Game Thread GAME# 2: BLAZERS @ KINGS - OCTOBER 25, 2019 - FRIDAY, 7:00 PM, NBCSNW

I sleep so much better when the Blazers win.

 

https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/...he-ambitious-prediction-of-the-nba-preseason/

"I think I'm going to blossom a lot here. They have so much movement, they have so many different plays and reads, I can probably get a triple-double with assists here. You know, I've been getting so many assists and dimes … I'm playing more like a point-center here." ~ Hassan Whiteside's prediction during Fall camp

 

Nice. As i remember he talked about this a bit.

 

You know it always struck me as strange @THE HCP always called this place a bunch of Nerds until i started paying more attention. This place is definitely full of NERDS.

 

Our Big 3:
FG%: 29/48 = 60.4%
+/-: +51/3 = +17/player

Very encouraging.

 

Zach Collins, Damian Lillard, and Kent Bazemore led the team in assists with 5 each.

Encouraging signs from Zach and Kent.

 

This is so true!

 

I don't have access to the forum at work anymore. Which fucking sucks. This time of year is really busy for me coaching and refereeing. Finishing up Fall season then we go right into Winter.

Somebody's gotta herd these cats!

 

https://theathletic.com/1325550/201...put-his-unique-spin-on-it/?source=weeklyemail

SACRAMENTO — Over the past four years, the beauty of the Trail Blazers was their continuity and familiarity. Virtually the same cast of characters played the same way every season, which offered an entertaining, yet almost predictable style.

And maybe that’s why two games into this season this Trail Blazers group seems like such a revelation, an intriguing and curious collection of talents so different from that steady and successful group of years past.

That diversity was on full display Friday in the Blazers’ 122-112 victory at Sacramento, when Kent Bazemore, Hassan Whiteside and Anfernee Simons showed us things we haven’t seen very often around here.

And, of course, there was also one thing we have become very accustomed to seeing — another dominant Damian Lillard performance, this one a 35-point game that was capped off by consecutive daggers, three pointers from 28 feet and 31 feet — that put the game out of reach with five minutes left.

Naturally, just two games into the season there are still some rough edges — the 3-point defense and the second unit among them — but there was a lot to like.

‘Blur Baze’
There were several players worthy, but if there was a game ball awarded for Friday’s game, it would have gone to Bazemore.

There were sexier statistical lines in the box score than Bazemore’s nine points, eight rebounds, five assists and two blocks, but it’s hard to imagine somebody impacting the game more broadly.

The signature moment was a chase-down block in the fourth quarter, which preserved the Blazers’ 94-86 lead. Simons made a bad pass, and what looked like a breakaway layin for Bogdan Bogdanovic was rejected by a sprinting Bazemore.


“The block he made in transition was a huge play for us,” coach Terry Stotts said. “Kind of a turning point for us.”

On a night when he did a lot, Bazemore said the chase-down block stood out.

“My favorite play of the game,” Bazemore said, recalling other famous chase-down blocks by Tayshaun Prince and LeBron James. “Those are the plays that gets everybody amped up.”

After two games, it seems safe to say Bazemore could turn out to be the most disruptive defensive wing Portland has had since … I don’t know, Scottie Pippen? He has a seven-foot wing span, and he hunts the ball with the gusto of Fido sniffing tails at the dog park.

“He’s got his nose in there all the time,” Lillard said of Bazemore’s defense.

With those long arms, his quickness and his nose for the ball, and Bazemore has been at the center of the most entertaining stretches of the Blazers’ season, creating opportunities when the team gets out and runs and plays with flair.

“It’s like playing against five of him,” Whiteside said. “I call him ‘Blur Baze.’ He’s a blur. He’s just all over the place.”

He has also shown he is a heady passer and one of those guys who does the little things. Smart plays like taking a foul, or tipping a rebound to a teammate, or making the pass that leads to another player getting an assist.

“He kind of does what you need him to do,” Stotts said. “He doesn’t get caught up in trying to score, he just kind of takes what the game gives him. And defensively, he’s up for the challenge.”

Whiteside’s “obsession”
Again on Friday, Whiteside was a monster, following up his 16-point, 19-rebound performance against Denver with 22 points and nine rebounds against the Kings.

The game changed in the third quarter, when the Blazers broke away from a halftime tie by scoring the first 12 points, and Whiteside was in the middle of it all. He scored 16 points in the third and showcased a pretty lob-dunk off a pass from Bazemore, something we haven’t seen many centers do around here for some time.



