Why the Blazers will be ok

There has been a lot of discussion as to what needs to change following the tough loss to Denver last night.  A lot of fans have been pointing fingers as to what Nate has or hasn't done right in the first two games.  I think a lot of that criticism is justified, if not downright correct; however I think that a lot of fans are forgetting a very important point concerning this years version of the team.  

There are going to be growing pains with this team.  Period.

The Blazers have two new major rotation players and an emerging center.  That's 1/3 of your rotation players, not to mention the loss of Batum doesn't help this transition as I think it's obvious that Trout isn't the answer at the 3 and is better suited for the 4.  Regardless the playing rotation is still in a lot of flux.  Foul problems for our big men in the first two games combined with the plethora of injuries in the preseason have made it difficult for Nate.  Could he do better?  Probably.  Though he sees practice every day and has a much larger data set to make decisions from than ANY fan or media member does.  Thus, I think we, as fans, need to have a little faith for the first 1/4 to 1/2 of the season.  

People can point at the negatives of the Denver game: poor free-throw shooting in crunchtime, inability to defend Melo (though the dude couldn't miss down the stretch, jumpers no less), etc.  Being at the game last night I noticed some very encouraging things.  

1 - Improvement on turnovers from 26 against Houston to 7 against Denver.  That's a huge deal in a close game.  We didn't force many turnovers (8), but this indicates that this team is really going to improve throughout the season.

2 - This game featured a team that is basically the same team from last year.  A few changes in role players, but their starters are basically the same.  I expect Denver to get out of the gates quickly this year, whereas I expect the exact opposite from the Blasers.  Play this game in December or January and we blow out Denver at home.

3 - Rebound dominance.  I was watching the center matchup on the boards throughout the game.  Nene was held without a rebound, offensive or defensive, until the end of the second quarter.  This was after Greg picked up his 3rd foul.  Greg was up 7 - 0 on the boards and our centers had 12 boards to Denver's 15 or so rebounds as a team.  This kept us in the game despite shooting in the low 30% range for the half (and the game for that matter).  

4 - Improving defense. The second half defense was porous, but we help Denver to 40% from the field for the first half.  With the exception of Melo, who was playing and flopping like mad, we held their team in check.  The team just needs to play hard-nosed D for a full 48 min and we're going to win a lot of games, even if we have a shooting night like we did last night.  This coupled with our rebounding will make it exceedingly difficult to beat this team.  They aren't there yet, but the team is already better defensively than last year in my estimation.

5 - Brandon is the equalizer. He didn't get much help tonight offensively, and we still nearly won the game against a top 4 western conference team.  That isn't going to happen for most teams.

The growing pains that we are seeing will subside as this team feels each other out.  Cleveland is the perfect example of another team that is going through this too.  They made significant offseason moves and they are 0-2 to start.  San Antonio is 1-1.  Do you think those teams need wholesale changes? I don't.  Just because the Blasers are 1-1 now leaves me no reason to think that this team isn't going to play at an elite level, particularly after the all-star break.

Besides...don't we want our team peaking come playoff time?  I sure do.