Yeah, we lost. Yeah, we're 3-7. Who cares? This isn't supposed to be the season where we go for it. This is about developing guys, and that's exactly what we're doing. Sharpe already looks like he's going to be a legit star. Yes, he has holes. Yes, he makes silly mistakes. He's 20 years old. I'm much more enthused about what he CAN do. The fact that he can go out and have a rough shooting night, but get 8 rebounds, 7 assists, and 2 steals is awesome. I love it. Sharpe is the future of this team. Jabari Walker and Toumani Camara are legit. They're going to be rotation guys for a long time. Those two would be buried on a playoff team, but we're getting to see them grow before our very eyes. Ayton is a solid center. Is he a star? No. Should he have been the #1 pick? No. But I'd much rather have him than Nurk. He hasn't even hit his prime yet, and we're just starting to learn how to use him. I think the future is bright for this young man. Thybulle and Grant are finally starting to hit shots. In October, Grant struggled from three in the first four games. He shot 19% from deep. In November he's shooting 44.7% from three. That's going to help Scoot immensely when he comes back. He needs Grant and Thybulle hitting their open shots. Thybulle is shooting 38% from three this season. We will hopefully get Simons and Scoot back in December and then we can see what we've got. I'm actually fine with moving Brogdon. Keep Mays. He's an adequate backup. We don't need Brogdon. Let's move him when he's healthy for a pick and maybe a player. Murray and Rupert have looked good on the Remix. Hopefully they can continue to grow. RWill was great when he was healthy. Hopefully he can come back next season and be healthy. Our center rotation was awesome with Rob and Ayton. I just think there's a lot of positives to be happy about right now. We're rebuilding, but we have a great young core to build around. Sharpe, Simons, Scoot, Ayton, Camara, Walker, Murray, and Rupert. Plus we will most likely have our pick this year and the Warriors look like ass right now. We could end up with two lottery picks this summer. That's two more guys we can add to this core. If we keep Grant and Thybulle, great. They seem to be fine playing with our young guys. If we trade them, fine. We have guys who can take their minutes. About the only thing I'm really seriously grading this season is Billups, but I trust Cronin to make the right move. Joe Cronin deserves A LOT of credit for putting together a complete rebuild in not even 2 years and we have a bright future. Plenty to be excited about. Go Blazers!
the big positive I see is that my sister-in-law and her husband left town this weekend to snowbird for 7 months in Scottsdale. It's a long ways from my house to Scottsdale
Sharpe already looks like he's going to be a legit star. Yes, he has holes. Yes, he makes silly mistakes. He's 20 years old. I'm much more enthused about what he CAN do. The fact that he can go out and have a rough shooting night, but get 8 rebounds, 7 assists, and 2 steals is awesome. And 10 free throws (making 7).
can't get whooped by Utah, then expect fans to be positive & happy under any circumstance. The Blazers exceptionalized ultra stinkiness this evening.
Seriously, poor shooting from Sharpe yet I am still impressed. His rebounding and passing and defense and ability to get to the free throw line are the anatomy of a great player.
Yes a lot to be excited for this year. Sharpe and Ayton have been great. Grant has been fine. Camara has been a nice surprise. The Ant injury really sucks as he was the #1 key go to our offense so would've really liked to see how he'd perform in that role. Also would improve Sharpe and others role since they wouldn't be trying to force so much. Our defense has been good enough to where it would've been very nice to see if his offense gave us that nice balance. Certainly a lost opportunity for the first month of the year, hopefully we can still get some good months to watch him this season. Scoot is probably the biggest concern. Yeah it's only 5 games. Yes it's a tiny sample size. Still he looked much worse than expected. Also health wise he couldn't make it through 1 summer league or 5 regular season games. No he isn't close to being a bust yet...... but that can't be ruled out as I expected it would've been at this point. Hopeful we can get something in trade for Brogdon. As we saw with TimeLord one injury can instantly flip an asset from positive value to negative. If we can get a FRP for him lets pull the trigger. If not then I suppose it's probably worth the risk to keep him. Billups has been very good. This roster is a joke, he really has these guys working hard, giving effort, defending, improving, and developing. That's all we need at this time. Once we are a playoff team we can worry about finding a contending level coach, that might be many many years from now. I'll say that one big development is I have much less concern of keeping all 3 of Scoot Sharpe Ant long term. Defense has not been an issue, we really need offense, Sharpe has slid to SF for minutes better than expected. The chance one of these guys misses significant games is very high over an 82 game season. Never thought with those 3 and Brogdon we'd need to have two Gleague two way PGs sharing 48mpg before we are 10 games into the season. Also less likely to want to flip Ant for a forward now. Let's say we also draft a forward, both Camara and Walker improve, Scoot busts... We could suddenly be desperate for a guard next summer. But those are long term directions we can worry about in the summer. For now the biggest thing to root for is Scoot/Ant health, and enjoy watching this team put out great effort.
Sharpe is enough to keep me happy. Everything else has been a bonus. I love watching this team develop!
Scoot getting injured for two weeks was the best thing that could have happened to him. He can reset, take the mulligan, and come back ready to give it a second try. I also think having his self-confidence shaken by Westbrook et al was a good wake up call. Hopefully he lets the game come to him now instead of trying to force it around much better talent than the average college or g-league team faces.
Good post and I agree with everything except moving Brogdon for "a pick and maybe a player." A late first round pick is not enough. We do need him because games like last night are tough to watch...and injuries will continue to occur. We need some decent depth. I also am impressed with how Walker has progressed.
All good points. My main concern is Scoot's long term health. Also don't expect Williams to ever be back and healthy. I didn't want to tank this year but maybe it will happen naturally and is the best thing right now.
Look at Mr. Positive this morning. It sucks that the audio and internet on my end was not great as we covered much of this in the Blazer Metrics show but didn't load it because of the poor audio quality. Sharpe continues to show ways to contribute even though his shot wasn't falling. He looked a little tire and seemed to be coming up short, which given the the amount of minutes he has played to start the season, might be understandable. Mays is the best back-up real PG this team has had in quite a while. 33 assists in his last 3 games with only 6 turnovers. That makes life easier for his teammates. He just needs to be able to stretch the floor better. Ayton seems to be finding his groove and his teammates are figuring out what he can do. Grant is shooting it better and has had some better rebounding games (although only had 2 against Utah). Toumani continues to do a lot of little things and if he can improve his shot, he becomes a real rotation player. Brogdon should be back shortly and Scoot not too long after that which will help backcourt depth. They are back to being pretty small up front with RW3 out and Brown not having the confidence from Billups to play. Duop is not bad, but he is a stop-gap and not much of a rim protector. But they are getting time to grow and develop and that is what this season is all about. I was hoping last night would be a little closer with Kessler out, but 7 of their first 10 games have been on the road. Hopefully the home crowd can give them some energy as 12 of the next 19 are at home, although there are a lot of good teams on that part of the schedule. I'd like to see: Shae with an efficient 25+ point night Mays shooting over 33% from '3' Grant averaging 5+ rebounds Camara shooting over 33% from '3' on at least 4 attempts/game
We’re in the long game. Anyone expecting anything immediate will most assuredly be disappointed. Great post and I agree with almost everything.
Positives: despite Shaedon looking kinda like a deer in headlights at times last night, still had a decent stat line (not counting shooting). They're missing 2 starters and 2 role players and while they did lose, they don't look like a total and absolute train wreck.
I have book looking at the forwards who are projected to be high lottery picks this summer and boy…. None of them can shoot. They’re basically taller Scoots.
