as much as I have doubted NATE so far, I must say his subbing was perfect tonight. I sure hope Nate makes me publicly say how terribly wrong I was for ever doubting him this season. For the first time in a long while, and this goes back to last season, Nate actually forced the other coach to be forced to change their game plan mid game. I sure hope he sticks with his guns. And whoever motivated the team to communicate, chest bump, pick each other up off the floor, stay tuned in the game and mainly trust one another gets the biggest pat on their back. I owe that dude or dudes a beer.
Nate is still the retard he was yesterday. The win comes from our bigs domination close to the rim. The way PryzEN altered the shots of the SA players was great to watch.
It was nice to see Nate do what some people have been saying we need to do since the day Miller was signed. Start Miller Run Pound the ball inside The need to play Blake baffles me, but at least Miller is starting like he should have been all along.
Blake was very efficient last night scoring the ball - and he was the one guarding Parker before he went down. In 11+ minutes Parker did not really burn us - he had 1 of 4 shooting. So - it is pretty clear to me why Blake started - because as much as he struggles against quick guards - he is still faster than Miller out there. Were you guys not watching the game?
No. But if you read the first post you would see that the first poster said he thought Nates subbing was perfect. I was responding to that comment.
But Blake played well last night. I don't see how it's not justified to play Blake when he's doing well.
Well you think that having Blake on the floor was why it wasn't perfect? Or were there other things. Because I would agree on other games, but last night Blake played very well. So please explain.
The game was still shit. If the Spurs made more of their shots, we wouldn't be talking about this. We would be talking about "FIRING NATE!!!" The bottomline is the execution in the fourth was abominable. The team SHOULD have won by a lot, lot more.
If the Spurs hit their shots? Maybe our defense had something to do with that. If the Blazers could hit their shots, we would be 6-0. Fact is, none of that happened, so therefor they can't be debated.
They were still open all night long from the perimeter. The difference between this team and the previous few teams we lost to is they weren't hitting te shots. So yes, I think it can be debated.
I would much rather give them that shot, then allow the guards penetrate and give fouls to our bigs. You see the main reason we won this game wasn't from "outshooting" the Spurs, but we beat them in the paint, out rebounded them, and most importantly kept our bigs in the game. In the playoffs, you play "half court" basketball. The more we stay away from being a "jump shooting team" and mix it up, we will never win a damn thing. So let the other teams try and beat us from the perimeter while we pound the issue down low. I bet you we win way more than we lose.
No. No, it wasn't "perfect". Far, far from it. Hey, at least we got a nice win, despite Nate's subbing mistakes.
It was a good win, but I don't know that we won because of Nate at all. We won because an old Spurs team played poorly on the second night of a back-to-back and lost their best player pretty early in the game. We won because Oden was able to stay out of foul trouble in the second half. We didn't win because we had Blake and Miller on the floor together to start the game. Ed O.
I posted on O-live the "What If" game. And for the most part, what if Oden hit those two free-throws in the 4th against Denver? What if the Blazers shot 44% from the field those other games? Would we have a 6-0 record? Fact is, we beat the Spurs because we outplayed them. Not because the Spurs beat themselves. We took Duncan out of the game in the 4th with Oden, we made a conscience effort to close any penetration from the guards and the "line-up" change lifted a concern from different factions of the Blazer team on who starts. So for me, it maybe not "Clearly the better choice" as the starting line-up being a better line-up. It just allowed everyone to stop focusing on the stupid things and more on the game.
This is an argument that the Blazers deserved to win, but none of it is any evidence that Nate deserves especial credit for the win. Ed O.
