So that's my season. 48-34.

Shout down mine, make your own, or go OT on me and talk about how the Blazers are really good.

Welcome to the Trail Mix....well this is where you post all your randomness that doesn't really deserve its own fanpost, but is still important and doesn't fit elsewhere. Don't forget about the fanshots too--you can always use those for pictures, vidoes, links, etc. Sometimes I feel like only TiH reads my fanshots...

Alright so to get thingsgoing, I need some advice. I've been in Tillamook for the past week and a half visiting family, and I've yet to go to the Tillamook cheese factory. I'll probably be going Saturday; what ice cream flavors should I get?

I'll probably get a waffle cone, cuz' they're the bomb. But I don't know what flavors to get. I want a double scoop, so here's the scoop--I'll post a poll, EngineerScotty-style, and you guys vote. Top vote getter will be my bottom scoop, and second-best vote getter will be my top scoop.

Ok, we don't have Comcast. We don't have NBA TV. But that's ok--NBA.com to the rescue! And to fill up the word count, allow me to steal some words from our fearless leader.

 

Finally the chance is here to take on one of the true titans of the Western Conference!  I am so looking forward to testing ourselves against Chris Paul and...what?  What do you mean "not here"?  Well at least there's David West then.  He's pretty accomplis...huh?  No way!  I suppose next you're going to tell me that Peja Stojakovic didn't...YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING.  Then who?  Hilton Armstrong?!?  Who the HECK is Hilton Armstrong???  Well geez, then Brandon and Greg and the boys better win today.  That's all I've got to say.

You can register your own thoughts here in the comment section before, during, and after the game.  Enjoy the massacre!

Enjoy...

Link to watch the game

Finally, game time. Well I have a feeling Bayless is going to have a bad first quarter. Other than that, ehh who knows! So who's with me? Any non NBA TV watchers out there? Stuck with NBA.com? Am I at 75 words yet? Filli filli filli filli buster! Whoops, only 50.

Oh, here's a filler. Go to NBA.com and watch the game with us. The link is here.

Game time in Cox Pavillion...

Finally, 75 words. I thought I was going to die.

Well, in a recent fanpost titled "Chips? What Chips?" by blazerwizard, he posed the question, "What chips do we really have?"

For obvious reasons, some of us disagreed with his premise. Dheepan made a solid response with this reply.

In all the back and forthness, I paused and thought about all this from my point of view. There are some chips that we have that are obvious (the big 3, RLEC, vets like Pryz with nice contracts, young guns that can contribute, etc.).

In particular however, Martell and Travis are often the target of criticism by naysayers. How much are they really worth? What is their role on their team? How much room for development do they have? What do they need to be a vital part of this team?

With that said, I will do my best to examine both Martell and Travis and in doing so, perhaps try to understand what their future is with the team, and hopefully at the same time, show that Martell and Travis are most definitely, "chips," and not only chips, but also quality players that could have key roles on this team.

Martell Webster

28.4 MPG

10.7 PPG    3.9 RPG

42.2% FG%     38.8%   3FG%   73.5%  FT%

Salary Status:  One year remaining at $3.8 million then a possible qualifying offer.

The good

Martell has grown into NBA material.  Though he disappears at times, generally he's a solid contributor that can spread defenses. He improved his 3 point shooting to nearly 39% and he's only 21. There's guys who were drafted this year that are already 21. The success this past year of Travis Outlaw appears to have given Martell another year to try and grow into his role on this team. Martell has tons of that word we all have a love-hate relationship with--"potential." In addition, the dude can flat out score when given the opportunity. People like to bring up the 24 points in the 3rd quarter against the Jazz. That's great, except for one thing...

