Like it or not, Roy is now a full-time small forward

Going into the season, the Blazers were thought to be so deep at the 3 position that Nate McMillan would struggle to find enough playing time for everyone.  Now, just three weeks into the season, the Blazers' captain and All-Star shooting guard, Brandon Roy, is stuck playing small forward, indefinitely.   Last night's game against Atlanta was the first that the Blazers have played without both Travis Outlaw and Nic Batum.  During the game, Brandon Roy played 38 minutes, all of them at the small forward position.  The only true small forward still on the active roster, Martell Webster, played just 11 minutes, essentially serving as Roy's backup.

What became clear to me watching the game last night was how much the loss of Outlaw limits the Blazers' rotation options.  Outlaw was really the only guy on the team who could readily switch between the small forward and power forward positions, which allowed the Blazers to play a variety of lineups.  Without him, McMillan is more of less forced to use a more traditional substitution pattern.  Like Joel Przybilla has been doing with Oden, Juwan Howard will now platoon the power forward position with LaMarcus Aldridge, playing virtually all of the minutes when Aldridge is not in the game.  And unless/until Martell Webster's play improves, it appears that he will play a similar role vis-a-vis Roy, coming in to play small forward when Roy is resting. 

That leaves Steve Blake, Andre Miller, Rudy Fernadez to fill the vast majority of minutes at the guard spots (all pulling down roughly equal minutes), with Jerryd Bayless getting a few spot minutes here and there.  If there are going to be any significant shakeups in the Blazer lineup in the next month or so, I suspect it will be in the way McMillan rotates through his guards.

Last night, McMillan started with Blake and Miller.  Then, as he's been doing lately, he brought Miller out around the time he took Oden out, with 4 or 5 minutes left in the first quarter.  I think this is a good strategy.  It minimizes the amount of time that neither Miller nor Roy (our two best dripple-penetrators) are on the court and it increases the minutes that Miller and Oden are on the court together. 

When Miller leaves, Rudy Fernandez comes in and plays the 2-spot, with Blake moving to the 1.  If Bayless gets any minutes, it's unusually in relief of Blake (and alongside Fernandez). 

It may well be that this is the most effective way to rotate through our guards, but what I'd really like to see Nate try is swapping Blake and Fernandez's roles.  Of the four non-Roy guards, Blake is our best combo guard (he is best able to switch between the 1 and 2).  It may make more sense, therefore, to start Fernandez at the 2 and bring Blake off the bench.  His minutes wouldn't necessarily be any different, but he could play more of his time at point and, if paired with Bayless for part of the time, could free up Bayless to do what he does best, which is attack the basket.     

I also think Blake's veteran presence would help steady the ship during the stretches in the early 2nd and 4th quarters where some of the starters are sitting and the team seems to lag and let other teams catch up.  Most of all, though, I'd like to see what a starting (and ending) lineup that features Roy, Ferndandez, and Miller is capable of.  Though Blake is a steady hand who contributes to the team in many ways (including many ways that don't show up in the box score), Rudy has a higher ceiling as a player and I have a hunch that he might respond well to being elevated to a starting role.  Given the injury situation, I think it's at least worth testing that hypothesis.