Brandon Roy has a pretty good feature in the most recent Men's Health.  It, like all press with Roy, shows him as a classy guy with a long-term plan.  Just a really good read about how Roy thinks of himself and thinks of his career.  Good tips for an aspiring athlete too.  It's cool to read, and cool to see our boy in the national press.  Linked here:

http://www.menshealth.com/cda/article.do?site=MensHealth&channel=fitness&category=sports&conitem=ee52dab131e49110VgnVCM20000012281eac____

Off Topic Post Script:  Did anyone catch the Wimbledon final?  Not my favorite sport, but Feder and Nadal are clearly at the peak of it.  Best Tennis I've ever seen.

Take a look at our bench.  It is stacked.  Stacked. In fact, let's take a look at it together.

PG: Jerryd Bayless

SG: Rudy Fernandez

SF: Travis Outlaw

PF: Channing Frye

C: Joel Pryzbilla

Bayless and Rudy are both rookies next year, so a lot of their value is based on their potential.  But they certainly do have plenty of potential.  Joel is a tested veteran who gives good defense and great rebounding in the interior.  Channing has shown that he excels playing the 4 with a big center on the floor, and this gives him that opportunity.  And Outlaw gives the white line a go-to scorer who has proven he can get his own shot.  This line-up doesn't have tons of outside shooting, but has competent scorers and very decent defensive potential [note, since this team will play as a unit, I think they have a chance of being the best defensive bench unit in the NBA.  That cohesiveness matters]

Being the stereotypical Blazers fan that I am, I naturally wanted to brag about this in as effective a way as possible.  So I will be comparing our bench unit to the Memphis Grizzlies starting line-up.  Let's take a look at that line-up below:

PG: Mike Conley Jr.

SG: OJ Mayo

SF: Rudy Gay

PF: Hakim Warrick / Darrel Arthur

C: Darko Milicic

For more on the woes of Memphis, check out their clubhouse page at ESPN.  Yup, it has a big picture of Pau Gasol.  They really update that page well!  Note that I believe Marc Gasol won't be starting, at least not at the beginning of the season.  I also believe Mayo will have trouble proving himself better than either members of the Grizzlies' current backcourt.

So let's do this head-to-head:

Bayless vs. Conley

Bayless is an unproven rookie.  Conley is a somewhat proven sophomore.  Conley distributes the ball well and has above-average handles.  He won't be confused with a great shooter, but you can't leave him wide-open.  Bayless will be in the game as an energetic defender and shooter.  I wouldn't be surprised if he has trouble playing as a true point guard for the white unit, and we won't rely on him to run the offense much.  If Bayless plays to the peak of his potential, then he wins this matchup.  As it is, Conley is the proven commodity [didn't think you'd hear that phrase any time soon, did you?], and has the advantage going into the season.

Fernandez vs. Mayo

Rudy is the MVP of the best basketball league outside of the NBA.  He comes in with an NBA-ready body and a game a bit like Ginobili's.  He was able to score some buckets in Spain based on superior athleticism, but he won't be able to do that in the NBA.  He's not known for his defense, but has the physical tools to be a capable defender. Mayo was the consensus #3 pick in the draft.  Memphis obviously has high hopes for him fitting into their system, since they traded a very capable Mike Miller for his rights.  Mayo is a slasher, with good handles and an eye for distributing.  His game is a bit like Rudy's, but I think Rudy will come into the league at a higher level.

Outlaw vs. Gay

Besides Roy and Aldridge, Gay is the best player to come out of the 2006 draft.  He plays a bit like Outlaw, and both are capable of playing the 4.  They can both score i bunches, and rebound decently for a SF.  The biggest difference is that Gay has proven himself as a starter, and Outlaw has only been successful playing in somewhat limited minutes off the bench.  For now, Gay is the embodiment of what Outlaw could be.  Like Bayless, if Outlaw played to the peak of his potential, he would win this matchup.  Otherwise, you'd have to give Gay the advantage here.

