If this has already been posted, I apologize. I just saw this, and toward the end, Roy says that most of the Blazers thought they could just "pick up where we left off last season . . ." In other words, everybody has been overconfident and not working hard enough. http://blog.oregonlive.com/blazers/2009/11/hawks_97_blazers_91_postgame_c.html
Interesting, because KP said that it was one of the most intense training camps he had ever witnessed.
didn't roy take most of the summer completely off? and i don't see him working at all on defense, let alone hard. Roy seems a lot more vocal so far this season, but it seems like a lot of his team criticism could be directed at himself as well.
to my eyes it seems wing players have been killing the Blazers, and Portland's best wing defender is out... I see a correlation. STOMP
I think us as fans are at fault for the same thing. The team isn't firing on all cylinders out of the gate and so the sky is falling. Besides the core this is a new team: Batum is out, Martell is now starting Greg is now starting, Pryzbilla is now in the 2nd unit. Sergio is gone Channing is gone Added Andre Added Juwan That's quite a few changes to go through. Last years team had the benefit of being mostly together for at least 2 seasons.
KP is a salesman. I never bought that. Our preseason was atrocious. Everything Brandon said here I had already considered. Sure, we have some new pieces and guys are learning their roles a little bit - that's PART of the problem. But the effort and intensity just isn't there. We aren't getting to loose balls, we're reacting slow defensively . . . it's like they are playing with a hangover. I suspect Brandon is right. They won 54 games last year, and many of the pre-season rankings by "experts" had the Blazers finishing 3rd in the West. It was suggested that if there was one team that could get over on the Lakers it would be the Blazers. Maybe they read the press clippings and thought they could waltz their way to 50 something wins. They forgot they won last year by playing together and outscrapping their opponent. They didn't overwhelm the league with talent like the Lakers or Celtics can do. This lack of intensity bothers me. I agree with Roy that it's overconfidence. I also think there is some underlying animosity about minutes, who's starting, and how they are being used . . . I'm speaking of Miller, Blake, & Rudy for the most part. Bayless can't be happy either (which even as a bench player can affect moral) Last year, I really believed that we played as good of team ball as anybody in the league. It's never perfect, but I think everybody accepted their roles and put the team 1st. I'm not sure that's the case today. This whole Roy/Blake/Miller thing is wierd too. Clearly, Blake is Roy's guy. That can't make Andre happy. The team just needs to put personal agendas aside, or it's going to be a long season.
