But in order to win those 64 games and beat out the Warriors like you predicted, we better step it up a bit right?
It should take more time to figure out. Some new players (Turner, Napier who IMO should play), some players coming back a little bit slow from the summer (Ed Davis), Meyers just now getting into the rotation. Vonleh that needs to regain confidence. Some new rotations, many (too many?) bigs that Stotts should figure out how to maximize their ability and keep them happy (making decisions based on playing the right players in the right matchups should do both). There are some lessons learned, like if you wanna play with both Turner and Crabbe you better have Harkless or Meyers at the 4 for spacing and creativity. It'll take some time but we'll get there. CJ started a bit slow and is now getting in rhythm. We still don't look amazing but we're starting to look better
These days, our rebounding, more so even than our poor interior defense, is our biggest problem. As others have pointed out, our offense isn't the problem. We are scoring 3.6 more PTS/G than last year. Fix the rebounding and it will go a long way to fixing our other problems. Last year, we were 5th in the league in TRB/G at 45.5. This year, we are dead last at 41.2 TRB/G. Last year we were 3rd in the league in ORB/G at 11.6. This year, we are also dead last in ORB/G at 7.8. How the fuck does a team, with no significant roster changes, go from basically the 4th best rebounding team in the league to dead last? Seriously, how does that happen? A lot of that is on Ed Davis' disappearing act, but he's not the only one. I feel compelled to call out Ed, after I relentlessly defended him, saying he was just as good a rebounder and a better player than Kennth Faried, when rumors of Fareid's availability were first mentioned. Right now, Ed is making me look like an idiot. I want last year's Ed Davis back, please. BNM
Wish I could like this a billion times. Our rebounding sucks and is our biggest problem. It's impossible to get out rebounded every night and finish the season with a winning record. We're BARELY beating the dregs of the league, the teams we should be beating by double digits, because we can't rebound the basketball. Watching all the film in the world and refining the offense won't do a damn bit of good if we don't start boxing the fuck out! Jeezus guys, that's about as fundamental as it gets. Boxing out was one of the very first skills I taught 5 and 6 years olds when I coached YMCA ball. Even little kids that don't yet have the motor skills and hand eye coordination to dribble and shoot, can learn to box out. So do it!!! BNM
Dame was our second leading rebounder yesterday (8 to Plum's 9, Ed's 7. and Leonard's 4). How in the hell does a 6'3" PG, who's also carrying the scoring load, double up a 7'1" guy like Leonard? It's like the guy has ball repellant on him.
I actually can somewhat answer that. Dame played 1.5x the time that Leonard did - and he got 1.5 times the defensive rebounds that MyLe did. He also got 2 offensive rebounds - which probably shows you that he lives a lot more in the paint in the offense than MyLe. The bigs, MyLe specifically set a screen far from the interior and see the guards running into the paint. They are not really in position for offensive rebounds. It still would be nice of the bigs to rebound better. Dame seens to be the only player on the roster whose TRB% has gone up this year.
It's fallen off because of a lack of effort. That's the only reason. The team did so much better on the glass the second half after Stotts lit a fire under their ass. Too often other tends have one guy crashing the glass and get the board. During those times we usually have one guy going for the ball and 3 guys in the vicinity not boxing out and watching.
Not sure but he was our leading rebounder so it's safe to say. Al-Farouq Aminu 6.6 Mason Plumlee 5.8 Damian Lillard 5.0 Maurice Harkless 4.6 Evan Turner 4.5 C.J. McCollum 4.3 Ed Davis 3.5 Noah Vonleh 3.3 Meyers Leonard 3.1 Allen Crabbe 2
