Just dropped an article giving some positive things I noticed from last night's loss: https://www.blazersuprise.com/five-positives-from-the-portland-trail-blazers-opening-night-loss What were some positives you took away from the loss?
I though Nas and Ant looked better, at least on offense, and Ant displayed some decent court vision as well as possibly breaking his out of one-trick pony stereotype Zeller looked active hard to take a lot of positives from the starters when they lose, at home, to the Kings
Id say CJ looks poised to have another start like last year, which will be huge if Dames slow to get going. side question. If Cj starts hot hot, Does that waver Moreys stance?
I could definitely see the defense was better rotations were really good. Like to have seen Nance play more. Simons and Nas both played good basketball, you can see they have way more confidence under Billups.
I think the bench shows a lot of promise, Ant looked bigger and faster. I saw some nice steals that should've led to points, but the awful shooting all around prevented that.
Individual performances have been decent. Simons and Little are making an impact. Zeller can move well and i like the combination with Nance as a solid second unit. I'd like to ride the Nurk/Roco first unit and Zeller/Nance second unit for 20 games at least but there might be a point they go to Nurk and Nance? I did see those two miss some opportunities and it even looked like Nance was a little upset at one point with Nurk for missing an easy pass to Nance for a Layup or Dunk. Nurk is active but we all know Nurk by now. Some issues die hard. He needs to dunk the ball. Even more so Nurk needs to quit talking to refs. He's way too worried about the missed call. CJ strong out of the gate. If CJ plays this well and Dame comes into form they will be able to score. Billups went with the switch a bunch more than i thought he would. Not sure this team can do that consistently? They seem to be missing the help defense and I'm not sure exactly what scheme they can maintain? When they collapse they leave a wide open look from three available and they cannot trust help defense or their Center to cover well. My opinion is they need at least one very strong on ball defender. Last i like that they didn't quit and are working hard to improve. My hope is it will come.
They attacked and didn’t just settle for jumpers. They shot 23 free throws. If they average that during the season they would be borderline top 5 in that category. Powell, Roco, and Lillard all had off shooting nights and they were still in a position to tie/win the game despite the Kings having a good shooting night on top of getting to the line nearly 30 times. The fouls should go down as they get more comfortable in the system. They also protected the ball; outside of McCollum no one had more than 1 turnover. Pretty encouraging considering how they’re playing this season.
They played through two horrible quarters and still made a game of it with Lillard unable to shoot a 3 all night....Cody Zeller, Ant, Nance and Nas are going to be a good bench mob! They adjusted a bit too late but they did adjust. Nurk didn't foul out when we needed him. Nas was more under control which is good unless you want Snell taking his spot...to me he looks like a young Gerald Wallace in the making...this is his and Ant's year to shine.
The way the we comeback and the chances that we have to tie the game. Dame was terrible from 3, which I don’t know if will be a trend at this beginning, or he’s comeback after a bad shooting game (like he usually does) and strikes a good perfomance. We’ll see, Saturday we face Cp3 which I think Dame has a poor record against
We lost to the team with the worst defense in the history of the league, but silver lining, we only have to play the Western Conference Champs next!
Having league pass I didn’t have to listen to our shitty announcers. That was a huge positive Nas didn’t hurt himself Olshey is one step closer to the door The Big Handsome seems like a nice role player
