Definitely the offense will struggle more. I feel like Lillard kind of got to be known at the beginning of last year and teams locked down on him and he wasn't nearly as successful. Without Aldridge to take that load and draw defenses he is going to get focused on hard and I'm not confident anyone else can take the scoring load unless we're starting McCollum. The defense should be pretty decent with Aminu and Plumlee, those guys have generally been pretty solid.
I love to read. In fact when a sports website does podcasts; i won't listen, I hope for a transcript later. I can skip the BS a lot easier that way.
There is no doubt in my mind that the answer to the OP is we will struggle more offensively. Defensively I just don't see us any worse than last year. PG: Dame is improving slightly each year. Pressey will be better against quicker PG's than Blake, but worse against bigger ones. SG: Henderson, although not as intense/strong as Wes on D, he is more athletic, so I anticipate the drop off to be minimal. SF: Aminu, Harkless and Crabbe are deeper defensively than last year. I think we improve even though Nic was very effective PF: LMA was a puzzle to me defensively. He was good when he wanted to be, but he did not exert too much effort on that end. Davis is not worse on D than LA. Meyers and Vonleh will get better as the year goes on. Honestly I think it is a push. C: Robin was a decent defensive center, but I think Plumlee has more potential as a shot blocker and rebounder. Robin was a smart defender, but had slow reactions. I think it is a push although I am not sure who the back up center is? Davis or Meyers or Kaman? Offensively: PG: Dame will be as good as last year, even though more teams will focus on him. SG: Henderson and an experienced CJ will be as good if not better offensively than Wes/CJ last year. (Just not from 3 pt range) SF: Wash. Nic struggled too much last year to say we will be worse. PF: No way we are as good, even though Meyers can shoot as well from the outside as LA. C: Wash Losing LMA is huge offensively. We will struggle not having him on the court even though his stats were not always the best. I bet we exert more effort on the defensive end this year. The last couple of years we tended to conserve our energy until the 4th.
That made me think about how quickly the Ducks seem to be able to integrate some new players and have things running fairly smoothly in a real game. But of course the Blazers have a lot more to integrate. Since it seems one of our goals this year is to get everyone learning a new (for most of them) defensive and offensive system and learning to play together; wouldn't it be a good idea to have some full length practices during the season (between games) even if it meant they might have to limit minutes in a real game? It might be a good idea to spread the minutes around anyway so they can find out what they really have?
I completely agree with this breakdown (might even upgrade the C position on offense rather than call it a wash). It's all going to come down to coaching and new players learning to play with each other. With good coaching there's no reason this team can't be every bit as good as last season's team. I don't think it'll play out that way, but on paper it makes sense. I sure wish we'd get a new coach to start this new era off right!
I know you wont answer this, because you never engage in debate and much prefer to splatter your negativity out there without any backing statements, or when someone questions something, you disappear...but.... How does one become a name? Obviously lottery picks are names from the moment they are drafted, but other than that how do you make a name? This league is not made up of only lottery picks that everyone knew from college. so again, I ask. How do you make a name? Isnt basically improving your game enough to make people notice you? These guys we got are all still young and haven't had the opportunities that the people they are replacing have had. I would like you to answer how a player can make a name for himself if he wasn't a lotto pick or a ROY? Id also like to say I think your posts are bad. Really, really, bad. Almost always negative without any type of concrete foundation or explanation of the reasoning behind your thinking. Are you really a Blazer fan or a troll?(rhetorical) Now onto the article that I read the whole thing of... He is both right and wrong, though Bones pointed out some glaring hypocrisies. At any rate we will struggle more on Offence than D. I think most of us will agree on that. However, like someone else pointed out ( Sorry, I rarely seem to get past Tlong's posts because they are sooo... ughh)Decent players coming from bad teams will still have poor winshares and this isn't even a relevant comparison in my opinion. He also said that AS IS, we stack up fairly close on D and not TOO much of a drop off on O. The only player who is moving from a contending team to a bottom half team is Dame. Everyone else came from a team that was average or worse. My point to this is that these players we acquired didn't have stars around them helping, so I don't think their numbers will drop. Rather I see at least a couple rising from the ashes and possibly doubling their output this coming season. Points will come. I agree, mostly this article is just a bunch of fluff. Say I drank the Koolaid. I don't care.
I think we will play a more pleasing style of offense but due to talent on the floor we wont be as effective as in years past. Defensively I see more of the same, maybe a little more rim protection and steals though.
I don't like to read some nobody on the internet. When I do, I find myself reading things I never hear anyone say in real life. Like starting a sentence with "to pivot forward". I literally stopped reading after that.
I just started skimming some more of it. Does the guy have no idea why anyone would want to move Batum? Do I really have to read the whole thing to find out? Not gonna do it.
As soon as that bozo called called LMA a "border line All-Star" I was done taking it seriously. I still skimmed it though, 'cause ya know there ain't much else b-ball related info to read this time of year.
exactly how many nba players are household? being realistic about what you can actually attain makes it much easier to be sane. Try it!
You should try being positive sometime. You'd be suprised what its like to let a little sunshine into your life
As I agree we won't be world beaters this season, I think we will surprise a lot of people. I think we may have a growing curve in the beginning of the season but will hit our stride about 20-30 games in. We should finish middle of the pack with around 30-40 wins. The following season will be our break out year
I think struggle is the wrong word. I think they'll have fun and bring a lot of energy on both ends of the court. CJ, Meyers and Crabbe now have a green light to score..before they really didn't so that changes the dynamic and the guys we brought in should be better defensive players than we're used to.
