Game Thread GAME# 32: BLAZERS @ JAZZ - DECEMBER 26, 2019 - THURSDAY, 7:30 PM, TNT

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Should the Blazers pursue the recently-waived Jeff Green?


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    43
  • Poll closed .
Don't blame Dame for that, it's not his fault. He has to for us to have any chance. Stotts doesn't give him a choice.
I’m not really blaming him. Just wish we’d play a way that helps the bench get better even if they F up and Dame can do better on his own.
 
3/4 Time
Us - 76
Them - 96

Turnovers (Points Conceded)
Us - 11 (17)
Them - 5 (11)

Points in the Paint
Us - 20
Them - 48
 
We have the best player between them.

They have the 2nd and 3rd best.

We have the 4th best. Maybe the 5th best as well.

They're bench is as bad as ours.

I'd say we're equally talented.

Snyder is certainly the better coach.

Say what?!? Vegas had Utah tied for 2nd most wins in the league to begin the season and Portland around 12th. You can't possibly think these rosters are equal.

Edit: And that was before we lost Collins and Hood for the season. I can't imagine what the difference would be after that.
 
I'm getting close.
It would be nice to see more "set plays" rather than just "sets"..

I've always hated the way we defend the pick-and-roll. But then watching Gobert come off that little cross screen and get it for an uncontested dunk and I am thinking to myself "Why don't we ever run a screen away from the ball for something like that?"

That and watching Baze and Carmelo get rebounds and dribble up the court and fire up 3s that missed badly. That's lazy offense or playground offense or something. It's bad, whatever it is.

As good as Dame, CJ, Melo and others on our team are, you can't convince me that getting defenses out of position by moving away from the ball and sharing the basketball wouldn't get them even better scoring opportunities. Imagine if our guys were getting the looks freaking Joe Ingles was getting tonight. On the Blazers, Joe Ingles is Anthony Tolliver.
 
Ultimately as a head coach, Stotts has to sign off on the gameplan, so he's not free of blame.
Players too I’m guessing. I mean maybe they get yelled at in practice for letting someone smoke a player going one on one so they always collapse so early to help. Seems like every game we play there’s somebody open for a wide open three. Maybe there’s a balance between always helping out and peer pressuring someone with poor defense into improving.
 
Who told 1M to start launching threes five seconds into the shot clock?
 
Guess what! Teams get comfortable is you let them! We let Utah get comfortable by giving them numerous open shots. They got confidence, and now they're hitting contested shots too. After the game, the excuse will be "They hit shots". Rinse and repeat.

That's why you don't just let guys like Joe Ingles walk into 5 straight open 3s off the pick n roll without adjusting coverage. That's why you work on defensive rotations and scramble drills.

I rarely bring up my playing experience because the generic response is "That's not the NBA", but that adds to my point here... In college, we worked hard on defensive rotations, scrambles, and different pick n roll schemes. If we didn't rotate correctly, or messed up a coverage, we got called out or taken out of the game. We were held accountable. Thing is, we did a better job of positioning ourselves and rotating defensively than the Portland Trail Blazers this year. That's ridiculous.

That's why I get so frustrated by these things... Portland's defensive fundamentals aren't up to par. Not even close. They defend better than we could because they have length, athleticism, quickness, size, etc. Obviously there's a HUGE difference there. I realize that. But in terms of the things that aren't affected by those intangibles, my college team did a better job defensively than the Portland Trail Blazers. That's not a flex at all, that's just how bad the Portland Trail Blazers' defensive fundamentals are.

It's fucking frustrating.
 
So, who are the two guys who have been out during this run? Bazemore and Whiteside. I usually like Whiteside, but he hasn't done much tonight.
 
See, when this team does basic fundamentals, it has the ability to go on 10-0 runs against good teams. They have shot-makers... That's also why this is so frustrating. This team has the talent to play much better basketball! They COULD be a good team, even with these injuries.
 

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