They are winning the games they are supposed to. Playing tough and winning some of the games they are supposed to have trouble with. They are 100% against the eastern conference. They seem to be having good luck with injuries. Chemistry is good. This team is getting better. They are right on schedule in my book. Will they win a championship this year? Can't be certain but they are in the mix and they seem like they are poised to stay in the mix for the next few years. That says they are in the window of opportunity to me. That is where they are supposed to be right?
6 game road winning streak. We don't get rattled at the end of games on the road. MSG was rocking down the stretch tonight and Aldridge calmly buried two FTs and a long jumper to get the win for us. We don't choke like the Drexler teams and Sheed teams had the tendency to do. We are mentally tough. The only point we wavered was the end of the GS game but the refs didn't acknowledge Batum's timeout and then didn't call the foul when Matthews got hacked. If that happened in a playoff series, we'd bounce back and win the series.
You nailed it! That's the biggest and best thing I've noticed with this team. We don't choke and we definitely have go to clutch players to win these types of games. You are also right about the Drexler and Wallace teams. They did choke. In fact, I remembered listening to Chuck Daily in a huddle and he emphasized how Portland chokes and keep the pressure on. The closest team of clutch play during my view, was the Roy led Blazers. Problem with that team was the coach and the lack of the second star. Aldridge wasn't there yet...
Other people have mentioned it I think but I'm most impressed that we are winning and we can play better. I'd almost go so far as to say when our 3 point shooting is on we are nearly unbeatable with our improved defense. And the bench will get better as the season goes along.
Yeah. this is how i feel too! get the rust out against the east and play well enough against the good teams.
Julius was right when he said last year, for much of the season, the Spurs couldn't beat the good teams.
Agree with this as well. The wins don't seem as lucky, and although there have been some interesting and entertaining 4th quarters (as with any team), there's not many W's that I'd say that we SHOULD have lost. Could have? Sure, there's a few, but games we should've lost? Not so much. The difference is in the intention of what we're trying to do is right, and the execution is coming along with it. With borderline teams, oftentimes one or both of intention and execution are questionable. Or to say it simpler: we're doing the right things and it's working.
Still not sold on our offense. It'll be good enough to be a Top 5 seeded team, but I don't buy it as a contender. And our defense just gave up 50% shooting to the Knicks. Defensive improvement is immense, but I think it's also a bit over-hyped. Unfortunately, I think we're seeing the same thing we saw last year - a good W/L record to start the season, but I'm less and less impressed by it as the weeks go by.
I think our Texas swing will say a lot about our team. SAS, NOP, HOU, OKC. 4 Games in 5 nights and 2 B2B's obviously. Going 3-1 on that trip would speak volumes. Lofty goals sure but that it the type of trip that would speak to where we really are. Also the SAS and OKC games could go a long way towards deciding season series tie breakers.
I don't know why you would use just one game to make an observation for the entire season. Lets give you the true numbers. The numbers that have been accumulated throughout the season. 1.) The Blazers hold teams to a 43.4% shooting, which is 6th in the entire league. 2.) The more important advanced stat shows the Blazers holding opponents to eFG of 46.3%, which is third best in the entire league. 3.) We hold teams to 29.6% from 3, which is 2nd best in the league. 4.) We are 5th in allowing 2% FG at 46.8% 5.) We are second in the league at TS% at 100.2% 6.) We are tied for 8th in Block% at 6.3% 7.) We are 5th in the entire league for holding teams assists per game at 19.3 8.) We are #1 in the entire league in RPG So I don't know why you suspect our defense? We are top 10 in every major category.
About a quarter of the way through the season and the Blazers have won 80% of their games, what's not to like? They're winning at about the rate they did last season despite predictions around here that they wouldn't be able to reproduce last season's hot start. Sure, their winning percentage will come down as they start playing more top-tier western teams the second half of the season, but they're on pace to duplicate or exceed last year's 54 wins, which is pretty darned impressive. Their offense hasn't been clicking the way it has in the past, but the perimeter shooting will come back and the defense is an order of magnitude better than last year at the same time. The Blazers are doing everything right to put themselves into contending status. Stay healthy and keep doing what they're doing.
I said I don't buy our offense, and that while our defense is vastly improved I think we're over-hyping it. Despite having a good OppFG% in the paint, we're 9th worst at allowing opponents TO shoot in the paint.
Had a similar trip last year, and we went 1-4. I still don't think we're capable of beating all those team on the road. I haven't yet seen a game in a while where we put down a team from start to finish and play a complete game on both ends. Our record is nice but I don't see it being sustainable based on the play so far. This tendency to flip a switch and letting bad teams hang with us is frustrating.
Agreed which is why I feel like personally I would be happy with 2-2 whereas 3-1 really feels "elite" if you will.
This is the year. We win it all and paul allen opens the bank account. We keep the core pick up a vet maybe and put together a dynasty for lillards entire career
You can flip that around... We haven't see a team able to take us down either. In fact, I think we've only lost 1 game trailing in the 4th. The other 3 losses were when we had ties going into the 4th. As much as I would love to blow out teams, I think these nail biters are good for the ball club. We need diversity style games to always keep us on our toes. Steam rolling through the competition may not help us for the real battles of the post season.
You have to be pleased with 16-4 start. The thing that's frustrating is how ridiculous the Western Conf is. When have you ever seen the #7 seed (Dallas) on pace to win 60 games this far into the season? Nobody said it would be easy, but Memphis & GS playing this well just makes it absurd. And now OKC is about to join the party. If we run into injury problems or just hit a dry spell, it could mean slipping to the 8 spot within a week or 2. NBA dynamics just really strange right now - 8 teams on pace to win 60 games, 7 teams on pace to lose 60 games. Both would be records by far.