The bad

We have scoring options already. Martell needs to learn how to score without taking touches away from Roy, LaMarvelous, and O-dog. Martell flourished when Nate set up plays for him. I think that if Martell would have been drafted to a team with no solid first scoring option back in 2006, there's a good chance he would have grown into a lot more of a scorer, maybe a 18-20 ppg player. He had that kind of potential. Unfortunately, that scoring potential was never utilized on a Blazer team stacked with guys who needed the ball (cough, Z-bo, cough), and now he's relegated to scoring his 12 a game. Now that he's in that mold, barring something way out of the ordinary, that is who Martell is. He needs to grow in it by getting more rebounds, more assists, continuing to increase his 3FG% and his FT%. He needs to work on breaking ankles using his athleticism. Right now he can't really put the ball on the floor and drive to the bucket, even though he should be able to. We saw some dunks and sweet moves from him this year, way more than say...James Jones, but for his body type he should be shakin' and bakin' to the rack all the time. He is somewhat passive right now and loves to hang out on the weakside waiting for the 3 point corner shot. That's what James Jones does, who can't do anything else because he has bad knees. That's what Bruce Bowen does, because he's too old to move around and burn people. Martell--you're young! Get to the rack and throw it down. Martell has to continue to grow his game so that, though getting the same amount of touches he is now, he can get 15 instead of 11 points per game. He needs to be efficient, because that is how he's going to make his money in this league. Barring Martell being traded to the Knicks, he's not going to be a number 1 or even number 2 scoring option. You need to get efficient and learn what to do without the ball to set yourself up for success. Speaking of success, there's one more thing you could be doing...

The ugly

As Dave once put it,

"He’s not a marquee defender.  He’s not even a sign-on-the-telephone-pole defender yet."

People point to the fact that Martell came in fresh out of high school, and his defense would improve once he'd been in the league for a few years. Well that's true--but you put me in the NBA for three years and watch my his defense improve. He should be improving drastically to prove he's NBA-starter material. When Martell came into the league, he was the Sergio of shooting guards. Unopposed drives by him, people faking him out of his pants and pulling up for the J, you name it, they did it to 'Tell. Three years later, Martell can keep his man in front of him (most of the time), but there's still two things that he lacks.
1) The ability to stay with some of the more premier guards in the league and

2) the desire to do so.
To be fair, who can stay with Kobe or 'Bron 'Bron? I mean really...nobody. I actually thought Martell did ok on these guys as a matter of fact, but sometimes, people of less athleticism seemed to shake 'Tell, no problem. This seem amplified by the fact that if his offense wasn't clicking, he really didn't give a hoot on defense. It seemed like when his mission was to shut down Kobe or 'Bron, he concentrated on them, did a pretty fair job, and let the offense come to him. On other nights, maybe against other players, it seemed like Martell went looking for his offense, and just played enough defense so that Nate wouldn't pull him. If he would play his heart out on defense, he has enough natural ability to get his 12-14 points per game. That's all the Blazers want from him. Heck, anything over double digits on a nightly basis along with solid defense would solidify his place on this team. The area of defense, now ugly, could be the brightest spot on his resumé if he works at it.

The future

So what's Martell's future with this team? Well it's obvious--this season is the determiner. Either he steps up and increases his scoring, rebounding, assisting, shooting percentages, and defensive intensity, like he did last year, or he stays flatline or worse, regresses. If we see a regression, or even if he doesn't improve, I think Martell's future becomes very limited with this team. With Blake/Bayless/Sergio/PK at point, Broy and Rudy would gladly manage the SG. Interestingly though, if Martell does improve his game, I do think some of his minutes could come with him at the 2 and B-Roy at the 1. I was watching some old summer league (Brandon's first year in the league), and in almost every game of that summer league, Brandon was playing point guard and getting 15 points and 8, 9 assists, while Martell would score 20-30 points at shooting guard, with Travis at the 3 and LMA at the 4. That summer league lineup could be realistic this year I think, with GO at the 5, IF (and that's a big if) Martell shows that he belongs on this team by doing the aforementioned tasks, which in short, are these:

1) Continue to grow in confidence
2) Learn how to score without having plays set up for him
3) Increase effieciency. Keep raising those FG%, 3 point FG%, and FT% numbers. Use LMA, GO, and Roy to get yourself open looks.
4) Be a defender. Be aggressive. Bring passion to the defensive end every night. If you can make Kobe score 20 instead of 30, that's as good as scoring 10 points of your own.

