Media Row Report: Blazers 97, Jazz 108

I feared that would happen with the integration of Andre (and more Oden) into the game, looking good on some nights and really bad on others. I guess my 55 wins prognosis isn’t that wrong, we might be in for a slow start especially on nights were either LaMarcus or Roy aren’t clicking either.

…and I have to say that the officiating tonight was the worst of all of them. Refs blowing whistles anticipating a foul, or swallowing a whistle on an actual foul. It’s really enough to make a fan shake his or her head in disgust. Now, fairly, these replacement refs are clearly learning as they go, and had little training beforehand, but still…

On the players, I thought Brandon played much better tonight, got his flow going early, when nobody else could put the ball in the basket. Outlaw, Howard, the Inferno… They all had decent games scoring-wise. Turnovers are going to be a problem until the team gets used to a faster tempo.

But I would venture to guess if LMA had played there would have been more flow to our offense, more punch.

be preseason?

I figured that would eliminate the logjams and let the unscathed guys find their rhythm. But this is too much of a “good thing.” And the timing is bad: just when Nate was intending to end the experimentation and settle on a rotation, the team is riddled with minor injuries.

Time to brace for a slow start. The good news: it’s a long, long season.

…it was a horrible preseason game. You never want to learn to embrace excuses, but The Blazers did have some unexpected events happen. I have to think Oden and LMA would of made a world of difference.

  The other reality is that preseason has revealed some realities good and bad. Oden has improved, Miller has skills, Webster can play, Josh Howard can help this team. On the bad side, there seems to be something wrong. At this point it’s both tangible and intangible. Tangibly you can see that our defense needs a lot of work, tangibly you can see that this team is struggling with regaining it’s identity on the court and finding cohesion.
    
    Towards the second issues, Why this seems to be such a struggle is far more less tangible. I’m a little in the dark here. Did The Blazers forget the mantra of " Hungry and Humble"? I don’t mind losing a home game, but losing one when it appears the most of the available players are playing in a detached manner is frustrating. I don’t mind losing a preseason game, but I want the players to look like they want to win it.

   Like I said, I’m not one to panic, but I agree with Ben. The Blazers better find that switch quickly. As Bob Dylan once sang, “It’s not dark yet but it’s getting there”.

Imagine the Portland Trailblazers rolled out of bed at like 5 in the morning, immediately put on their uniforms and played a game of professional basketball together. That was last night’s game. Nobody really seemed to want anything other than Travis Outlaw, Dante Cunningham and late in the game, Jerryd Bayless. Roy kinda sleepwalked through the whole deal. But look, there’s just no getting around this fact. We were forced to put some really unproven combinations of newer guys and deep bench players on the floor. Last night, here’s who played from a minutes standpoint. The guys on the floor played like crap, but seriously. Here’s who played last night.

—

PG: Steve Blake (21:27), Andre Miller (16:02)
SG: Brandon Roy (29:51), Jerryd Bayless (20:55)

Fowards:

Nic. Batum (:54)
Martell Webster (28.52)
Dante Cunningham (20:31)
Ime Udoka (16:36)

Juwan Howard (24:49)
Travis Outlaw (20:34)

C: Joel Pryzbilla (14:10), Jarron Collins (25:18)

—

Look up at those minutes. We played the Utah Jazz who had Millsap AND Boozer active. Hell, most of their roster was available. Jerry Sloan basically played with his rotation a bit, but it looked pretty damn close to being polished if you ask me. I’m no Jazz fan but they looked VERY cohesive. Like, all their guys healthy and ready for the season cohesive.

..and we had no Rudy, Batum, LaMarcus, Oden and Joel plays limited minutes.

That’s the second guy we run our offense through and basically two starting centers. Joel playing 14 of 48 minutes, had 2 points, 4 rebounds and a bucket full of “kiss my … refs”. I would have appreciated a better effort from the guys we HAD, but I really can’t blame them for being outclassed by Utah’s season ready rotation.

I know that I have myself been looking at these games as “just” pre-season, and telling myself not to panic yet.

But regular season is less than a week away. One thing that kept us in the running last year is that we started off pretty good and were able to suprise a lot of other teams. This year, teams are ready to play us. They hear the hype and I’m sure they can’t wait to beat our beloved Blazers. And we have looked like a hot mess in every game thus far.

I’m starting to panic. I’ll admit it. I do not want to get beat by a Yao-less Rockets team on opening night. And yet I fear that it might happen. It’s hard not to push this key.

And here’s why: I am absolutely not buying anyone sellnig the “unanticipated lineup” thing. Check it out.

