Game 57 Recap: Blazers 84, Spurs 99

Its about defense and it comes down to coaching. The fact that the Spurs can plug in Mason, Bonner, etc. and still play remarkable defense is a testament to Pop. I don’t see us ever playing that kind of D under Nate. Nate has done a good job and certainly deserves more time to work with these young guys, but if we want to play championship level D, we’ll probobly need a new coach eventually.

That said, regarding this particular game, if Roy plays like himself, we’d have had a good chance tonight (if Duncan and Manu had played… not so much).

Also, Tony Parker is really good. Maybe not as good as we made him look, but really really good. 2nd best PG in the league, I’d say, with apologies to Williams, Harris and Billups.

on the road against western conference contenders. Ouch.

Yes, had the Blazers hit open shots, they’d have been in it. But like Dave said, good teams have defense to fall back on when their jumpers won’t fall. Not our guys—at least not yet. There’s no Plan B.

What a painful game to watch. And I’m less optimistic about Friday’s matchup than most. I"ve seen a four game losing streak coming (these three road games followed by the Spurs at home), and nothing I saw in Texas changed my mind about that. I do hope the guys can regroup and whip those Wolves, but I wouldn’t bet on it.

I replayed that hit in the Houston game several times and seriously thought Roy might miss this game tonight. He was 5 for 18, it looks like it might have been bothering him…Haven’t seen the game yet.

that Sergio was the only Blazer with a positive +/-.

But I can’t wait until we get swagger– even a little.

I stopped at halftime because I saw the final score and had to watch American Idol. I was planning on watching the second half after work. The strange thing was that my American Idol feed was messed up at the beginning just like Dave’s Blazers feed. I wonder if the Blazers have some sort of cosmic connection to American Idol because the only performance I missed was Jasmine Murray’s. As you all know, she is the sweet young lady from Starkville, Mississippi, the hometown of Travis Outlaw.

It seems like A LOT of things need to click for us in order to get a big win. The Spurs are just a better team and can afford to miss their star and still beat teams (DAL and POR) back to back. Dave hit it on the head above – we need more desire.

With everybody shooting badly, the hardest thing to watch is nobody underneath to at least challenge the Spurs on our offensive boards. When under the boards, once again, Spurs had the fire. ADD on the Blazers part, but the best part of the game was watching a really good team playing together in the Spurs.
Wished they put Bayless out there to at least shake it up…is he just in Nate’s doghouse for some of those bonehead rookie shots he tries sometimes? I like his wild cannon outlook!
Thanks for the review, nice job!

Dave couldn’t muster it in his recap, so I am here to deliver some enthusiasm. As mentioned, he had 7 assists, but Dave did not mention he had only 1 turnover, which is a very ratio, and his 4 rebounds (3 offesnive) and a steal, showing he was really leaving it all out on the floor in a game where some of our players seemed to be barely present. Dave also didn’t mention his scoring, which when foiled with Blake’s performance, is quite nice, 2 for 5 shooting with 8 points (4-4 FT, both times fouled at basket, not in bonus time). But most spectacularly, he was the only Blazer with a positive plus/minus (+1), which combined with the fact that he played 20 minutes, is pretty significant for a game we lost by 15. It was his best game in awhile and hopefully he can keep it going and use it to get Rudy back on his game make the second unit feared again.

There was nothing “spectacular” about it, other than the fact that this team achieved a spectacular “never in it” FAIL against SA on a night when they were missing TWO of their big three.

And Nate’s refusal to let Rex even sniff the floor on a night when Tony Parker was burning by ALL defenders, on a night when Steve Blake laid an ostrich egg offensively, on a night when NOBODY was getting to the rack effectively, was………………… what’s the work, bizarre? Inexplicable? Incompetent? Irrational?

Minnesota becomes a flat out MUST WIN — and, ya know what? I wouldn’t be spending any money with the Vegas boys on that prospect, gamblers…

Dave remains convinced that this group isn’t #9 in the West. I’m not so sure.

Let’s just be honest, like Ben was. The Blazers are a 6th or 7th seed and first round KO. 10 games ago I thought they might be a tough first-round matchup but that was before they proved to me that they still refuse to show up for big games on the road.

Why do they continue to make that mistake over and over and over and over? Drives me ape poop.

