To get easier baskets we need to play better D. While you can run it up court after a made basket it's a lot easier when you rebound a miss shot. Having Oden healthy wouldn't hurt. We did seem to do more plays against the Pacers, but it was against the Pacers. Better teams will take stuff away from us. Usually the most effective is pressure which keeps us from getting into our sets until the clock is down.
Detroit won a championship by having rather mediocre offense - but by having absolutely fantastic defense. The Celts won a championship by having the same distribution of jump-shooting/inside shooting as the Blazers had last year (when we had GO and Joel) and playing fantastic defense - In their championship year, the Celts took 66% jump shots, 29% close, 4% dunks and 1% tips - their offensive rating that year was #10 in the league. Last year, our jump shooting team had the following distribution: 66% jump shots, 24% close, 7% dunk, 2% tip-in - very similar to what the Celts took (only our offense was more efficient, 1st or 2nd in the league) - but the defense, of course was not there. However, as we have seen, before GO went down, this team was 2nd in defensive efficiency and 10th in offensive efficiency - and you would have expected them to get better with more games on both sides of the floor - again, the idea that this team's offense (assuming full strength and GO/Joel in the mix) is "ineffective" for the playoffs is totally unfounded, imho - especially when you see how similar it was to the Celts offense when they won the championship. This team is, despite the cries of "stale offense" - is actually an offensive juggernaut, and early signs at the start of the year showed to be much improved on defense as well. It's easy to buy the Charles Barkley "they are a jump shooting team" nonsense - but the data shows it to be exactly that - nonsense. BTW - if we look at the Spurs, the year they won their last ring - they took 67% jump shots - higher than what Portland took last year. Again, the numbers are just not their to support this claim.
The numbers might support it, but it shouldn't be fair to lump Tim Duncan's silky smooth Bank shot and a Blazer fading away as the shot clock is about to expire in one group. I think I have posted this before, but an NBA scout friend of mine claims that Portland has one of the easiest offenses to defend, in terms of the X's and O's because they shoot so many jump shots. So I will listen to his nonsense as well as Barkley's
If the ball goes in silky smooth or ugly and bouncing it is worth 2 points. Well, the numbers show that they do not shoot so many jump shots and the numbers also show that they execute their offense very efficiently - if it was so easy to defend against, surely they would not score as many points for each possession. Hey, you are a big boy. You can listen to any nonsense you want. But unless there is something more than "he said, she said" about it - and there is real data to support it - I will choose to look at it as nonsense.
Oddly enough team failure is also common in the NBA. Let me be very clear. I think Nate is a good to great defensive coach who has not really had the personel in the past to really implement his game plan. I also think Nate is a decent but not good offensive coach who could stand to have some improvement in that area. Maybe it comes down to personel in this case as well but I just don't think that is true. It isn't a crime to suggest that the team shouldn't stand around so much in the last 5 minutes of a close game. Or that the lack of movement may make them easier to defend, especially in a playoff series where the teams can focus on stopping one team instead of having a few hours of tape session on a team before a game like the regular season. I don't remember which analyst is was (I think Hubie Brown) who said in the playoffs you need a decent 3rd and fourth option on offense in the playoffs because the other team is going to shut down your first and second options. I fear that Portland's third option is the Flaming Bag Pass and desperate shot against the clock. I would like to see that change.
Most teams never make it past the first round. Only 17 out of the 30 teams have ever won a championship in the history of the NBA. I am aware of the fact that all 30 teams haven't existed for that long but it is still disconcerting. If you consider success to be getting to the second round of the playoffs (and this would be my yardstick for a good team having a successful year) then every single year only 8 out of 30 teams enjoy success. The rest are trying to reach that level. The teams that have had the most success in the last 15 years had fairly complex offenses (Detroit had an offense setup to run Rip's man into the ground so it wasn't as simple as Portland's currently is). San Antonio did, the Lakers offense is brutally complex (it actually works less well when Kobe stops playing within it). I have no clue why anyone would think our offense couldn't get better. I think Portland's offense could be better and will have to be better to make it to the second round of the playoffs.
I understand your definition of success, and that helps me understand your previous post. I'd be shocked if there is a person out there, including Nate who doesn't think our offense could be better. I certainly have never heard someone say that our offense is perfect.
