Name the best players in the league and then list how many years of college they had (or forced to have in most cases) Talent is what matters
What would be the purpose of that list? To prove that great players are great? The problem with that list, and why I find your post disingenuous, is it would completely exclude all the players that were drafted on potential, but never lived up to that potential. And, that was the point I was making - that guys that are very young and very raw are a crap shoot. We're not talking about the next LeBron here. We're talking about Noah Vonleh, a very young, very raw player with a very limited skill set, but lots of upside and good measurements. He will be a lottery pick, based on his "upside", but not expected to make an immediate impact. He will be a project for whoever drafts him. Your list would also exclude players like O.J. Mayo, Brandon Jennings and Shabazz Muhammad whose draft stock all slipped after just one season competing against better-than-high-school competition exposed their weaknesses. BNM
Yikes... Size wise, he's a carbon copy of Terrence Jones. Their combine numbers are nearly identical. And Jones looked like a midget next to Aldridge. He was just too small to guard bigger Pf's and that's magnified in the playoffs.
I assume we'd have to give up a starter to acquire him? Sounds like my worst nightmare. Tear a part a promising second round team for a project that becomes another Blazers draft bust. Remember all the talk of Meyers Leonard prior to the draft? He was all team big 10 or whatever with even more impressive physical attributes but the guy is a total turd on the court. NO THANKS TO PROJECTS! Let the crappy teams draft them so the very rare successful ones can leave as a free agent. I hope we stay away from that.
I understand it's a fact we did indeed make the second round, but it's not like we destroyed Houston. We were lucky Dame hit that shot.
That wasn't the only high point of the year. We had the best record in the league well into the season and were a top3 seed most of the year. This was despite one of the league's worst benches. We still finished with the NBA 5th best record. We beat every team except the Heat who won on a 3 point game winner. Our roster is full of young players with upside and nobody past their prime. Maybe we are a contendet now, maybe we aren't quite there yet; but we are damn close and I haven't been able to say that since Steve Smith was our starting shooting guard.
I think we justified having the 6th best record in the league this year. You can make a case that maybe we were 7th best team overall if you're not feeling generous, but our playoff performance backed up our regular season performance, lucky shot (like Dame hasn't hit that before) and all. This is a problem the 2009 vintage of the Blazers had; they won some games, but couldn't back it up in the playoffs. I bet that if we get the personnel to win a few more games, our playoff performance will justify our regular season again.
I see where you are coming from, but I think the playoffs are an entirely different animal from the regular season. It's my opinion that we aren't as close as you think we are
I disagree; we showed we were the 6th or 7th best team in the playoffs, which is right where we were all year. We are as close as we seem. No closer, no further. Frankly I don't think any of the championship Bulls teams could have beat the Spurs in the WC semis; they are just playing out of their gourds right now.
Hmph, I agree with you. Setting aside "The Shot", we also got two historical performances from LMA in G1 and G2. You can't count on performances like that if you want to make it far in the post-season. And stepping back into the regular season, we amassed the bulk of our Ws during the first 1/3rd of the season when we were - again - getting historical shooting performances from both LMA and Wes. Once their shooting returned to their career numbers we were rather ho-hum. And even during that great run we eeked out wins against CLE/DET/OKC, and probably a few others, that counted in the W column but showed we weren't really as strong as our record suggested. Additionally, we went up against several teams that were missing key players while we had the healthiest season in recent memory. This isn't to take away from what we accomplished this season - it was far and away the best season we've had since losing to DAL in the 1st round. But I really think we need to look at some of the details of how the season went, rather than pointing to "54 WINS", "SECOND ROUND", "FIFTH SEED". That's what people were doing during that first 1/3rd of the season when some of us were pointing to signs that the pace was unsustainable.
