Anyone wanna address the elephant in the room??

How horrific the defense is??! The raptors came back from 17 down!!!! Not to mention this team is all three pointers or nothing. 8-2 yup.... But coming back to earth won't be pretty for us. That defense is atrocious.

 

The defense has looked great and terrible at different times. This inconsistency and our reliance on threes are what is keeping us from being elite, or a real contender for an extended playoff run.

It's still an improvement from last year.

 

A weak-side shotblocker is needed.

 

I was wondering about that too. Why do we give up more points in the paint than any other team? It's not like our guys are under-sized or unathletic. We're at least average in both respects, and should at the very least be a middle of the pack defense. I think we need to get a defensive specialist like the Suns did, those guys really got after it on defense.

The Blazers knew today that the Raptors just wanted to go one on one and take it inside, and they couldn't figure out how to stop that? It's not like they have any stars on their team.

We are actually ranked 11th in the league right now in eFG% defense, that factors in the fact that we're giving in the lowest 3pt% in the league. And surprisingly, we are #4 in the league in free throws made against us. So we do a good job at not fouling despite all the inside work being done against us. Last year we were 5th worst at eFG%. So overall, it's not that bad statistically.

 

there's only so much as a fan that I'm willing to give too big of a shit about this early in the season. I'm just gonna enjoy the win and the fact that we're 8-2.

 

The stat that matters is 8-2. That is the most important stat of the regular season. The micro adjustments will be made in the meantime.

End of story

 

I didn't see today's game so I can't say why it happened today. But whenever I watch I notice time and time again that LMA refuses to rotate to protect the basket. Once Lopez comes out to help whoever burned the perimeter defense LMA needs to rotate away from his man towards the hoop - he rarely does. And what's even more maddening is that he's often guarding the least-gifted offensive big, so he should be able to help out and then recover to a poor-to-average offensive player if the ball does get passed to his man. And even then there should be rotations by the other players to help out on LMA's man when he rotates to protect the hoop.

We will always give up points in the paint until both Lopez AND LMA rotate and protect the hoop.

 

We're at the bottom of the league in blocks and near the bottom in steals. Ultimately, the most telling stat for a defense is points allowed per possession, and Portland is actually 21st in that catagory. But we're #3 in offensive efficiency, so as you can probably tell by watching the games, we win with offense.

 

Is a anyone going to address the elephant in this thread?

This wasn't the elephant I was expecting. We thought you were finally coming out.

Or at least admitting you're mixum.

Two strikes on me, I suppose. But regardless, I like you, but your posts suck.

 

I realize we win with offense but u can't hold 17 point lead vs the chuckers on Toronto??

Other thing is again... Beating raptors? Not quality opponents. Nets would be nice win.

 

The points-in-the-paint issue is a large one that so far, a ton of 3's has made up for. Longer term, against more quality opponents, that just isn't going to work with such a large disparity. The 3's won't always go down and fighting uphill from a 20-25 point deficit in the lane on a nightly basis doesn't seem like a long term strategy for winning.

Lopez - shot blocker
Aldridge - upper echelon defensive PF
Batum - upper half defensive SF
Matthew - upper half defensive SG
Lillard - ....getting better

So individually they don't seem that bad or certainly not to this level so it must be a scheme/communication issue. Hopefully that can be improved and if so, Portland could maybe even contend for HCA.

 

The elephant in the room is that we're 8-2 and we've won 6 in a row.