“Hassan was terrific,” Stotts said. “Strong impact on the game.”

Stotts said he felt bad for not playing Whiteside in the fourth quarter, but Sacramento went to a small lineup, so he stuck with Zach Collins and Mario Hezonja as his bigs.

Whiteside has now played 26 minutes in both games, and talk about making the most of the minutes. For the season, Whiteside has made 15-of-17 shots and is averaging 19 points, 14 rebounds and 1.5 blocks. Also of note is his free throw shooting. He is 8-for-10 at the line, where he is a career 59 percent shooter, including 44.9 percent last season. That percentage stuck with him as he entered the summer.

“I was a little embarrassed with myself,” Whiteside said.

Two seasons ago, he shot a career-best 70.3 percent from the line, but he said off-the-court disrupted his mental game, which in turn eroded his confidence. So this summer, he hired a shooting coach, and the two worked on his free throws for two-to-three hours a day.

“When I’m not good at something, I become obsessed about it,” Whiteside said. “So I was obsessed about free throws.”

He changed his hand placement, moving his left hand to the side of the ball instead of in front of the ball, and he is starting his shot more in front of his face rather than bringing it behind his head.

“I’m using my touch more than I was using it in the past,” Whiteside said.

Whiteside said “I plan on being an 80-percent-plus free throw shooter” — for two reasons. One, it will better allow him to play late in the game — “I know if you can’t foul me, it’s a whole different thing” — and it just might convince Stotts to give Whiteside the green light on 3-pointers, which the 7-foot-1 center views as his next evolution.

“I told CJ (McCollum), and if I shoot 80-percent plus from the free throw line he said he will get me shooting 3’s,” Whiteside said.

The delivery man
An important segment of Friday’s victory for the Blazers was an 11-minute stretch late in the first quarter and into the second quarter when 20-year-old guard Anfernee Simons made his first impact of the season.

Portland was scuffling, having been on the wrong end of an 11-0 run and trailing by as many as six when Simons checked in. After all the talk over the summer about how Simons was poised for a breakout season, he was rather nondescript in the opener, going 2-for-7 from the field.

“It was fast at first,” Simons said of the opener. “It felt sped up, erratic.”

The thing about Simons, though, is you can never tell if he just scored 37 or 7. For a youngster, he has this remarkably placid way about him, almost stone like. That demeanor is not indifference, it’s confidence.

“I try to stay level headed, and when stuff doesn’t go your way continue to believe in yourself and continue to move onto the next game,” Simons said. “And so I just moved onto the next game.”

And then, boom, there was the Anfernee Simons who has caused Neil Olshey to so uncharacteristically tout as a can’t-miss prospect. Simons scored 12 points in his first 11 minutes with everything from a floater, to a mid-range pull-up, and two three-pointers.

“That’s who he is,” Lillard said. “If we are going to be the team we want to be … we need him to score and be aggressive, confident … because he has the kind of ability where once he sees one go in, that can turn into three, four, five.”

Simons’ spark helped cover for another slow start from McCollum (scoreless first quarter), and bought the Blazers time to regroup at halftime while being tied.

“We didn’t seem like we had a lot going on in that stretch, and he really provided some timely shooting for us,” Stotts said.

Simons finished with 15 points on 6-of-9 shooting in 21 minutes, but it was that early stretch where he rescued the team that highlights the instant-offense that is so unique. It was performance that prompted Whiteside — who if you can’t tell was on quite the roll in his postgame interview -— to reach deep in his bag of quotes.

“He delivers like Walmart(?), and Fed Ex and Amazon,” Whiteside said. “Just delivering out there. I love it man, I love him. I sit beside him on the plane and I talk to him all day. I love that guy.”

Tap that wrist, it’s time
For all the great performances from Bazemore, Whiteside and Simons, the game was still in doubt early in the fourth, when the Kings cut it to 96-91 with 9:20 left.

So like he has done so many times during his career, Lillard brought the Blazers home.

In a nearly flawless quarter, Lillard scored 13 points while hitting all four of his shots, which included three 3s, which were from 28, 31 and 26 feet. The 31-footer seemed longer — he was just in front of the Kings’ halfcourt logo — and it gave the Blazers a 12-point lead with five minutes left.

