Even the clipper game reports seemed to comparatively praise him- Quick said: On Friday, Miller was particularly effective in driving and finishing at the rim. Each drive was either set up, or accentuated, by a convincing pass-fake. There were some careless turnovers, but there was also the sense that, as a veteran, Miller understood this was a preseason game. Quick also said: Steve Blake is a real nice player, but he is not in the same league as Miller. Simple as that. link Mortimer- from Blazer's Edge- had a similar opinion. I like Steve Blake. He is great in his Blakeness. But it is so mind blowingly obviously that Andre Miller is a much, much, much better player. link
What's up Wheels! I'm around here every so often, but I haven't been posting too much. I'm working my normal job, plus coaching high school hoops, and scouting for Syngery (when I have spare time). How in the world am I going to make it to the Blazer games? Your Bronco's are something else right now. And our Ducks keep finding new ways to win, I love it!!
dang sounds like you been busy! and yeah the Broncos have already won 2 more games than I thought they would.. I can admit I think I was wrong about coach McKid. And yes the Ducks have been such a surprise since that opening week. I can hardly remember it, thats how good they have been, and have erased the opening week debacle. Fun times.. especially when my Football teams are a combined 10-1, and the Baseball playoffs are here, and Basketball is upon us.. what a GREAT time of year! Good to hear from you though, and glad all is well.
With all dues respect for Quick and to Miller's ability to finish (which is very nice and was never disputed) - the fact is that at least so far - the Blazers fell in a hole quickly with Miller on the starting unit - something that did not happen in earlier games. Does it mean that this would not have happened with Blake? I do not know - maybe yes, maybe not - but to say that Miller earned it and the team looks better with him starting than with Blake is just a fallacy, at least with the data we have so far.
Unlike last year when Portland fell in a hole in the first quarter of 60% of all their games? The bottom line is they need to get off to a better start then last year no matter who is in the starting lineup. Nate needs to find a combination that gets it done. Portland can't count on getting 18 come from behind wins again this year if they want to get out of the second round. It's harder to stage big come from behind wins in the playoffs. Better to keep it close the whole game.
54% to be precise, and I do not think they were 8 or 9 points under in most of those, they were usually 2-3 points behind... I agree with this, in theory - but again, looking closely at the data - the place where they really fell off into a hole was usually in the 2nd quarter where the 2nd group would dig us in, and I suspect that one of the reasons the first group got behind as often as they did is because Roy always seemed to conserve energy in the first quarter because he knew he would not to go into superman mode to climb out of the hole the 2nd unit got us into. I other words, if this suspicion is correct - and just having Roy play hard from the get go knowing his minutes will be lighter than a year before and he will not need to take over games so often because the 2nd unit is better - this problem can be fixed just by having big-game scorers like Miller and Oden in that 2nd unit... All of a sudden, the Blazers are a bit better in the first quarter, a lot better in the 2nd (because not many teams will be able to contain a group that has Miller, Rudy, Webster, Travis, Oden with their 2nd team, or even their already tired 1st team)... In other words, the real problem the Blazers had last year in the first half of most games did not come because of the 1st unit, and fixing the 2nd unit will also indirectly help the 1st quarter problem)... Again, I want to make sure that people understand that if Nate and company think that Miller and Oden in the first unit is the way to go they should not - what I object to is people saying that "if Miller and Oden are not..." it is a mistake - when the data so far does not support it...
I remember it different. When Portland didn't lead after the first quarter, they tended to be down pretty big. I don't have the numbers to back this up, but it sure seemed that way. It's not like Portland didn't have high powered scorers on the second unit, what with Outlaw and Rudy. It seemed like the problem was defense on the second unit. Sergio, Rudy, Outlaw, Frye and Oden was not a team full of stoppers. Oden was ok, the rest were horrid. I would say they need the opposite on the second unit. That second unit needs to be better defensively. Having Joel on the second unit would be a good start. I am hopeful Martel can get it done. Blake may not be the greatest defender he isn't the complete pile of shit that was Sergio. That leaves Outlaw and Rudy.
The numbers are available on basketball-reference.com via the game log. I looked at it yesterday - and it is just not true. Sure, there were some games where they were down at the end of the first quarter - but most games they were down at the end of the 1st quarter - they were down just by a couple of points. Surprisingly enough, looking at the defensive and offensive rating of most of these guys leads me to believe that their problem was actually offense. Take Sergio for example, his defensive rating is only a little bit worse than Blake's - but there is a huge difference in offensive rating, with Blake on the court the team scored 118 points per 100 possessions, with Sergio - only 103 - of course, when you remember that Sergio lost the ball at twice the rate Blake did - it's not a surprise that his offensive rating is so low. The difference between Batum's defensive rating and Outlaw's is very small - but there is a much bigger difference (in Batum's favor) on their offensive rating. I think people did not realize just how damaging these turn-overs were and how bad our offense sputtered in the 2nd quarter.