People are claiming the absence of Oden hurt the team. Well, sure… but Pryz was starting all last year on the Big Winning Season. And he’s been mentioned as the starter most of training camp. Missing Oden should not have been the big deal it was… it wouldn’t have so badly hurt last year.

LMA was out… this is IS a big deal. But there were games last year where the team was missing either Roy or LMA and in either case the team performed well. As far as I’m concerned, missing LMA was the only unexpected event last night. Shouldn’t this have meant that Travis (our awesome 7yr veteran) and Juwan Howard (or cagey vet) could step in and cover for a game?

Batum got hurt early… but whither Martell Webster?

Missing Rudy… I think this is actually a preggy big deal. But the team supposedly has this logjam at guard. Shouldn’t this be the time that Bayless could step in and lead?

My point with all of this is that depth—depth!—was supposed to be this team’s core strength. Depth and togetherness and team play.

It turns out that if LMA is missing, the team falls apart. It turns out that the depth at guard is a chimera… if one believes last night’s game.

I’m ready to read some analysis on what’s happening to the team that is making this happen. Rotation confusion? System confusion? Roy apathy? Lack of intimidation from Maurice Lucas? But what I don’t think we can do is either

a) Blame the refs
b) Blame the unanticipated absence of LMA and Oden. This team is built and designed (supposedly) to overcome this problem.

Or so they tell me.

Anyway…is Dante Cunningham like the third-best player on our team? Maybe he’s the starter at SF.

brand-new refs to perform up to the expectations of horrible refs that have been in the NBA for years. The entire notion is so absurd that it didn’t surprise me at all to see Canzano write an article about it.

First,The refs are expected to radify the deal wid the NBA.At least now,we can get bad calls from high paid professionals! I think DC is going to be a diamond in the rough.If Trav faulters,DC will steal his minutes.He’s smart and talented.Its true with the new additions,we are playing less instinctive as a team.BECAUSE of our unselfish nature,we are passin up shots to get new players involved.That part is good,but the end result is no continuity as a team.Also’I agree that Dre is takin too many shots,he should be setting the table,as they say.He probably thinks that SOMEONEhas to score!

The scariest thing about the preseason is that Brandon Roy is playing exactly how you would expect someone to play if they haven’t touched a basketball all summer.

It doesn’t look like “I didn’t play 5 on 5” is what he meant. He’s playing like he didn’t touch a basketball. Which unfortunately is what he said.

The best positive spin I’ve heard is that, even if Brandon starts slow, it will all be worth it if he’s healthier and dominating come playoff time. That’s very true.

But in the meantime, we should modify our expectations coming out of the gate. This team may not be ready to challenge the Spurs or the Mavs, much less the Lakers. Not without Roy playing at the same level he played at last year. Obviously, I am still hoping he does that, but all signs point to that being unlikely, at least at first.

watched the Jazz’s defense from the get go. All I can say is, “wow.” Excellent, tight, swarming, rotating, pork-choppin’, knee-throwin’, Sloan-cheap-shottiin’, you’re-gonna-earn-every-basket smart defense. Their D is a solid 9.6, we played a 2.1. Everything is contested, nothing easy, and they never look panicked, rushed, or out of sync. I really don’t like Sloan, would hate to meet him in a dark alley, but the guy can coach D.

Yeah, we missed a gaggle of guys out there, but aren’t we the team that we herald as exceptionally “deep.” We were in it deep last night, that I can tell you.

Liked what I saw from Dante, and that’s about it. Amazing what 4 years of college can do eh? :^) He may not have all the glitter of an “unlimited upside” 1 year-of-college wonder, but he seems to know where he’s supposed to be out there, plays team basketball, is in position, and doesn’t seem confused out there. Sometimes that’s awful refreshing to watch… But play him at the 3, or against a similar-sized (undersized) 4.

Not hitting the panic button at all, but we need to keep in mind there are other teams like the Jazz out there that play smart, experienced, effective, well-coached ball and can exploit our boys, and slice ’em up on both ends.

I took my 6 year old to the game last night and by the third quarter he was so frustrated by the play of the blazers that he started crying. I knew exactly what he was feeling – the blazers were completely outplayed in every facet of the game. They were never in it and never looked like they could compete. On offense they looked plan-less on defense they were hopeless. It was simply terrible to watch. The refs did not add much to the game, but at least provided someone other than the team to shout at.

It this continues it will be a long season….

This just in. Travis Outlaw doesn’t play defense.

This is new news?