A masterful showing in Sacramento. @Dame_Lillard is tonight's @biofreeze Performance of the Night.

His fourth quarter was beautiful in its power, precision and timing — a memorable performance for most players — but it was just another night for those who have come to expect such excellence. But for the newcomers, it was moving.

“Dame was special,” Bazemore said. “That’s my first time seeing it on his side. It was special to watch.”

Whiteside didn’t play in the fourth, but he said he knew what time it was, playing off Lillard’s “Dame Time” declaration at the end of games. During Lillard’s spree, Whiteside paced up and down the bench mimicking Lillard’s trademark move tapping his wrist as if pointing to a watch.





“I already knew what time it was,” Whiteside said. “Did you know what time it was? Yeah? We knew what time it was. I think everybody knew what time it was.”

In two games, Lillard is averaging 33.5 points, 6.5 assists, and 4.5 rebounds while shooting 53.7 percent from the field. He is also second on the team with four steals.

On to Dallas
The Blazers stayed the night in Sacramento and flew to Dallas on Saturday for a practice before Sunday’s game against the 2-0 Mavericks. Chances are the Blazers will once again go over their defensive coverages and assignments, particularly the 3-point line.

After Denver went 18-for-32 (56.2 percent) from three in the opener, Sacramento went 10-for-19 in the first half, with many of the attempts wide open. The Kings went 5-for-18 from three in the second half, but still nobody was dodging the notion that the Blazers’ perimeter defense has to tighten up.

“We’ve been putting ourselves in scramble situations … moments where we didn’t execute,” Lillard said. “I had three of them in first half where I misjudged the play or I made a read that wasn’t in our game plan and it cost us two wide open 3s.”

The catchphrase uttered by Stotts and the players is “better communication,” particularly in transition.

“It’s a work in progress, that’s what you have a regular season for,” Bazemore said. “We are trying different things and we installed some new things, and we have a lot of new guys, so we are still trying to figure it out.

“But the effort is there and we are finding ways to keep ourselves in the game with that being our deficiency right now. You look at everything else, I think we’ve done a pretty solid job across the board. It’s just the 3-point shot.”

So it was on to Texas, this new group with so many different personalities, so many different playing styles, toting the first of what they figure will be many victories.

“There’s some stuff we have to sharpen up; every game isn’t going to be perfect,” Bazemore said. “It gives us something to work toward, and once we figure that out, we will be a heckuva team.”

 

"Stotts said he felt bad for not playing Whiteside in the fourth quarter, but Sacramento went to a small lineup, so he stuck with Zach Collins and Mario Hezonja as his bigs."

This dude still hasn't learned anything

 

We got shooooootahs!

 

Not sure about your take here. Sure, there is a time to go big when the other team goes small to punish them on boards and in the post. But, with the way Sac was firing off 3 pointers, we needed 5 guys on the floor who could, at least in theory, defend the perimeter. Also, even with Zach at the 5 in the 4th quarter, he was still a nightmare for Sac on the O boards. He gathered Offensive rebounds or was fouled going for them several times towards the end.

 

Hey bro...good to hear from you! You need to get an NBA job!

 

there was also the previous game as a gauge. Whiteside got burned by Jokic three's in that 4th Q because he was slow to challenge the shot. Last night in the 4th the Kings were going with Bjelica at C and last season, he shot over 40% on three's. Collins is simply a better defensive matchup than Whiteside (or Nurk for that matter

and on the other end of the floor, there isn't enough synergy yet between Dame and Hassan to have confidence the two-man offense could offset a potential defensive issue. Maybe later in the season, the Blazers can have more confidence their end of a Whiteside mismatch would win

 

I feel like this is an unfair criticism.

1 - Whiteside is still coming back from that ankle injury. He was clearly winded at the end of the game.

2 - Jokic was a 30% three point shooter last year, so it's not like he's a deadeye.

3 - Yes, you have to defend him, but this is a center we're talking about. We never used to ask centers to defend other centers on the perimeter, and Whiteside is more a traditional center.

 

Did we win?

 

lol!

 

Finally got to watch the game. Not great play overall but it kind of got better as the game went on and we won all good I guess

Simons' eyes light up when he sees kings' jerseys I guess
Tolliver is still terrible. Just play Skal
Collins had a few impressive rebounds. And I like his post-ups
Whiteside is good
Nice to see CJ find his shot in the 2nd half.
Perimeter defense still need improvements
I want more from Mario.