We haven't had a single televised game yet (aside from fanfest which doesn't really count) and people are already talking about how he looks? The only thing we have to go as far as making a judgement about Miller's efficacy is what Wheels has fed us and what little we can glean from the boxscore. So far about the only conclusion I'm willing to make about Miller's game is that he makes Oden better (at a minimum). Oden is outplaying Przybilla, he wants to start ... he probably needs to start, and Miller has shown that he's willing to feed big fella the rock. If we want Oden to develop into the offensive force that we hoped he could be when KP drafted him, I see Miller as a key component of that growth, especially for weaning the team off of the guard/perimeter-centric offense that's been in place for awhile, and integrating a more inside-out approach.
Really? We are going Mr. Language Person here, Nik? You know what I was inferring with the word look here... Oden was a monster at the start of the 2nd pre-season game when Miller was not in the line-up, I am certain that Miller helps everyone around (other than Roy, so far, maybe) - but I am going to give the props for the improvements of Oden's game, so far - to Oden himself... ... and this will happen anyway if Miller plays around 30 minutes a game - even if he does not start. What I oppose to is the fact that some people have decided that Miller earned it and should start - when the limited data we DO HAVE so far - is not nearly that clear-cut...
Most also wait until the All-Star break to write off the entire season as a failure. What can I say, our fans are exceptional. There's always a few sky-is-falling WE NEED A TRADE NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!! posters on this board whether it's January or June, and no matter if the team is winning or losing. It's just the nature of this board, and the reason god invented the ignore poster feature. BNM
Ah, you think I'm being snide. I truly didn't mean to, my point was that without actually seeing him play there's really nothing we can say at this point because we're only inferring what works or doesn't from a boxscore --a boxscore based on three pre-season games at that. Certainly Greg deserves some credit for working on his game, but Centers don't typically create offense for themselves, they need ball-handlers to get them the ball. In Greg's case this could also be as much to do with Juwan Howard feeding him the rock off of high post passes. All I know is that I heard Greg say in an interview that he loves playing with Miller and Howard Certainly a couple of valid points (particularly the minutes part), but to say Miller hasn't "earned it" seems kind of strange -- for me he earned it when they inked him to a 7 million dollars per year deal, he earned it when he was the only reason Philly was in the series with Orlando last year, he earned it when he's consistently performed as one of the top ten point guards in the league for the past decade. Granted maybe Miller is best suited to a Manu Ginobli kind of role, where he and Roy can take turns running the offense, but I think if that's all he does an opportunity will have been lost for those two to make each other better. I think it's a mistake (in the long run) to not put the time in to let Roy and Miller develop some rhythm and feel for each other -- if that's what ends up happening.
Fair enough about being snide. Water under the bridge and all that. On the other hand, your argument surly goes both ways about infering stuff from a box-score... I am sure he does - and I am willing to bet that with time - Roy, LMA and just about everyone else will as well. When Allen Iverson went to Denver he was one of the best players in the league as well - but his presence on that team really did not translate into contending when playing next to 'Melo - I honestly do not think that Miller's salary or what he did in a different environment where he was the 1st or 2nd best player on the roster automatically entitles him to a guaranteed starting spot on this roster. If and when it is proven that he is the one that makes the first unit run better - I would be all for him getting it - what I said before and I will repeat - is that I do not think he proved he earned - especially if you look at how this team started the games so far. I do not really think it matters that much in the long run, to be honest with you. Travis and Roy seem to work very well together to close games for the Blazers - despite the fact that they do not seem to coexist that well at the start of the game. Why? I do not know - but so far - this seems to be the case. The Blazers seem to be very methodical at the start of games - maybe because they were a young team that needed to get into the groove of the game, maybe because of something else - I do not know - but at the end of the day - it seems to me that forcing Miller on the first unit because he is Miller just does not matter that much. I, personally, appreciate the fact that Nate is going through the methodical process of evaluating his combinations and tweaking things along the way. I work as an engineer - and it seems to me that when things work pretty well (as they did last year for the Blazers) - throwing everything and starting from scratch is usually the wrong way to go about things. There is a reason that Netscape - as a company went from being a dominant web company to an afterthought - after the they threw away all the code they had in Netscape 4 and started to develop from scratch what, many years later after they became an AOL subsidiary - became Mozilla Firefox...
Hold on now. Andre Iguodola went for 21.5ppg, 6.3 rpg, and 6.7 apg against Orlando. Saying Miller is the "only reason" for Philly losing in 6 seems like a reach.
Well its a message board. This is what we do! Talk about this stuff... But I agree that we should wait and see how it works out in the season to get worried about it. Edit - This is post 1,999! Edit 2 - Epic
Well OK, Iguodala too ... I kind of forgot he had that good of series, I'm just saying that when I watched the games Miller seemed to be the difference maker for that Philly team and whether or not they stayed in the game (or won it outright). At times he absolutely dominated.