Jeezus, every silver lining has a cloud, doesn't it? A guy, who as only a second year player that had previously hit multiple game winning shots during the regular season, hits a game winner during the playoffs and it'a a miracle that will never be repeated. And there's a reason Aldridge had two consecutive historical performances - he's that good. I know you hate on the guy every chance you get, but guys that suck don't have multiple historical performances when they matter the most. Alrdidge stepped up big time in when it mattered and won that series for us. We didn't just steal home court from Houston, we took BOTH Games 1 and 2 from them in their building - courtesy of LaMarcus Aldridge. It's called stepping up. For a young team with very little playoff experience and no previous playoff success, our two best players stepped up big time during that series. And yet, this is somehow viewed as a negative???? Seriously? Houston had HCA, more post season experience and supposedly their stars were a notch above ours. Our guys went out and proved you and Mediocre Man, wrong, and rather than give them credit for stepping up when it matters most, you view it as some kind of fluke that will never happen again. Our stars outperformed their stars and we beat them in 6 games in spite of not having HCA. Credit where credit is due, please. Double Jeezus, again more clouds and doom and gloom. Guess what, the NBA regular season GRUELING and long. Every team goes through ups and downs, but in the end all wins count the same. There is no degree of difficulty, no extra credit for margin of victory and no style points. Yeah, we got off to a hot start and won some close games, but we also lost some close game and we lost the bulk of our games when we had two 5 game road trips in the same month for the first time in the entire 43-year history of the team AND our best player also missed 9 games that same month. The fact is, we also won 9 of our last 10. So, we started hot, stumbled in the middle and then finished strong. It's not like that's all that unusual over the course of an 82-game schedule. Actually, it was much BETTER than that season. That year we only won 50 games and LOST in the first round. Please explain how that season was better than this one. Even more importantly, that was a veteran team with a TON of playoff experience and with many key players (Sabonis, Pippen, Dale Davis, etc.) on the last legs of their careers. With the the exception of ZBo, every player on that roster was either at, or past, their peak. That was a team on the way down, not on the way up. By comparison, this team won 54 games and WON the first round. Our best players are either in their primes, or still improving. On this team all our starters were between 23 and 28. On that team that LOST to Dallas, we only had one starter under the age of 28 and two that were 33 and 37. Sabas who wasn't a starter, was 38. This team was better than that team, both regular season and playoffs. I know you and Mediocre Man consider yourself "realists", and the rest of us clueless homers, but anyoen who claims the team that won 50 games and LOST to Dallas was better than the team that won 54 games and BEAT Houston is not being very realistic. Yeah, the pace was unsustainable. No shit. I don't think anyone here ever realistically thought we'd win 70 games based on our 22-4 start. But on the other hand, after that same 22-4 start, Mediocre Man was still claiming we were a average team that would finish at .500 and miss the playoffs. Now who was being unrealistic? I just don't get it. Both of you make excuses (we got lucky, we needed historical performances that will never be repeated, we got off to a hot start) for "your" team's success and and constantly piss on everyone else's parade when the team does well. The fact is, this was the 8th most successful season in the 43-year history of the Portland Trail Blazers. The team is young, healthy and still improving. But hey, keep serenading us with your negativity. Eventually, you'll be right. All teams eventually peak and decline. When that happens, you can finally say, "I told you so!" Good for you. BNM
I certainly thought we would come back down to earth sooner than we did. I was wrong about them this year. I think it's foolish though not to acknowledge LMA's historical performances in games 1 and 2 and Lillard's miracle shot in game 6. the two teams seemed to be pretty evenly matched, all the way down to the total points 667-660 in favor of Houston. I'm not sure what our biggest lead in the series was, but they led every single game by double digits. That being said, Houston would have been "lucky" to beat us too. It's like you refuse to let anyone else have an opinion unless it is glowing Blazers
And I think it's foolish not to give those guys credit for stepping up when it counted. To act like those performances were just dumb luck that can never be repeated does not give those guys the credit they deserve. Aldridge PROVED he is capable of having HUGE games that can carry his team to victory in the post season. Lillard PROVED he can hit a big shot with the game on the line in the playoffs - he'd already proven it multiple times in the regular season. Those are GOOD things. You and blue9 act like it was just dumb luck that we got by Houston and don't give these guys credit for the skills and talent it takes do do what they did. Yes, the teams were very closely matched, but we won because our stars did what their's couldn't - had historic performances and hit big shots. Those are the things you need to do to be successful in the post season. The fact that Lillard stepped up and hit a series winning shot in his first post season is a huge positive. It reaffirms what we've already seen in the regular season - that the guy is a clutch finisher who wants the ball in his hands with game on the line and isn't afraid to take the big shot. He thrives under pressure - and that's the kind of cold blooded confidence you need to win in the post season. Again these are good things, not negatives. All that proves to me is Houston is not a clutch team. They wilt under pressure and can't hold a lead. The only score that matters is the one when the game is over and we won 4 of the 6 games in spite of having a younger, less experienced team and not having HCA. The games were close, but we were the better team. Our guys stepped up, their guys didn't. Why is it considered lucky when our guys out played theirs? We didn't win because were were lucky. We won because we played better. Lillard's shot wasn't a lucky shot. He's hit other similar game winning 3-pointers. It was a break down in defense by the Rockets that allowed him get that shot off. It was good execution by the Blazers and poor execution by the Rockets. No luck involved. Credit where credit is due, please. Oh bullshit. I have been plenty critical of this team when they deserve it, but I also enjoy it when they succeed and give them credit when they earn it. I was a HUGE critic of McMillan's his last three seasons in Portland and I was all over Felton's fat lazy ass and dogged most of that roster for their lack of professionalism. I was also a very vocal critic of Whittsit back in the old ESPN forum days. I save my ire and negativity for those who deserve it. Given the success of the team this year, I saw very little to be negative about. I enjoyed this season and this post season more than any in the past 14 years, and given the way that 2000 season ended with the 4th quarter meltdown against the Lakers, I think this may be my favorite Blazer season since we made the finals against the Bulls. I don't "refuse to let anyone else have an opinion unless it is glowing Blazers", I just fail to see why there is so much to be negative about after the season this team just had. So yeah, when I see someone downplaying this team's success, saying it was just dumb luck, I'm going to voice my dissenting opinion. It's not like you hold back with your negative opinions. Why would you expect me to hold back with my positive ones? BNM
It's just such a combative take on the topic. Our guys played great, but Aldridge played at a level only a couple of players in the history of the league had played at for those first two games. Having huge games and having historic games is very different Lillard may have hit shots like that before, but a fade away 30 footer with .9 seconds on the clock is about as low a % shot as there is, so to say it isn't lucky is not being real, IMO Houston was the youngest team in the playoffs, BTW
