A lot of folks have said it tonight, and I totally agree. I miss Brandon. I know he can't ever come back, and I wouldn't want him to sacrifice his knees for a stupid, possibly rigged sport, but man... I miss him.
He was a great player, but I think he was also a bit of crutch. Because he was so good at what he did, he covered over a lot of the warts that many people chose to overlook when things were going (relatively) good. It's painful to watch, but it is nice to see Nate's lame-ass offense be exposed for what it really is. Hopefully it leads to somebody who can design and implement a ball-movement and player-movement based system.
I under estimated his importance. I under estimated his unique contributions. With guys like Crawford and Felton we're just another aimless and "talented" team stuck in purgatory. We're the Golden State Warriors, and it fucking sucks.
The GSW's are my local team. Would you rather have a team the is more fun to watch offensively but never makes the playoffs yet never seems to do anything right with their many, many lottery picks? We're talking about one playoffs in something like 20 years with very little to show for all that misery.
I didn't underestimate his importance, which is why I always said that Roy made McMillan look better than he is. It's pretty easy to hand the ball to your All-Star and let him create. Now we don't have the All-Star playmaker and Nate looks like shit. Go figure...
This is a trick question, because the only right answer is I would rather have neither. That said, if you're going to spin your wheels fruitlessly and go nowhere, being entertained probably causes less heartburn.
Hmmm, did we ever get out of the first round with Brandon. that was it's own set of problems. Nothing against Roy, he was an all start player, but Nate's ISORoy offense was not going to take us anywhere, especially with Oden's loss. With Oden healthy the half court offense likely would have worked, but not without him.
LOL tough question on bad Blazer hangover Sunday morning. I think its more disappointing making the playoffs and losing first rd after first rd, but both situations suck
ISO ball wins NBA titles if you have a great offensive player. Look at all of the high-post ISO sets Dallas ran for Dirk last year in the playoffs. Roy eventually would have become unstoppable offensively with good knees. Now, we have wishes of motion offense and such, when the approach rarely wins titles.
It doesn't win titles when it's the only thing you run and teams are prepared to stop it. How many times did we see Brandon at the top of the key, trying to make something happen, tossing the ball out and someone clanking a three?
I miss Brandon too; but it was his time to leave the game. I really wanted him to play this season; but if the doctors said he may never walk again; then it was a good move to retire. I think the player we should really miss is Andre Miller. I didn't realize just how important he was to this team. Way better than Failton
Not as many times as we see the ball moving around with no threat on the perimeter late in games, and somebody clanking a three without knowing who should get the ball. I actually feel bad for those of you who bitched and moaned about Roy while he was playing, or how Nate was coaching the team back in Roy's heyday. I'm convinced that some of you will never be happy with the Blazers, which makes me wonder what is the point of posting here? Self-loathing?
McMillan craves certainty and stability, and isolation offense with a great creative scorer is among the most stable forms of offense in the NBA. If you could hack into McMillan's basketball-related dreams, I think what you'd find is a team that plays great defense, takes care of the ball and plays isolation basketball with a durable star. It's about as stable a winning formula as you could create. McMillan would probably call it "playing the odds" to make it as hard for an opposing team to beat you. And he wouldn't be completely wrong, if that is what he said. Isolation ball is pretty successful when you have a star. Complex motion offense have a higher ceiling but also a much lower floor. Unsuccessful motion offenses are turnover and bad shot machines. Running a successful motion offense, at the NBA level, takes a number of smart, versatile and high-caliber athletes and a creative offensive mind. Very few NBA head coaches are creative offensive minds. Tom Thibodeau is a well-respected coach and he's not a creative offensive mind (though he's a smart defensive coach). Last year, he coached the exact team McMillan wants...a tough, disciplined defense and an isolation offense for his durable star Derrick Rose. It wasn't a great offense, but it was successful enough (and they played at a low pace). Combined with their defense, they were a top team. McMillan has failed to create that kind of defense, which is more the problem than the offense he's run. I do think he's weak in terms of making changes to the lineup (but he's strong in getting the team to overcome adversity, a skill he's unfortunately had many chances to utilize). I'm not a major McMillan supporter, but I don't have much problem with what he did offensively when Roy was at the top of his game.
