I think this is worth talking about. And this is not me shitting on CJ, so I didnt want to bump one of his hate threads. Blazers are 9-1 this season when CJ has 15 or fewer attempts. Fluke? Last year they were 10-5. This isn’t my argument to trade CJ (there are plenty other threads for that) but I do think there’s something to it. Everything flows better when we’re not leaning on CJ. This is more on coaching than anything because they’re the ones giving CJ the freedom to do whatever he wants. I’ve thought of this before, but maybe it’s in his, and more importantly the teams, best interest if he was utilized more as a Klay Thompson than as a Damian Lillard.
So you are saying when the other players are hitting shots and they don't have to force CJ to shoot because they can't get any offense anywhere else then the Blazers win? Nice.
There’s the fundamental problem with the team right there. CJ should never be forced to shoot. That’s not how you win consistently, especially in the playoffs. You have to allow everyone else to play through their struggles, even if it means losing a game, otherwise how will they develop? That’s why Portland gets bounced in the playoffs every year. They lean on two players to carry the load. That’s not winning basketball.
Agree. When others are making shots he does not feel like he needs to carry the load. This is a hard thing for me to try and understand but there has to be something inside them that triggers the need to have to take over a game instead of just letting his teammates work their way into the game. Seems like the really good players don’t lean on this need to win every game themselves but only use sparingly. But in doing so sometimes you lose but you empower and show teammates that they are responsible for the wins AND losses.
I agree it's a fundamental problem for sure. The team isn't that good. There is a lack of talent on this team. 42-40
I think Dame used to do this but now more than ever seems to have broken the habit of shouldering it all. He is letting guys shoot make or miss. I see less hero ball from Dame this year than any other year and i think its best for the team. We get Cj on the same track and we might actually have a TEAM. Klay is a perfect example in my ook but its that defensive separation between the two i cant get over. Klay temains in his role because he can still impact the game on the decensive end. Cj cant. The only way to impact the game is for cj to be a high volume shooter or he will be in the negative. This is a conflict to our team play. Cj needs to be our sixth man.
The funny thing is Meejay isn't even Clutch would you really trust him on a crucial possesion to score? I wouldn't
That’s the thing though, I think CJ can be affective in that Klay role, where he doesn’t have the ball in his hands as much. He’s a great spot up shooter. He moves well off the ball. His handle is his, and our curse. It’s neat that he can dribble, but it’s not efficient when you give him 15 seconds of the shot clock to hopscotch around the court. I agree about the defense, but that’s another story.
Klay is on a team that has elite players. Players that score at will. Klay rarely has to be the offensive spark plug so he can dedicate himself to defense. It's very tough to compare CJ to Klay. First off he is 6-7 and there are rarely times when defenses ever double him. They double Durant and Curry.
But what about before KD went to golden state? Yes Golden State has elite players, but the real reason they’re so good is because they share the ball. That was true before they even got the cheat code in KD.
The Klay comparison is really good. Klay has all of of accolades and prestige of being part of the formula but does not have to run it thru him. A very nice balance. But not to start a we don’t have any shooters but Klay has the benefit of having some journeymen players surrounding him. But as you said about Dame he seems more comfortable with the idea that the guys around him are going to make some and miss some. Letting players shoot regardless should be the deciding factor on who plays and who sits, not salary.
"Teams that play together beat those with superior players that play more as individuals" Jack Ramsay
The league actually keeps track of “clutch” situations and yeah CJ hasn’t graded out well. The free throw struggles in the fourth dates back to at least last year, so you can’t even say small sample size anymore. The guy that should be playing more late in games is Stauskas. That guy has the clutch gene. I understand why he isn’t out there, but I’d honestly swap out CJ for him. That would never happen though. I’m laughing just thinking about Stotts benching CJ.
there was an article on Blazers Edge at the end of last season about CJ's 'tendencies' and wondering if he was a ball hog. They posted some synergy stats in charts that were pretty interesting first was a chart of the NBA's 20 most frequent shooters and their TOP and dribbles: basically, CJ was a dribble-monster and quite a bit of a ball-stopper. That sure fits the eye-test. He holds the ball longer and dribbles more on his touches than any other player on that list. He ranked 1st in time of possession, average seconds/touch, and average dribbles/touch. But he was 14th out of 20 in average points/touch. That isn't a good combo next, they looked at CJ's rankings in the NBA on specific play types: after all of CJ's clever ball-handling and shake-n-bake-crossover-dribble-rocker-step he wasn't really that good at it. The style didn't match the substance. For instance nearly 35% of CJ's shots came from transition, off-screen, and handoff plays, but around 2/3 of NBA players were better at those things. And the play CJ gets all kinds of kudos for, isolation..well, 21% of NBA players are better at that. But the one thing he was elite at was spot-up shooting...you know, the kind of shots that require CJ to move without the ball instead of dominate the ball for comparison, they posted Dame's numbers: https://www.blazersedge.com/2018/4/...all-hog-does-it-matter-portland-trail-blazers first, I apologize if this was all posted here last April but second, I think those numbers make a great case for what CJ's game should be instead of what it is. CJ has an assistedFG rate of 40%; last season, it was 33%. Stephen Curry's assisted FG rate has been over 50% and Klay's has been over 80%. CJ is not nearly as good as Curry in iso (few are), but still, it sure does look like CJ should have an assisted FG rate well over 50% rather than the 35-40% range it's been. His game should be a lot more like Klay's than like Dame's something else about CJ..... assists/36: 2015-16 4.4 2016-17 3.7 2017-18 3.3 2018-19 2.7 assist rate: 2015-16 21.6 2016-17 18.0 2017-18 15.8 2018-19 12.3 CJ's trendlines are headed the wrong way. He has the ball in his hands a bunch. His 26% usage rate doesn't reflect his time of possession/touch or dribbles/touch...so, in a critical way it doesn't fully recognize how much he dominates the ball. But that ball dominance means CJ using lots of possessions and lots of shot clock for only average scoring efficiency and well below average passing efficiency. The point being that CJ isn't nearly as good with the ball in his hands as his style would imply. He should not have the role he does problem is he's on a near-max contract and him being a 6th man or much more of a catch-&-shoot player doesn't fit his salary. And of course, the GM's man-love for CJ has meant that he's done a poor job of giving Stotts better options than "give the ball to CJ and hope he scores"
Where is the 1000x like button? I've been saying this for years from the eye-test standpoint but this is EXACTLY what I've been referring to. Props for the research.
probably true but I'd like to see what CJ's assist numbers were in those 10 games never mind, I just looked it up (I have time and I've had too much coffee as shown by the post above) CJ had 22 assists in those games. 2.2 a game when his average has been 2.5. So then. the level of competition? Spurs-Magic-Pacers-Rockets-Pelicans-Minny-Boston-Bucks-Minny-Toronto this implies that in those games, CJ's touches, usage, and ball-stopping were below average, and Portland won 90% of those games and 90% of those games came against "playoff-level" teams. You're right, that does appear to reveal something important
If that was all there was to it you would expect an analysis of Dames numbers to be very similar. Would you bet on that being the case?