Last night’s outcome should surprise no one:

• Utah’s players are older and more experienced.
• Utah’s starting five was way better than our starting five.
• Utah is not nearly as deep as we are, but that’s actually an advantage this early in the season. The Jazz players know exactly which of them get which minutes and what their roles are. Nate is still trying to assess new and returning players and has a lot of them to assess. He may even at this point have no idea who his starting five will be in game 1.
• Was Utah missing anyone important? We sure were. Let’s remember that we did beat the Nuggets in the previous game when we had Greg.

I agree that Nate needs to nail-down a starting five now. Today, even. I think his desire to ensure none of his players feel what he felt when Gary Payton displaced him is creating a crisis of leadership and confusing the players. They want to know their roles so they can settle into them. Now there’s only one more preseason game before we face the Rockets.

But there is still no reason to panic.

The Blazers may need longer to gel than we had hoped, but they still have a lot of talent and should still rip through their early schedule, at which point the ship will be sailing smoothly.

and I almost had to start rooting for Utah. They were playing defense, they were moving the ball, getting into the paint, getting themselves second chance opportunities and playing smart. The Blazers…..well, the Blazers looked like a college team that just started playing with each other. I don’t think I saw anybody post up or try to get into the pain besides BRoy and Andre and they didn’t seem to be succeeding. Sometimes I wondered if they were calling any plays because it just looked sloppy on the offensive side and defense wasn’t much better. I wish Nate would decide the lineup he wants to go with and stick to it so the players can get use to playing with each other. And the officiating of course was god awful. I wondered how anyone could get a run together when the whistle was being blown every 45 secs. And that blocking call against Joel that should have been an offensive foul just summed up the night for the blazers. At one point I started to laugh because the officiating was so horrible. I’m so glad the original refs will be back soon. At least they let the game flow a little and are for the most part consistent.

on Sunday they were pretty terrible, but last night I thought they were Violet Palmer-esque:
just calling the game too tight. it’s boring that way, as it breaks up the flow of the game.

I’m looking forward to once again defending Violet against all the crap BEdgers throw at her soon.

Joel wasn’t set on that blocking foul.

It was painful in virtually every aspect, unless you happen to be a Utah fan. For the record, I am NOT a Utah fan.

As has been mentioned, the Blazers were out of sorts and out of sync. They all looked as lost as Travis usually looks on defense. Except that this was on offense and defense. The early game plan appeared to be, “Give it to Roy and stand out of the way”. If there was a defensive strategy during the first half, it must have been, “Execute the Damon Stoudamire Matador Defense” in a way that even Damon would blush *whether from pride or embarrassment would be anyone’s guess).

I left the game last night near the start of the 4th period…something I never do, even during an old-fashioned home team beatdown. Last night’s Blazer play was just that fugly.

As for the officiating, I have never missed Violet Palmer…until last night. It was THAT bad. Historically awful. Throw-up-on-the-people-sitting-in-front-of-you wretched. What little flow there was to be had during the game was immediately cast aside by horrific call after horrific call. Nevermind the obvious missed calls…. It got to the point where I wasn’t made at teh officiating crew…just David Stern…and the Owners. If you put this product on the floor, everyone will be sorry.

Which brings me to my final point (WARNING: Conspiracy Theory being postulated!): Perhaps the contract negotiations are being drawn out to distract the fans from the normally inconsistent officiating. What better way to make fans forget Donaghy than to throw this crapfest at us? Hell, someone near me last night even yelled out, “Give us Donaghy!” I found myself nodding in agreement.

Well played Mr Stern…well played…

Coach Nate, maybe your players are taking you literally when you say you want them to scrap. Afterall, scrap literally means a detached piece of something or a fragment. This preseason your team looks like detached pieces and fragments.

but it is time to be a little worried.

I’d simply argue that Roy and Aldridge haven’t been holding their weight so far this year.

We’re just seeing the results when everyone else tries to do it without them. Only Oden can do it, maybe a bit Miller…

And that laziness by the stars is fine with me as long as it stops when we hit the regular season.

this year but will come back more focused and have a more definite direction that they need to go to take the next big step next season. It happens to professinal sports teams with ‘loaded’ rosters all of the time.

Yes, it’s true, it would be nice to have settled Blake versus Andre, but as for the rest…

Oden would likely have started last night, but he was wearing a nifty blue blazer on the bench (although the confused guys behind me kept barking at Nate about playing Oden, and they weren’t kidding).

Juwan Howard started because LaMarcus was injured. Batum came out of the game before a minute was gone.

How on earth could they possibly have had any chemistry???!!!

