(EDIT THIS WAS INCORRECT - was looking at prior season - last season was 29th offense) Somehow the Blazers offensive rating was 18th last season. I'd think that was primarily from Brogdon/Grant/Ayton early in the season. Blazers had the 27th ranked defense, year prior was 30th, 29th, 28, 16th back in 2018-19 WCF run. So yeah defense has been the biggest problem for many years. Brogdon was actually very good on that end last year so I'm not sure we upgraded much just solely in the Avdija trade. If we trade away Ant or Grant it could help our defense quite a bit, as well as improvements from Scoot who was really bad last year especially at the start. But if we trade away Ant or Grant we'll take a bigger step back on offense. With Brogdon being dealt and not acquiring a guard I'd actually be shocked if we trade away Ant. Blazers want to first see how our trio of guard play as they didn't have a single game together last season.
Hmm? What stat are you looking at? I go by offensive and defensive rating, which normalizes how scores may vary based on pace etc. The Blazers were #29 in offense, with the worst TS% in the league, and #23 in defense. But the gap offensively between them and other teams was larger. https://www.nba.com/stats/teams/advanced?SeasonType=Regular Season&dir=A&sort=DEF_RATING
Ya, let's trade one of our best players for another super green guard, when we already have Scoot... Come sense has left this thread.
Careful. You're going to hurt somebody's feelings with all of this trade Ant talk... Where does this fount of hate spew from? WHY DO YOU WANT HIM TO LITERALLY DIE?!?!
Some people have a defense fetish. Defense is great, but I think some folks here would construct a fantasy roster of Dennis Rodman, Dennis Rodman, Dennis Rodman, Dennis Rodman, Dennis Rodman.
Or, you know, maybe just a little bit of effort at the defensive end would be nice.... If a person is incredibly athletic yet a very bad defender, that just means they don't care about defense. That's not good. I would avoid players like that when in a rebuild, if possible. Simple as that.
(EDIT I WAS LOOKING AT WRONG SEASON) It was bbref offensive/defensive rating, I believe that's just pts per 100 possessions.
Ok you are correct I had the wrong year pulled up. Yes the Blazers were 29th in offense rating last season and 23rd in defense. Will be interesting if we just run back the roster as is? I'd think Deni as a starter next year would help our offense a ton with little defensive drop off. That is more so because he is a legit NBA role player and Camera/Walker/etc were such poor starters last season. While Brogdon was good defensively the Blazers now only have two players under 6'5" on the roster so that might help the defense. Also only having one rookie who might not even get many minutes. If we keep Grant/Timelord/Ant, have our youth improve, and have better health next year this team might be able to put together some wins and even try to push for the playin. I'm not sure that is very smart strategically to go from the 3rd worst record in the league to then miss out on top lottery picks in a year there are so many more studs in a loaded draft. I guess one thing Cronin has shown he is masterful at is to engineer a full on hard mid season tank - so if we hover around .500 or worse the first few months perhaps he can still get us a very good pick.
