I haven't predicted playoffs in some time. In fact, I started predicting the lotto the day they traded out Sheed for spare parts that most everyone in this community was doing over attaining. I rated Roy and Aldridge as the top 2 prospects in their draft and of course like most everyone salivated over the prospect of adding Greg. Prior to Oden going down last year I was predicting 50 wins and took heat for it. They lost him yet still went 500 as the 3rd youngest team in league history... I viewed that as confirmation that along with a select few others (Hi mook and TH), I was right. We shall see, but I think there is a new sheriff in town with a message to send... I'm thinking homecourt in round 1 is within the realm of realistic. STOMP
I've been pretty pessimistic about Portland's chances ever since Bonzi and Sheed were dealt for pennies on the dollar. This year, I'm optimistic. However, I'm tempering that enthusiasm a bit, because I don't want to ruin what should be a fun season with disappointment created by possibly too high expectations. Enthusiastically, I can "see" this team contending for 55-60 wins. It has an absurd amount of talent and they all seem like smart, hard-working players. Low chances of implosion. Tempered expectations are...if they make the playoffs, as any seed, I will be happy. That's all I need this year. I think the result of those two things is that I can dream on the team, but still keep a very attainable goal (and one fairly necessary to legitimately show improvement) to avoid being upset by them "failing" to win 60 games.
I watched the clip on O'live of the fan fest again and again and I saw Rudy making plays. One time the pass came to him on the right wing and with one motion he threw it to the top of the key. Smooth! Set up the play. Another time he was directing Bayless I think from the same spot to go to the corner. He just know Basketball and is instintive in the game. Like a point he knows the next move or two ahead. Many players like Webster and more so Outlaw don't seem to see that. Jones was good this way also to a lesser degree maybe. Rudy is so much more a player. He is like a vet in what he brings because he really is one. g Blazer
No doubt. I watched every Spain game during the Olympics, too, and he constantly reminded me how smooth Roy looked right off the bat during his first summer league here. I don't know if he'll be as good as Roy was immediately, but on the continuum between Jack and Roy, he's much more like Roy in the polish of his game. At this point in his rookie year, Jack was an intriguing prospect who we were optimistically projecting to be an NBA player. Pretty good for a non-lottery combo guard. Nobody is debating that Fernandez is an NBA player--it's a question of whether he has future All-Star in him.
I'm pretty comfortable with predicting a 51-55 win season, but I don't have the same emotion tied to that prediction that I did with, say, the 2000 team. With this team I realize we have a lot of new parts and a ton of youth, and we could get derailed by 10 wins just because stuff happens. (It happened last year with Oden.) If we had gotten that badly derailed in 2000 with a fully loaded veteran team, I would have been mad as hell. Going into 2000, I thought we had a 90% probability of going to 55 wins. Going into this season, I think we have a 60% probability of going to 53 or so wins. I think it's likely we'll succeed, but my expectations are tempered by a greater probability of failure. So my prediction is high, but my expectations are lower. What's the difference? In 2000 if we'd gone off the rails, I'd be looking for Dunleavy's head. In 2008 if things go off the rails, I'll be looking for 2009.
You are wise. Or you would've been if you'd stopped there. I really don't think Oden will be much of a downgrade on offense at Center than Aldridge and Frye were. Neither guy is really great at getting cheap buckets under the basket, so we ran something of a spread perimeter offense most of the time. We took more jumpshots than most NBA teams. Oden is going to change all that. He's going to get several buckets a game just by being under the hoop and being bigger and stronger than anybody else there. He may not score more points than those guys did while playing center, but he'll do it at a higher percentage. And he'll create better spacing, because teams are going to have to protect the middle at all times. I think Fernandez is better than either of those guys right now, even without a chance to adjust to the NBA game. I could be wrong, but we'll start to find out within a few days just gauging his play in preseason. I never hated Jack, and I actually like Blake. But at this stage in their careers they are both backup guards on most playoff teams. This team is better prepared to handle an injury to Blake than they were last year. Roy's job gets easier this year, even if Blake is hindered. Aldridge looks better. Oden and Fernandez are new offensive options. Even Outlaw and Webster may continue to progress. Last year we didn't stand a chance if Roy had a bad game. This year we do. You are right. Jones was a better SF. He had a lethal perimeter shot and he was smarter. But Rudy looked pretty smart and had a pretty good perimeter shot in the Olympics too. And with Oden our perimeter shooters are going to be getting more open looks this season.
