and the other keeps thinking people are saying lillard is better than rw... despite people saying rw is the better athlete and played a hell of a good half... youre in too deep, but you can get out. its okay,we still love you.
Team ball trumps ballhog ball. We put the better team on the court and we finished the game much better. Westbrook could not score on Nico in the 4th. The strategy actually worked to perfection. Westbrook was gassed after 3 qtrs but he did get his stats. Lillard had an off 1st half. So what. We have a lot of guys contributing and in the end we blew them out.
Yes, it usually does. But I didn't see a lot of team ball from the Blazers. I saw us missing a lot of shots through most of the game, and then finally heating up in the fourth quarter. To be honest, OKC was moving the ball better than we were most of the night. We just finally got untracked late in the game, hit some big shots, and got our confidence up. Yes, Lillard had an "off" first half, but he also couldn't stop Westbrook to save his life. That's not being "off," that's being incapable of guarding a guy. Yes, and I'm happy about that. The Blazers won, and we got to see an amazing performance by Westbrook.
Lillard > Westbrook Look at the 4th quarter numbers. Lillard saves his best for last. He never tried to show off. He could have taken 25-30 shots and got high scoring numbers. But he played within the team framework. Then when his team needed him, he scores 7 points in the 4th quarter and his team gets the win. Westbrook was all about showing off and then he was too tired to close the deal. MAYBE Westbrook is the better one on one player but that is not what this league is about. Westbrook should've been setting up Perry Jones and Ibaka throughout the night. That's what Telfair did and Thunder almost beat the Clippers. When Westbroom played (against Blazers), he got blown out.
Wes and Blake couldn't stop Westbrook, either, and Nic only slowed him down a bit. Great offense is unstoppable in the NBA. Lillard has had more than a few of those offensive nights himself.
For God's sake, KingSpeed, Westbrook carried that team on his shoulders for 3 quarters. There was no choking. Maybe some exhaustion, but not choking. If Lillard had poured in 38 points and 6 assists in a valiant losing effort, I don't think you'd be saying he "choked" just because he couldn't carry his severely depleted team to victory in the fourth quarter.
Now that you've seen how much better the Thunder play WITHOUT Westbrook, you can see how selfish Westbrook was against us. It was an awful performance. Ugly and selfish. Lillard had 20 points, including 12 in 4th quarter, vs Kings but I was not happy and do not consider it a good performance. His 10 point performance against OKC was better. You DO realize that if we ran our offense solely through Lillard that he can score 38 points every fucking night? No problem. But it's a team game and he has to pick his spots and play within the frame of team-oriented winning basketball. And he did choke. And if he was exhausted, that was HIS fault. He didn't pace himself to play a 48 minute game and didn't include his teammates so that they could be there for him if he struggled. It was an awful awful performance.
Westbrook choked by getting a T and missing a FT. Meanwhile, Lillard does what is needed to WIN the game. Like he did on opening night. No "exhaustion" here. Lillard>Westbrook Checkmate
