Not concerned about Wayoff P. We’ve beaten him before. They have no leader. Kawhi had Duncan and Lowry to lead. In that series against Denver, I saw all I needed to see. We are better than that Denver team. If they couldn’t stop Murray, how they stopping Dame? Sorry. Clippers are trash. We are in great position right now. Nuggets and Clippers (and the Lakers at this point) are the most beatable teams in the West. Last time, we played those guys , we lost by 1 point. We’ll beat them in playoffs.
I think that stat is more important than our record against the top 4 teams in the west throughout the season. What is important in my mind is how we are playing now. I mean if they started out great and had beaten all the top teams two months ago, but looked bad once they traded for NP, do you think we would be touting our record against the top teams as hope for success in the playoffs? Of course not because it would no longer be relevant. I thought we started playing better in the loss against Boston on April 13th. Now we still lost a bunch of games after that, but you could still see they were playing a little better. In that stretch, they lost to the Clippers and the Nuggets by 1, but again there were signs that they were playing better. Granted the bar was set pretty low at that point, but still, there was progress. And they have continued to get better. I am not saying they will win in the first round, just that in the last 15 games the Blazers look like a different team. Nurk is a big part of that as well. I have been hard on him but he is really making a difference now that he is getting healthier.
I know Tendex doesn't mean much (it's basically a version of PER that predates it by several years), but, in the last ten games:
Random jocking for position question, anybody know why the May 16th game with Denver is TBD? Is it schedule time tbd, or the actual game itself tbd?
More than likely the time. My guess is the Networks want to show the games with something on the line on the last day of the regular season. (And not the games where teams are resting players)
it's a possibility, but the window for the Lakers in pretty closed, and the one for Portland is pretty open each team has 4 games left, so 8 game results lef. And, Portland's magic number is 3, as in Blazer wins or Laker losses. After tonight is should be down to 2, with 6 game results left so, pretty good odds for the Blazers, although the schedule is pretty scary. Portland sure can't afford to lose to Houston though
How the hell did the NBA think that it was even remotely fair to have the 7 and 8 teams face off first. Why would the two better records have to fight each other for a spot while the two crappier teams get to face each other?
To make it easier for one of 7 or 8 to claim the 7 seed. Winner of 7 and 8 is 7th. Winner of 9/10 plays the lower for 8th. If you had 7 play 10and 8 play 9, then the two winners face off, 7th seed would have to win 2.
The 7 and 8th ranked teams play for the 7th seed. The 9th and 10th teams play for the right to play the loser of the 7 vs 8 game and that game determines the 8th seed.
It's fair in that one of the 7/8 is guaranteed to get in, each of those teams can lose a game and still get into the playoffs, and the 9/10 teams each need to win 2 games to get into the playoffs. With a standard 7/10,8/9 tourney, each of the 7-8 teams could be one and done, and the 10 seed could win a playoff berth with a single victory.
