Game Thread 2023-24 Game #7 - BLAZERS VS GRIZZLIES - NOVEMBER 5, 2023 - SUNDAY - 6:00 PM PST - ROOT

What’s with all the hand injuries?

 

Toradol shortage. I believe it’s a supply chain issue and should be cleared up by January.

 

When iwll Ish be healthy enough to toss in a game? I wanna see what he brings.

 

• Blazers currently have the 9th ranked defense, super impressive. Sharpe defense has looked much improved even with him still making 20 year old mistakes.

• Blazers have the 29th ranked offense. Grant is leading the team in shots with a PER of 10.9 - horrendous efficiency. Grant needs to go back to his role of early last season being the 3rd-4th option. Grant can score well when he has an open shot or a very short dribble type of move. He massively fails when he is the primary option initiating offense.

• More offensive observations - When Scoot comes back he needs to be a bit more selective of his 3pointers and spend more time driving as well as working the midrange where he was effective in the GLeague. I have a lot of patience for a 19 year old Scoot learning this - but a 29 year old Grant being this ineffective while earning 160 million is extremely disappointing.

• Sharpe offensively looks like he has All-NBA elite star talent and is unguardable 1 on 1. It will still take him some time to refine his scoring here as he is inconsistent - but were seeing his excellent play from the end of last season being the lead offensive options working great. This is the most positive takeway so far this season.

• It's a huge luxury having 4 talented guards in Brogdon/Sharpe/Scoot/Ant. We still have two great starting guards even with two of these guys sitting out. With Sharpe and the teams improvements defensively I'm wondering if its more feasible to keep all these guys for the entire NBA season? I really like what Brogdon has brought to the team - and at 30 its not out of the question we could even consider keeping him long term for when this team is ready to fight for the playoffs - especially if that ends up a year or two earlier than we expect

• It's a good time to play the Grizz again, they likely will be playing better later in the year so now is the chance to get another win against them. Would be very nice if the Blazers can hang around the fight for the 10th seed playin spot for the later parts of the season.

• Ayton has been a beast on the boards which is sorely needed especially with Grant playing big minutes. He's also anchored the defense, shot very efficiently, and not taken bad shots. Watching Nurk and the Suns struggles down in Phoenix just exemplifies how great of a trade this was.

• SF has been a major weak point. Thybulle doesn't look like an NBA rotational player. Camara has been very impressive in the context of a late 2nd round trade throw in - but he is shooting just as bad as Thybulle. Walker might have been the best of the 3 just by default. Very concerning that the 23 year old Murray can't even sniff the court while we have such poor forward play. If this continues perhaps with Sharpes improvements he can get more SF minutes or even start once Ant or possibly even Scoot come back.

 

You obviously need to read the post just above the post you made.

 

So this game is just the regular November game on a Sunday. No special court and no tournament. Scoot still out and they are playing the worst team in the league record wise again.

 

We are 2.5 point underdogs tonight. I'm pretty sure unless things change drastically, we might not have a game this year that Vegas favors us in. The funny thing is that the drastic changes we are likely to make around midseason will likely make us bigger underdogs game to game.

 

I'd rather that than lower body injuries. Hopefully Ant is working on his left hand.

 

Is Scoot playing?

 

Grizzlies are scared of Shaedon. I can smell the fear.

 

I am hoping for total domination today. Shots will fall. They just wouldn't last game. Solid looks but they just wouldn't fall.

 

Wonder what the record is on these recent back to backs the league started having us play a couple seasons ago.

 

That sucks.

 

Random thought. I wonder if the traveling teams stay at the new Ritz now

 

This feels like a loss....not sure why. Tough to beat a team twice in a row.

 

It’s been the Nines but maybe?