many years and too many changes, Trail Blazers, Inc. turned into an exhausting relationship for fans.

The brand broke.

That's where Olshey was flat wrong on Thursday. Because he stated that the brand of the Blazers would outlast us all. He said it like a judge, minus the robe and gavel. I suppose he was right about general managers coming and going. He was also right about coaches, players and executives. We've seen so many come and go. But he was woefully wrong about the brand of the Blazers. Because it's a broken brand today, and I'm not sure ignoring the continued and chronic chaos helps fix it.

What feeling do you get when you think Trail Blazers? What images do you think about? What could Olshey and Co. do to alter any of that?

What fans want more than anything in Portland isn't a championship today. Winning is a symptom not a solution. What fans desire most on a day like today is congruency of vision, a good plan forming on the horizon, and to actually feel hopeful instead of feeling like they're just being sold on the idea of hope.

This can be fixed. That's the best part of it. With action, not talk. It's time to stop posturing and get to work with a good plan. Because continually insisting that nothing is wrong and there was nothing the organization could have done to stop what happened doesn't solve a thing.

The organization blew it. It's had a miserable summer. So let's own it and move forward instead of focusing on a narrative that makes everyone complicit look good.

I hope Olshey survives more than another season or two. I hope ownership doesn't attempt to pin the blame for what could be a difficult season in 2015-16 on coach Terry Stotts. I hope the talk about winning and building turns back toward actually winning and building. Shuffling the executives and players in a seemingly random pattern hasn't worked. Time for something new.

The worst enemy of Trail Blazers Inc. isn't that fan exhaustion, though. The enemy isn't even the NBA opposition, even if the rest of the league did just poach 4/5 of a pretty good starting lineup. The NBA organization's worst enemy, for years, has been the organization itself.

It's been like watching a good friend suffer.

--- @JohnCanzanoBFT