And if it weren’t for the injuries, we would mostly be viewing a pretty stable lineup at this point. I don’t get the “nate sucks” tone of most of these comments. I can only imagine what we’d hear if Nate had played the injured guys and they’d been hurt worse. Actually I don’t have to imagine it, because I heard it over and over and over and over on here last year.

going to come down to who the Blazers want to win with. Brandon Roy or Miller. Miller having the ball all the time is not good, it takes away from Roy.

On top of that the spacing is horrible when Miller is out there. Players are not in the spots they should be and he is part of the problem. Watching Roy’s 50 point game right now on my computer and the Blazers spacing is incredible. The passing is crisp and the ball movement is exellent.

Andre Miller needs to come off the bench.

But concerned about how they stunk up the court last night. Get it together boys you only have a week !!!

I honestly don’t recall it being such a big deal who was starting and who was playing with who with past Blazer squads. It’s not like we have a team full of specialists that can only do one thing. All these guys should be able to put together better basketball with whatever lineup is on the floor.

Granted, I’m not busting my ass out there, but I do think Nate stated the obvious that there is a pervasive feeling of being able to turn it on when it counts, and there hasn’t been that sense of urgency yet. Sure seems like teams like Denver and Utah who have less to prove than we do are already in regular-season mode. We better get there quick.

In retrospect I blame Sergio for last night’s loss.

Too many Experimental lineups results in Arrested Motion

Utah had their way with us.

I felt like a prisoner in Multnomah Jailhouse bunked with a much bigger, stronger, and hornier roommate.

3 points from section 221 last night.

1. From my view, the Utah Jazz were using the pick and roll, setting screens effectively to get layups, dunks, and open outside shots…While Williams had his way with Blake and Miller in isolation and transition. The only slightly fun thing about this exposition was to watch an excellent basketball player work well within his system.

2. The Blazers were chucking up hesitant and contested jumpers over and over.
It seemed like the Blazers didn’t run any plays. When they did, in the 3rd quarter, where Roy would drive and kick out to an open Blake, Blake missed the 3 pointer both times. They were moving the ball around the perimeter somewhat, but rarely thru the lane. Occasionally Miller would find an open Collins or Thrilla, but neither could score over their defender.

3. If all your offensive sets are to get open jump shots, why were there few open jump shots? These are either very poor plays or very poor execution or both.

The view from 221 was very poor.

I’m not going to jaywalk or speak loudly for the next week for fear of getting put back in the Jail with that roommate.

Maybe now Nate has gotten the ridiculous notion that Blake and Joel starts over Dre and GO out of his system. I was worried that if the starters played well together, he might actually go with that lineup when the real games start.

If Roy can’t get used to playing with those two, start Rudy and Roy will be our Ginobilli. If Mr. Max Contract doesn’t like that, package him for CP3. I have been the biggest Roy supporter since before he was a Blazer, but if he can’t work with more talented players he need to go.

NO ONE is allowed to worry about pre-season. The only thing we should worry about is that no one gets injured.

We have looked good and we have looked bad, and so has every other team in pre-season. We’ve had quite a few good things develop though— We KNOW, like for SURE, that Oden is a lot better than Joel. That is HUGE. Bigger than anything else. We know it now.

We KNOW Miller is better than Blake, but we also know the huge caveat is that everyone has to learn to play with everyone still. It will come— they are too good and unselfish not to. But it’s just an adjustment period still.

We gotta be beyond the “worry about pre-season” stage in our team’s development. Soon, we will be past the “worry about the regular season” stage, but that’s a few years away. We’re a good team, with a lot of talent, and most should naturally improve. We are seeing Oden blossom before (some of) our eyes, and that makes pre-season a success.

In my opinion, Oden showing he is on his way to becoming Oden is the biggest thing of all. The rest will sort itself out with time.

Mortimer

I was at the game last night and I kept telling myself not to panic.
Kept reminding myself that this is “just” preseason.
Reminded myself that these refs aren’t permanent.
Remembered periodically that we were without LaMarcus, Greg, and Rudy.

Even after all of that meditation I still walked out of the RG with a sickening taste in my mouth.
Batum played less than 1 minute, that defensive option was eliminated.
Joel collected fouls like Windows picks up viruses.
Juwon started the game with a horrible turnover that set the tone for his (and the entire teams) play for the rest of the night.
Travis shot the ball aggressively but clearly shooting isn’t everything.
Miller looked like a crippled old man compared to Williams.
Brandon looked like he is still waiting for the magic moment when the season starts and his testicles finally drop.

There is simply no excuse for our potential Division Champions, our potential second round playoff team, to look the way they did last night.
This wasn’t a coaching issue. This wasn’t an injury issue. This wasn’t a ref issue.
This was a bunch of players telling themselves that last years over achievement was good enough.

I am not buying into my own signature at this point…