Frye vs. Warrick

Frye is a long, athletic outside-shooting big man.  Last year, he played best when he had a big body to play next to.  In the white unit, he'll have Pryzbilla to do the heavy lifting of rebounding and defense, allowing Channing to focus on taking 18-foot jumpers.  Warrick is a very athletic big man.  A bit like Outlaw, he'll likely be able to drive past Channing on occasion.  Still, I think Frye is a more established professional player and would win this matchup by an inch. Note that rookie Darrel Arthur could get minutes here, but Channing's experience would trump Arthur's potential for now.

Pryzbilla vs. Milicic
Pryzbilla belongs in the NBA.  He would definitely start on a lot of teams.  One of those teams is Memphis.  Milicic struggles mightily against quality defenders and doesn't provide much defense of his own.  With Darko on the inside, Bayless, Rudy, and Outlaw can drive at will without anyone to stop them.  Pryzbilla, conversely, won't allow easy layups.  I think this is the biggest advantage for the Blazers.

Obviously, this is a rather homer-ish opinion.  This isn't something I'd recommend linking to on the Grizzlies blog.  But I think the real lesson here is that we have a chance at having a darn good bench.  The more they play together, the better they'll get, especially defensively.  The Celtics won a championship in large part due to the strength of their bench defense.  Hopefully, we can do the same.

Hey Guys.  ESPN.com has a new mock draft and it features a new guy I haven't heard of. 

Here's a big box quoted from their site:

 

Portland

Alexis Ajinca

Position: C Height: 7-1 Weight: 240 Age: 20 Country: France

The skinny: It seems unlikely the Blazers will actually keep this pick. They are loaded with young players and have a history of draft day activity on the trade market.

GM Kevin Pritchard is already burning up the phone lines. I think either he'll package some of his young players with this pick and move up in the draft to get a solid prospect or he'll trade the pick for a veteran. The Blazers have had talks with the Nets about Richard Jefferson, the Suns about Leandro Barbosa and the Grizzlies about a deal that would send the No. 13 pick and the expiring contract of Raef LaFrentz to Memphis for No. 5, Brian Cardinal and Jason Collins.

In case they do keep the pick, the Blazers have been eyeing Joe Alexander and Russell Westbrook. The Blazers would like to move up to get one or both players, but so far they haven't found the right deal. For the past several weeks we've had Brandon Rush in this spot. But the more I talk to the Blazers, the more I think they may go for a bigger splash. Ajinca is a long, athletic big man who is pretty skilled. He doesn't fill a need for the Blazers, but Pritchard loves to gather assets.

Found here:

http://proxy.espn.go.com/nba/draft2008/columns/story?columnist=ford_chad&page=MockDraft-080623

What do we think?

So I'm watching the Finals.  I think the Celtics have been playing some pretty good basketball.  Their defense is really well-organized and is taking away a lot of the Lakers' opportunities.  You can tell it's good team defense because they keep getting called for Defensive 3 Seconds

But what become apparent to me late in the 2nd quarter of game 6 here, was that the Blazers were missing the key to winning basketball games. 

We need players to get injured, go to the locker room, and come back later in the game.  It's sure-fire!

I sincerely believe that Ray Allen and Paul Pierce were both injured and in considerable pain and needed to get to the locker room.  But when those guys came back out, it was a huge turn in the game.

So I suggest we just put together a calendar and just rotate through which players will be going to the locker room with an injury.  They'll come back, and we'll dominate!! It's surefire. 

Let me know what you think, or if you need help getting all those Nobel Prizes mailed to the right address.

If Green was in this draft, wouldn't we draft him again?

He was the highest scorer and leader of the National Championship team, as well as being known for his defense.  He plays the position we're most interested in, PG.  He was an above average passer.

But mostly, he played good defense, was a winner, and had decent potential.

This is practically the only move by KP I don't understand.  Am I totally off-base, or would we draft Green at the #13 this year if he was available?