He also played on a team that was up tempo and relied on that for scoring, and when the playoffs came they got taken out because fast break teams can't win in the playoffs. So as you were saying?
Pretty obvious that Andre Miller would immediately vault us from being the slowest team in the league to somewhere in the middle. Which I think is fine. We'll never have an uptempo squad as long as we have Oden, Roy and McMillan. I could definitely get behind adding Miller and Odom, Miller and Bass, Hinrich and Bass, Hinrich and Odom.... There are still several possibilities, and any of them sound better to me than Hedo.
They got "taken out" because they played a better team. They weren't upset by an inferior team due to "fast paced teams not being able to win in the playoffs."
Portland has a lot more offensive options then Phili especially with their plentiful outside shooters... those sorts of players often excel with drive and kick PGs in half court sets. Having a 2nd guard who can drive and kick (or finish) would seem to make Portland's attack harder to defend... do you have any other smug questions? STOMP
Yea you guys keep throwing out Heinrich, Wallace, you name them. The deal isn't happening. This is exactly why I say wait until part way through the year, and there will still be free agents out there looking for a contract, and for cheap. If nothing else you sign them and use them for trade fodder later.
Im not sure if you want to increase the pace. Blazers have one of the most efficient perimeter playmakers in Roy, and two of the best rebounding big men in the league, neither of which has shown the ability to play in a more uptempo game. Why would you want to increase the amount of possesions in a game. I like Miller and would be an upgrade at the point, but not for the $10M/yr he is asking. Recently I have heard 3yrs at the midlevel and that does seem like a great deal.
Disagree a bit, ElCap. LMA is one of the fastest bigs down the floor in the league. He can play in a running game, provided Oden keeps up his rebounding %s. REbound, Outlet, Quick Pass up the floor to a sprinting LMA. Me LIkey.
I don't think it would be advisable to change the system, but it would be beneficial to run when there's an opportunity. Push the ball up after each rebounded miss; if you don't have the numbers, pull it back and execute your half-court offense. Every team can benefit from more easy baskets and Andre Miller can help ignite a few more fast breaks per game. Portland doesn't need to transform itself into a run & gun team.
The big difference to me would be that if we could run just a little we could add more 10 point wins and fewer nail biters. The Blazers are pretty good at squeezing out the dramatic victory, thanks to Roy, but it'd be nice to see Roy, Aldridge and Oden chuckling on the bench in the fourth quarter more. Having a guy like Miller pick his opportunities to exploit a scoring run by opening up the offense could cause that.
The Blazers were 5th in the NBA in point differential at +5.4 (behind Cleveland, Boston, LA, and Orlando), and that's at a slow pace. 6th was Houston at +4.0. Why mess with what's working?
Not sure about that since pace is a relatively new stat, but it's a bit surprising to see this information. http://basketball-statistics.com/theanatomyofachampion.html
Is it just me or didn't we have a shitload of blowouts last season...? Weren't we among the leaders in point differentials...?
Yeah, on average 13 places ahead of us. That article (a good read by the way) shows our other weak areas like age and defense.
We have to mess with what's working anyway. I mean, Blake isn't a starting quality PG for a championship team, even though he was a factor in the efficient offense. Replacing him with anyone is going to "mess with what's working," but most people here think it's worth doing. We were also going to add Hedo, who was going to change the look of our team too (making us taller, slower, a better passing team). I'd prefer to add a PG who brought more defense to the table than Miller, but he still seems to be enough of an upgrade over Blake on that end to make it worth while. Do I think it's imperative that we become a run-and-gun team? Definitely not. Am I comfortable having the slowest team in the league? I guess. But it seems like we could make it a little easier on ourselves if we just ran a little more. Miller would definitley help in that department.
Defense is my top concern as a fan and is the primary reason Portland lost the Houston series IMO. The team is going to be young barring a major reshuffling, so that's hard to correct, and pace may increase as the young players like Oden get a more varied offensive game. Miller would help with pace though, no doubt about it.
I am not advocating it in this particular post, but until we fire Nate, our team will always have a low pace.
