No, you missed seeing the Blazers give up a 31-2 run. 30 FUCKING 1 TO 2. 31-2. To the Memphis Grizzlies, at home. How could the Blazers let that happen? Big time fail.
Well, not having seen it myself, it appears that the majority of that run came after Oden was pulled in the 1st. 21-0 while he was out. That's just crazy.
I didn't really like Miller's game tonight. For a PG he really took a couple bad shots in there. I'd like to see him become even more of a passer.
I think we might be seeing a couple of phenomena at play. Roy hasn't quite looked himself all year (he's either doing too much or too little and hasn't really seemed in the flow of the offense), and in the case of guys like Steve and Joel we're seeing them flutter back to earth from their "career years" Roy I don't worry too much about long term, I think he's got a lot to adjust to with a true low post center in Oden needing touches and a true point guard soaking up minutes; an adjustment was probably inevitable. Blake and Joel? I'm not sure you can expect a huge rebound in performance; it may be time to cut bait and get what you can for them while there's still a market, especially with free agency looming for both -- although I'm not super eager to get rid of Joel unless you plan to trade for a high quality forward/center and intend to go with a 3 player front-court rotation with a guy like Pendergraph potentially soaking up 5-10 minutes a night max. (sort of like the old Sheed, Grant, Sabonis rotation).
Somebody help me understand what is going on with Brandon. I can think of 5 plays that were just brutal (even if his final stats looked decent) He's not finishing, he's getting blocked . . . NO WONDER why he is setting for jumpers (which he's not making) This just isn't the same guy, and I don't know why.
Thank god Nate is sparing him. It's especially nice to see the consistency with the 6 minute sub in the first quarter -- gotta get that much ballyhooed "second unit" in there ...
I think it's a combination of not playing basketball this summer, dropping about 10 pounds from last year (especially on the driving part), Greg being in the post, and Andre being on the team. And you know, Blake dropping down from his career year. But Brandon is making some bad decisions and reads on when to drive - especially at the end of the game tonight.
I thought Roy looked like his old self in the 2nd Q. He was handling the ball on every play and ended up with 15pts and 7 assists at the half on 5-10 shooting, and Miller only played 5min in the 1st half. I'd like to see Roy become more of the playmaker. As much as I thought Miller would help it's just apparent it's not working. I hate to say that, but I see no chemistry between the two on the court. Some players just don't mesh together.
I'm not going to disagree Roy looked off his game but damn near got a triple double playing poorly....
Roy in the postgame saying it's not lack of energy, just guys confused about what they're doing on offense. I'm not a basketball expert, but don't professional teams usually practice a thing called "plays" then call them out and run them during the game?
Ah, Nate talking about scrappiness, scrappy play. Says he needed to change the lineup to fire people up. barfo
Maybe it's a combination of Nate being a pretty below average X/O coach and perhaps the team is starting to tune him out.
It's just, I don't see him taking over games anymore. Certainly not like last year, where he would impose his will on the game, making shot after shot and then passing at the right moments. Now he seems to hesitate when he knows he has to get it going. He ends up forcing bad shots, making bad passes, deferring when he shouldn't, and even missing the easy shots. I think it's more of a mental thing, but I don't know how he's going to snap out of it.
Ahh I think I remember when Nate tried to fire up the players. Did you see when he unfolded his arms. I almost missed it but MM pointed it out. That fired me up!
