I enjoy looking at this stuff and frequently peruse myself, it’s nice to have it all in one spot! For that my sir you get a rec!

some home games against creme puffs is just what the doctor ordered.

Still, 8-6 with only 4 home games is amazing.

Nice post, snake. Rec.

The Celtics won a championship last year by committing to play tough D every night. For whatever reason, the stats confirm what anyone watching the games would say – the Blazers have been a TERRIBLE defensive team this year.

Although I agree that the difficult schedule plays into this, to my eyes, the Blazers don’t look much better on D against the creampuffs they have played up to this point. The first half against the lowly Kings (minus their best player and one of the most efficient two guards in the league) looked ATROCIOUS. Lay up, lay up, lay up. Open fifteen footer, open fifteen footer, open fifteen footer. The Blazers made John Salmons and Spencer Hawes look like Stockton and Malone in their prime.

This was overshadowed, ultimately, in the same way it typically has been so far – by shooting LIGHTS OUT from three. This probably isn’t a recipe for long term success. The Blazers are not going to end the season with six or seven guys shooting 40% from downtown. It will not last.

That’s why the Blazers need to, have to, MUST figure out how to improve on the defensive end.

What are the problems, and how can they improve?

Well, I think the bulk of the issues come down to two spots – PG and SF. Blake is a microcosm for the team so far this season – he has shot the ball well enough to distract everyone’s attention (for the most part) away from how atrocious he’s been on the defensive end. Trout has been predictable inept, other than brief flashes of psuedo-competence. And, notwithstanding his rep as a potential defensive stopper, Batum has struggled on that end. He’s just not strong enough or experienced enough to guard NBA wings.

The good news is, at the three, help is on the way. Martell is by far the best defensive small forward on the team. He will help. A lot.

PG is the long term question mark. Right now, the team lacks a viable option who can both space the floor by consistently knocking down the three (Blake, check; Sergio, nope) and play moderately competent D (Sergio, surprisingly, check; Blake, swing and a miss).

That’s why I think the front office is hard at work evaluating options at that spot, and why we keep hearing Hinrich rumors. He would combine the best attributes of Sergio and Blake – good shooter, good playmaker, good on D.

In the meantime, look for the Blazers to regress a little on offense, while still looking good. Let’s hope the D can find a way to step up and compensate.

but I dont think you can conclude that Oden has not helped on defense as he has not played in all of our games so you cant really isolate him as someone who has not helped. I think his +/- is not so good, but that stat is not so good in a small sample regime.

you can’t have a complete breakdown of stats without at least including 82games.com.

http://www.82games.com/0809/0809POR.HTM

And major credit for you letting stats be persuasive in reference to your prior post.

I, too, thnk your post on defense is right on. It’s interesting that me and everyone else I see posting here (for the most part) are obsessive about offense. Outlaw shoots too many weirdo shots; Rudy misses too many threes; LMA is in a slump… etc, etc, etc.

And here we are, one of the best ofensive teams in the league. So the post has done something for me: pay more attention to the defense!! And I think Martell can help here. Frye and Outlaw certainly can’t.

One thing though: I notice that the stat is per 100 possessions. That’s great as a benchmark for relative play. But I also note that we’re the slowest team (or close to it) in the NBA.

Does this mean that while we score a lot in 100 possessions it takes us, by far and away, the L-O-N-G-E-S-T amount of time to reap the benefits of that highly efficient offense?

I’m not talking about passing the ball around… which I love. I’m more worried about our chronically lousy fast break.

And Roy.

The only—and I mean only—irritating thing I found about Roy is how terribly slow he is bringing the ball up the court. I’m begging him through the TV to at least job if he’s going to bring the ball up. And is it just me or is Roy sort of bad running the break? I guess the whole team is plain awful at the fast break but it’s weird to me that Roy himself seems oddly out of position on those plays.

I mention this—maybe partly because I can’t avoid obsessing about offense—but also because I think that’s an easy way we could speed play up. It seems to me that every time Roy brings the ball up the court he’s bring the ball the whole way up the court and there is no chance for any sort of fast break or quick possession.

As an aside, I have no problem “living by the three” provided that they’re open and good shots. One thing I’ve been impressed about on this team is we take very, very good three-point shots. I’m totally fine watching a season on that and banking it through to the playoffs.

for a 7th or 8th seed playoff team. We won a few games against strong teams, and beat almost all of the weak teams.

We are 3-5 against teams that have a winning record as of last night.

Wins – Houston, Orlando, and Miami
Losses – LA, Phoenix x2, Utah, New Orleans.

We are 5-1 against the remaining teams.

Wins – San Antonio (6-6), Minnesota x2, Chicago, Sacramento
Losses – Golden State

In the 8 games we won, the opponents combined record is 46-55.
In the 6 games we lost, the opponents combined record is 49-28.

But I dont have anything useful to contribute

Here’s my simplistic simpleton line of reasoning. Sure at first glance speeding up the offense would give the other team more possessions per game as well. But given our superior offensive rebounding and low turnover rate, wouldn’t that mean, all other things equal, speeding up our offense would result in a greater number of shots plus more second chance points through orebs? In that case, a faster offense would mean not just a greater number of shots, but a greater a greater number of shots than the opposing team. For example, a slow offense could give us say 24 mins offense and 24 mins defense. But a faster offense could theoretically give us 26 mins offense and 22 mins defense.

I’m not saying take up the Nellie/D’Antoni playbook. But taking the shot a fraction faster each possession should help efficient scoring teams like ours! I just think by at least running instead of walking the ball down court and not running the shot clock down on most plays will in the end increase the Blazer’s proportion of possessions.

But I guess in the end, offense gets teams into the playoffs. Defense wins championships.