Travis Outlaw

26.7 MPG

13.3 PPG    4.6 RPG

43.3% FG%     39.6%   3FG%   74.1%  FT%

Salary Status:  One year at 4.0 million then a team option for another year at 4.0 million

The good

How can you not love Travis? The dude brings a scoring punch to the white unit and is probably the funnest guy to watch on the post game interview. Humble, aww-shucks guy that really is part of what defines our culture. He has amazing physical ability. The dude can get his shot. Whereas a guy like Martell really needs plays run to score, Travis is a guy who you can pass it to with 5 left on the shot clock and he'll throw up a shot that's got a good chance of going in. And even though he's been in the league 5 years, you really have to look at him with potential, as crazy as that may sound. His first year out of high school he only played in eight games, and in the years following that he was still stuck in the tail end of the Jail Blazer era, so only recently has he been surrounded with quality guys. And that's when his game has taken off. Coming out of HS, he had no real basketball foundation, so he's had to build from the ground up. It seems that for the last couple years, he's gone into the offseason lacking in a given number of areas, and come back the next year with one of those weak areas checked off. He has amazing basketball desire, and he tends to be obessive with a certain area of his game at a given time. He's the guy that can walk into the gym and work on the same drill for four hours straight. Furthermore, Travis has grown tremendously in basketball IQ. It's been debated before here on the Bedge, but I'll say it again--Traivs is not unintelligent. Don't be fooled by his shy, humble nature. You think you're smart because you know how to fix your car? 'Cuz you're making 80k a year with your cushy job you got after your 4 years of college? Travis is making 4.0 million a year without a degree. You might have mechanical IQ or "business IQ"...but Travis has something a lot more important to him--basketball IQ. I would wager that his "regular IQ" is pretty high as well, but that's a little off topic. There's no denying what Travis brings to the game from the thinking side of things. The guy has physical talent--no question. Does he rely on it more than he should? Maybe...but you cannot deny his baskteball IQ increase over the past couple years. Since KP got in and started cleaning house, the coaching staff has done a tremendous job with Travis. He's got experience in multiple systems of play, and he is growing hugely in his understanding of floor spacing, moving without the ball, etcetera.

The bad

With that said, Travis still has much to learn, specifically defensively. It's improved dramatically over the past few seasons, but with his athleticism, he should be able to keep his man in front of him consistently. He's tall, long, and lanky--he should be able to be a solid defender in this league. At present, he really can get distracted watching the ball rather than his man, let his man go backdoor on him, etc.

The ugly

While people tended to get down on J. Jack for a lot of "bonehead" plays, Travis did have a few this year that we gave him passes on. With that said however, I don't think there's anything in Travis' game that I would count as "ugly," as everyone tends to make mistakes here and there. I think Travis' mistakes just seem like more of a letdown because we know what he could have done. When he drives in and jumps over two guys and then misses the dunk, it seems really sad because he could have brought the house down and instead gave everyone a big letdown. In reality, it's a missed field goal, but when we look at it, it really hurts. When we've got the momentum in the fourth quarter and he totally misses everything on a pull up jumper, we groan because we know he could have swished it and sent the crowd into a frenzy. More than anything, Travis just needs to keep on doing what he's been doing--improving every year in becoming more efficient and more reliable.

The future

So what's Travis' future with this team? I think this is most interesting. With KP's rejection of the 13 + Outlaw for Mike Miller, along with Brandon Roy's outspoken defense of Travis (calling Travis "his best friend"), I would have to think Travis will be a Blazer for at least another few years. I think Mortimer summed it up best a while back,

"One of my favorite things about Travis is that he seems like a guy who will ALWAYS be happy to come off the bench. That is pretty valuable for team harmony, and gives us greater depth and consistent scoring. Humble, talented dudes aren’t exactly a dime a dozen"

Travis fills a role on this team. He gives the bench a solid scoring option. He's solid in the fourth quarter. He is the ultimate role player, and that is extremely important on championship teams. How many games have we seen guys like Robert Horry, Bruce Bowen, James Posey, Derek Fisher, etc. change a game late in the playoffs? Travis just strikes me as that guy.

So what are Travis' keys to success?

1) Continue mature and be "that guy" -- a role player who knows his job and continues to grow in it and excel at it.
2) Continue to develop an outside game, making his drive all the more dangerous.
3) Work on passing. Though I didn't really go over it in my breakdown, a passing forward who has a wicked 3 point shot and drive would be insane.
4) Be a defender. Keep your man in front of you. Your offensive IQ has grown leaps and bounds--let's see some defensive IQ. Be the master of help defense. Call out screens and switches.

No matter what happens, I think three words can sum up what our team is feeling right now: