Vegas has us at 47.5 wins. I think that seriously miscalculates this team. For once, Olshey had an amazing summer, getting rid of our worst weaknesses and shoring them up with better players. Even in the tough west, I think we match last year's win total, at least. I am very bullish on this edition of the team, especially later in the season when they have played together more and Nurk comes back. You?
Dame and CJ are getting older, they may not be able to carry the team through the regular season as in prior years. We have major concerns on defense at virtually every position. Bazemore and Collins are the only players whose defense potentially exceed their offense. Whiteside chases blocks not contributing to defense. Hezonja, Tolliver, Gasol are all bad defenders. Dame and CJ while improving are below average. Simons will likely have major rookie mistakes on defense. Hood is ok but still primarily an offensive player. I agree it was time to break up the Aminu Harkless duo, but it may be a major mistake not keeping one of them, or not replacing them with a big defensive forward. Nurkic may hurt the team when he plays this year. Paul George and Gordon Hayward were somewhat ineffective when they returned from injury, and both were superior players to Nurkic prior to injury. Nurk may provide zero help this season. The team wanting to get him experience could cost wins if he understandably is rusty. That could make the team worse than if he was not on the roster this season. Collins injury is concerning, he doesn't have the chance to improve his game and instead is working to get healthy the next few months. The Blazers dont have roster continuiting that had been a strength for years. Collins, DameCJ are the only active players with over 1 year Blazers experience. I'm excited to see what happens this season, but there's about a dozen ways the team could struggle mightily and have a very poor season. I hope not, but I do have major concerns.
Except for the "Dame/CJ getting older part" (they're 28/29 this season; not really concerning ages), this post elucidates my sentiments precisely. I'm not particularly bullish about the team this year, as far as the regular season goes. However, I do believe that they're better built for the postseason. I could see them ending up the 6th or 7th seed while coalescing into a unit capable of winning the title without home court in any series.
I'm predicting 55 wins. I'm all in on the Simons and Collins hype. Last year we were a .636 team with Kanter as our starting center, which would've made us a 52 win team. Whiteside is a better player and fit. The West looks rough, but only because we tend to think of superstars and not load management. The Lakers and Clips will be scary when playing at 100%, but they won't do that for a lot of the season. Golden State also won't be sopping up 60+ wins again. On a given night when we play in LA and the other team wants to win, we'll probably lose. But when those guys have to fly up to Portland, well, it's going to be tempting to sit a star player.
I think we'll be a very good regular season team if healthy as currently constructed. 50+ seems like a no brainer. But our holes on the wing are very obvious and the problems as a result will manifest in the playoffs.
Respectfully how often does that happen that a team is worse in the regular season and better in the playoffs? I guess I understand what you're saying, and I think their examples of teams who are just bored with the regular season and think they can turn it on when the time comes, but I don't remember a whole lot of teams that became worse in the first 82 games and (enough to lose home court) and were better in the playoffs.
Nurk's eventual return from injury would be the biggest contributor to this, if it were to happen. That and the needed development of Simons and Collins. And no, I don't see it as likely, but I do see it as feasible.
I kind of agree I was just thinking about this last night, as in the summer people tend to say oh this team will be a worse regular-season team and harder to beat in the playoffs, and I couldn't think of a lot of examples of teams that did that successfully. One of the complaints with the NBA is usually the real contenders prove themselves out to be the best teams before the playoffs come around, it's pretty rare a "low" seed wins a championship. To be fair though, the west is so tough, they really could be a better team this year and lose more games, be a lower seed and still be a really tough opponent for anyone.
We are much deeper and players such as GTjr. & The Rookie could see some consistent minutes as I think Terry will rest certain players more this year. We have a nice mix of players on both sides of the ball, and "we got scorer's" . Didn't want to use shooters....
I think I'll wait to see who around the league gets injured in preseason for example. Or even better to see our schedule.
We've averaged 49 wins over the past 6 seasons. And they're predicting 47, despite Dame/CJ in full prime and entering the season with the best supporting cast they've ever had? The two seasons we were below 49 wins Allen Crabbe, Noah Vonleh and Mason Plumlee were getting starter-level minutes. They kind of suck now, and that's with a couple extra seasons of experience. Crabbe was like 23 and Vonleh 21 back then. It's weird how prognosticators can be so consistently wrong for so long and yet do it again.
The 2019 aren't competing against the 2016 Blazers. They're competing against a conference full of other teams that also feel like they have a real shot for the first time in half a decade. This team very well may end up better than last year's squad but still take a hit in the win total due to the very real concerns of which we're all aware.