I will be very surprised if this team does not win at least 47 games - I actually think that 50 is where they will end. If all we get from Oden is a Pryzbilla like performance - it is a huge upgrade - since we are not being outrebounded and pushed around for half the game. If we get more (and I expect we will get much more) - it will be gravy. Loved Jones - but Rudy is an upgrade. I actually liked Jack as well -and we will miss him a bit at the start of the year - but Bayless will grow to give us what Jack gave us pretty quickly.
As for the over-under on wins we've all got our "feel" for what will happen so there's really no right or wrong answer until mid April, but if all we get from Oden is a "Przybilla like" performance then that's not an upgrade, since we already have a center named Przybilla; allthat nets you is about 4 points per game along with 9ish boards. Oden has to be an upgrade over Joel for this team to have success (and this is not to knock Joel's game, because he's a defensive stud). As for Rudy and Bayless filling the shoes of Jones and Jack, I see both players as clear upgrades over what we had before, Rudy will of course have to adjust to the NBA 3-point line, and Bayless is going to need to work on not over-dribbling, but both players are clearly better athletes, and in terms of the veteran presence that Jones provided, I see Rudy as being a consumate professional, and not your typical rookie, (kind of like Luis Scola). The real variables in all of this is how quickly and well does everybody gel, how quickly all of our rookies adapt to the pace of the NBA, and whether or not team chemistry holds when a few (probably deserving) players aren't getting the minutes they'd like -- this especially worries me with so many guys coming into contract years.
Your math is wrong. Pryzbilla played 23.8 MPG last year. that's a half of a game. The other half - the team was undersized and underpowered. If all you get is another Pryzbilla - it means you are not undersized and underpowered for the 2nd half of the game (since you will have Pryzbilla coming to replace Oden when he goes out and vice versa). It means this team no longer gets outrebounded. This was the biggest problem of the Blazers last year. For 1/2 a game they were outrebounded and could not guard the interior. Another Pryzbilla solves this issue. Of course, I expect Oden to be an upgrade over Pryzbilla on the offensive end with a bit of time - and probably on the defensive end from pretty much the get go. Add the fact that Oden puts a lot of pressure on the other team's defense and frees Aldridge (or gets the other team's bigs in foul trouble) - and it is clear that having him in the lineup - even if his offensive production is low - is huge. The funny thing is, that Oden in the lineup will also make Pryzbilla a bigger and better offensive threat. He will not have to go against the other team's best bigs all the time - or if he does - they will already be tired from battling Oden in the middle. Look for Joel to have a wonderful offensive year (by his standards). Everyday will be playing against Golden states day for him...
The problem with this logic is that you are assuming that Joel was somehow physically limited to 24MPG, and couldn't play more. I'm a Joel fan, but I think the reason he only played half the game was because he didn't give us enough of what we needed at various parts of the game. The point is: We had more than 24MPG worth of "Joel" that we could have used last year, and we CHOSE not to use them. If we only get "Joel" productivity out of Oden, we don't get that much of an upgrade, because we could have played with 35MPG or more of "Joel Minutes" last year, and we didn't.
Joel probably could play a bit more - but he had other issues - like foul problems and the need for more offense. Of course, with the addition of Rudy and Bayless for Jack/Jones solves the more offense issue (You have more than just Travis as a reliable scorer on the 2nd unit) - and foul problems will be much less of an issue going forward. The makeup of this year's team makes even a 2nd Joel a huge upgrade over the last year.
By this logic, we could have a huge upgrade this year just by playing Joel more, which I agree with, and which could easily have been done without the addition of Oden. Joel averaged 3 PF/game last year. LMA averaged 3.2 PF/game. We could have played Joel more last year, and chose not to. The fact that having Rudy and Bayless allows us to absorb his lack of offense is true, but that doesn't mean that another Joel would be a huge upgrade. We could just use the one we have for more minutes.
First of all - you assume that Joel can go 48 minutes a game - this is not true - I suspect that Joel could see another 5 minutes per game - but if Joel's health history is any indication - limiting him to 24 minutes per game is a blessing. He played more games last year than any other year in his NBA career. Second - the comparison for fouls per game to Lamarcus is not reasonable - since Lamarcus played almost 35 MPG... Joel fights the other bigs and goes for the blocks and hard fouls - his foul rate is higher than Lamarcus's - and for a good reason. Again - a 2nd Joel is a blessing for this team. Since I fully expect Oden to be a better center than Joel within 20 to 30 games - this team is in for a huge upgrade.