“It’s not only a lack of individual defense either. The rotations aren’t there. The understanding isn’t there. The hustle isn’t there.”

Add in the fact that this team isn’t very good at boxing out and I agree 100%.

But my question is “Why?” Are they not talented enough? Not smart enough? Not coached well enough? Do they not care enough? Are they simply too young, too inexperienced (I hope)?

I read something by George Sheehan (the “running doctor”) many years ago in which he said something sort of alluded to above: your offense comes and goes – sometimes you’re on, sometimes you’re not; but you can and must play defense every night – THAT is just a matter of wanting it badly enough. Can’t the coaching staff get this notion into their heads?

Parker not only smoked us but did the same thing to Dallas the night previous.

Jason Quick: “….. he was spectacular, if not breath-taking, blending spin moves with darting quickness while also displaying a deadly outside shot.”

Nate McMillian: “He was like a roadrunner, He was just blowing by us.”

Popovich: “He was a super stud”

Blake: “He’s as good as you can get,” his quickness, body control, ball control and his touch around the basket is second to none."

And the Spurs played good defense against us too. Popovich described the Spurs’ defense as “outstanding” and “fantastic” against the Blazers.

A very young squad got beat on the road by a solid, well coached team led by an outstanding player. And we were still within 4 points with something like 5 minutes to go. I don’t see much shame in that.

(Quotes credited to Jason Quick)

Jksnake with his Nate can’t coach defense.

Dropstep giving us the benefit of his analysis of Brandon Roy’s psyche and emotional state.

Criticism’s of players and coaching decisions (Frye’s jumpshooting, playing Travis on Parker, Bayless not playing).

San Antonio is a veteran team, with the second best record in the West. They have an established system, which can assimilate a new guy or two without much of a hiccup. If a guy makes a mistake, they other guys know what to do to adjust.

Portland on the other hand is still trying to learn the system. One guy makes a mistake, it often cascades. It’s tough trying to tell from the box score, but it appears that Portland was in the game for at least the first half and into the 3rd, but was not shooting well. In the end, it was as Dave said, SA’s defense was the difference. We all know that Portland does not yet have that level of defense yet. So we should also know that on nights they don’t shoot well, they don’t have that safety net to fall back on. No big deal.

I agree that we are still young. But we could have beat both the Texas teams and we fell flat both nights. And the problem is definitely defense. In the past two games, we look horribly soft on defense and bad on the boards. And waaaay too many of our players settle for jumpers. Can somebody tell Frye that he is almost 7 feet tall?

Oden hasnt been all that impressive, but at least he gives us somebody willing to bang inside that can finish. Joel is great, but the guy has zero offense. And with Nate refusing to play Bayless, our only threat at the rim is Brandon.

So even against bad teams, we will rely on the outside shooting of Blake, Fernandez, Outlaw, Aldridge, Frye, and Rodruguez. That wouldnt scare me if I was an opposing coach. Double B Roy and make that crew hit outside shots. Seems like a pretty simple game plan.

That turns the Blazers into a bunch of nancy boys? To be fair, back to backs are ridiculous, and the odds of winning at SA after being competitive against Houston and still losing is small. It’s another growth opportunity.

Update:

Oden out at least 2 more games. And then 2 more games after that. And then day-to-day for a couple of weeks until the playoffs. Then he will have surgery which will reaveal that his knees are made of styrofoam.

There is your Oden news.

It’s just not very fun watching this team chucking the ball – it works against average to below average teams, but against good teams it is nothing but frustration as BRoy gets beat up inside and the bigs shoot jumpers.

is that travis was actually looking like Rudy at times with his off the ball movement on offense.

That we never double team? I think I saw Parker get doubled maybe once in that whole game. Even though everyone knew he would drive to the rim or stop at the top of the key for a jump shot. Every. Single. Time.

It seems our defense is totally concerned about the other team taking jump shots, but not concerned at all with them driving inside.

last night. I mean I love Brandon and I know hes a great player. He has to find a way to defeat double teams and defense. The best players do that. Obviously we have to hit open shots which we didn’t do last night. Blake’s shoulder is still messed up, his shot has been short consistantly since he came back. Aldridge has to assert himself, him putting up only nine shots is equally awful.

Something about defending Steve’s honor perhaps? And only Joel? I didn’t see all the game and missed it. What happened?

gone