I thought Portland played well last night, but SA still got within 3 . Portland seems to be a team that can't put teams away yet again this year. What needs to be done about this? Anything? It's a pattern they got into last season as well. I did notice last night that the team settled for jump shots late in the game. Is it as simple as that? Just wondering what others think.
I think it's the crawl-walk-run scenario. First we need to figure things out (lineups and such) and win consistently, then we can look to the next step of putting teams away, can't have the cart before the horse, my 2 centavos.
Plus, any team that's well coached and talented can get back into a game if they're down less than 20. It takes a special kind of team to put last year's playoff teams to bed early and keep them there all game long.
I think they are just in early-season mode. You noticed that they blew teams away a lot more at the end of last season as well. This year's changes are a lot bigger than you guys acknowledge. It takes them time to get used to each other and it takes the coaching staff time to figure it out as well. Spacing seemed much better last night, they correctly did not try to use Miller as they use Blake next to Roy until the 4th quarter. It takes time. Sooner or later the big blow-outs will come.
The Blazers played pretty good team ball for the first 3 1/2 quarters, but when it's time to close teams out, just give it to Brandon and let him do his thing. He wasn't touching the ball when the Spurs cut it to 3 as you had Blake and Andre controlling the ball that resulted in Andre hoisting up 3s against the shot clock and LA continuing to shoot 18-footers. But get others involved early, and when it's Brandon ISO time, then I don't think teams will be so quick to double him immediately leaving the other guys open like Blake who was hitting shots; Oden who was a beast inside, LA is always a threat, and then Travis who had a big shot or two in the fourth.
I think it's learned and the more we start establishing low post scoring, it will be easier to choke teams and frustrate them.
Yea that was interesting that Brandon noticed too. In the Oregon live article, he noticed the crowd was like "uh oh here we go again." The players are aware of it, I am sure. If Brandon is aware of it like that, I am sure it will be brought to focus in practice.
I'm telling you, if we can efficiently score inside, things like that wouldn't happen as much. You can slow it down and just muscle them into giving up.
Because San Antonio is a very good team. Basketball is a game of runs...it's great to have a run and then play even all the other minutes, but against other top teams it's hardly surprising that the other team had a run in them, too. But San Antonio's wasn't enough. Portland had a lot of blow-out wins last year. That's why they had one of the best point differentials in the league (second-best in the Western Conference). I think the fact that San Antonio rallied to within 3 late in the fourth quarter and yet the game really wasn't in doubt in the last minute shows that Portland was able to put San Antonio away. San Antonio didn't get the opportunity to play for the win at the end...they got back into the game and then Portland pulled away again. It wasn't a blow-out win, but it was a convincing one.
And when did the turn-around happen? It was when Oden came back in the line-up and we were able to play Duncan one on one. Also, Oden scoring down low a few times, put a choke hold on SAS as well.
Definitly. That is how the Blazers killed teams off in the days when we had Grant, Wallace and Sabonis. The facts are, if you shoot a high percentage and get most of the rebounds, you will win most games walking away. Shots in the paint are high percentage. Having your bigs in the paint already to get the rebounds, adds to your chances. Back in those days, drubbing running teams like Phoenix was a daily occurance. That is why running teams can't win in the playoffs. You should always run just enough to get your easy buckets that are Gimme's and transition easy shots. But not base your whole team around it.
Last night was a relief. Things looked like they were starting to click for the team long enough to win a game against a good opponent. There were still signs of minor concern and we almost gave it away in the 4th again (god imagine the news today if that happened). One of the most poromising things I saw (besides G.O.) was about half way through the 4th it looked like we might collapse, instead we regained our composure and finished the game.
During the period when they were starting to "settle" (dumb, fucking lazy, bullshit is what it is) for long jumpers early in the shot clock, I just knew that the Spurs were going to make a run at that point. When will these players learn that if you STOP PLAYING NBA basketball and start goofing off like you are at the Y, the other team usually comes storming back. Thankfully the Blazers woke up in time to get back to their game, Parker was injured, and the Spurs just didn't have much mojo last night - any other combination and the Blazers might have let the Spurs game slip away.