Good post. He fouls a lot, he has a bruising style that's tough to maintain over big minutes, and he gets injured all the time. It's tough to play that kind of guy more than 26 mpg, which coincidentally is the most he's ever averaged in his career. On the flip side, though, he has the lowest Roland rating of any of our big minute players: http://www.82games.com/0708/0708POR.HTM Guys with similar styles (Dampier, Ben Wallace, Nesterovich, Diop) don't rank nearly as bad in that ranking relative to their teams. So it may be that Przybilla is more exposed on a team like last year where we had fewer offensive options. Anyway, this is all pretty moot. Przybilla can't catch an alley oop (or anything else not carefully handed to him at 3 mph). Przybilla hits free throws at 68%. Przybilla's idea of a creative pass is clearing it out to the guard at center court. Przybilla hasn't been the focus of any offensive team since junior high. Przybilla wasn't a highly anticipated center when he was a sophomore in High School. Setting Przybilla as the baseline of offensive expectations for Oden this year is just flat out aiming too low. It would be viewed as a disaster by everyone if Oden put up 4.8 ppg this year.
Nope, not assuming Joel can go 48MPG. I would expect him to have been able to go another 10MPG, for a total closer to 35MPG. It seems that you are assuming that one of Joel or Oden to be on the court at all times for the 48MPG of "Joel Time". It remains to be seen if this will happen, or if Nate will still choose to go with a faster lineup that can spread the defense at times. Agreed, it isn't a great metric for comparison. It was just a quick check to see how Joel compared. Scaling Joel up to 35MPG, he definitely fouls more than LMA. But, I think he still could have played more minutes than he did last season. His foul rate shows he probably could have played the 35MPG that I expected. I agree that having a 2nd Joel is a blessing. I'm just not buying the argument that having two identical Joels would instantly make a HUGE impact, because like I said, we could have played him him more, and chose not to. It is similar to the fact that I don't think adding, say, Erick Dampier this year would have made a HUGE impact. Yes, he would help, but not in a HUGE way. I expect Oden to be a much better player than Joel on both ends of the court very quickly. So, this conversation is probably moot, anyway.
I disagree. Even if all we get from the Bayless/Rudy combo is the same we got last year from Jack/Jones - a 2nd Joel will do the following for you: Rebound the ball more. The team 1 rebound less than the opposition per game last year. Joel lead the team in rebounds (8.4 per game). Aldridge was 2nd at 7.6. The person a 2nd Joel would be replaced is a combination of Frye/Raef (and out of position Aldridge). Let's ignore the Aldridge thing (because it means that the team is under-sized and you have a small Travis Outlaw at the 4. You will basically get 8.4 RPG from a 2nd Joel vs. 5.2 from the Raef/Frye combo. This falls into 1 more offensive rebound and 2 more defensive rebounds. Opposing teams shot against the blazers at 0.451 (probably more on offensive rebounds since they are usually caught near the basket) and the blazers converted at 0.448% - so these 3 more possessions per game will decrease the opponents points against the Blazers by more than 1 point per game and increase their production by around 2 points per game. So now the Blazers have gone from -1 point per game against the opponents - to +2. Last year the Golden States Warriors had a +2 per game against opponents and they won 48 games (compare to the Blazers win 41 wins and -1 point per game vs. opponents). I am willing to bet that 48 wins gets you in the playoffs this year. Just a 2nd Pryzbilla gets you a much better team this upcoming year - and with the upswing of adding Rudy/Bayless and continued improvements to rest of the team's core - I am standing by my assumption that 47 is about the worst I can see this team doing (assuming no major injuries) - and I will not be surprised to see them winning closer to 50.
Somehow Cheeks was able to get games where Joel would score about ten pts per game with the pick-and-roll and I can't remember who was the guard. Anyway Joel can score so we may very well get his additonal scoring in adition to Gregs. g
Cool, seems like one reasonable analysis. I'd love to see it work out that way. If I am reading this correctly, you are getting the added rebounding of 8.4RPG because you are assuming that the 24MPG Joel didn't play is being filled by "2nd Joel". Is that correct? As I mentioned, we still need to see if Nate keeps Joel and 2nd Joel on the court for a total of 48MPG. This is where I think we disagree. I'm not convinced, that given the option, Nate plays Joel for 48MPG. I think he would still choose to go small-ball and spread the defense at times. In that case, we don't get to add another 8.4RPG.
I am willing to bet that Joel's minutes were monitored and limited - and that the small ball option was forced on Nate because he was very likely to be in a size disadvantage once Joel went out of the game. If this was the case - there was very little incentive to play standard half-court basketball from a position of disadvantage - so going with a 3 guard lineup and playing small ball - to try and force the opposition to adjust to him made sense. Time will tell, I guess - but I really thought that the obvious holes this team had last year - PG play and SF play - were less of an issue than interior defense and rebounding when Joel was not in the game.
