Game Thread Game #5 BLAZERS VS. CLIPPERS - OCTOBER 29, 2021 - FRIDAY, 7:00 PM, ROOT SPORTS

[Mr. Robot]

do you think terry stotts watches the blazers

if he does, i wonder what he thinks of our defense

 

[andalusian]

do you think terry stotts watches the blazers

if he does, i wonder what he thinks of our defense

He probably thinks how nice it would have been to have Zeller and Nance instead of EK and melo, and not have djj and the corpse of Rodney Hood to play.

 

[BonesJones]

Come on! Anyone on this board care to differ with me? CJ scores only when he initiates his own shot, often times taking him many seconds to juke, spin, etc., while four others watch???

So do you ignore every time he shoots a catch-and-shoot jumper or gets a basket off a cut since you think he ONLY scores after dribbling for many seconds?

 

[BonesJones]

last year is over and done with. Blazers don't have the same defense as last year...right?

and teams don't have the same offenses as last season, especially not this early. All I was doing by using past ratings was pointing at how defenses usually start the season ahead of the offenses



again, has no relevance at all to THIS season...all 5 games of it

only one team has a rating as good as your 114.8. Here are the offensive ratings of Portland's opponents

112.5 (memphis)
108.9 (kings)
105.6 (suns)
101.5 (clips)
101.5 (clips)

that is an 'average' of 106 which would rank 20th. This year's Blazer defense can only play against the teams on the schedule. They haven't played the offense of last year's Clippers, twice, but the offense of this years Clippers and that offense is 16.1 points worse than last season. The Suns' offense is 14.6 points worse

if you want to make an argument that one reason those teams rank that low is because they faced the Blazer defense...ok, that carries a little weight.



I explained above why, but for fuck sakes, everybody is talking about the defensive rating from the 5 game sample size, so it sure as hell seems germane to me to talk about the offenses from that 5 game sample size. That's who that defensive rating was posted against. It's also especially germane to gauge for sample size because as bobf pointed out, one bad game can knock the Blazers rating into the bottom half of the league

you seem to think I'm dismissing the defensive improvement. I'm not. In fact, last night was the first time I have moved to fairly impressed with the defense because it was the most consistent I've seen it. Very few major breakdowns other than the first 4 minutes when the Clips had several wide open looks from three.

Dame and CJ are actually helping set the tone with their effort and execution. Dame played extremely good defense on Morant; that really surprised me because while Dame has always been pretty good at defending larger players, he's generally been a sieve when it comes to speed and screens..and Ja has plenty of speed (I do think it was asking too much for CJ to defend PG13 last night; fortunately, that didn't happen for all of PG's minutes)

The Clippers clanged a ton of bricks last night for sure. A lot of their 53 misses last night didn't occur against tight defense. But sometimes, the purpose of a good defense is to knock a team out of rhythm and I think the Blazers clearly had the Clips out-of-sync

personally, entering the season, I had more concern with Portland's rebounding than with their defense. But the Blazers are 10th in offensive rebounding and 4th in defensive rebounding. being 4th in defensive rebounding certainly helps their defense because teams are much more vulnerable after an offensive rebound. But again, except for Memphis, Portland has played poor offensive rebounding teams

Portland playing good defense drastically lowers those teams offensive ratings when 20% of their games (or in the Clippers case, 40%) have come against the Blazers. And they're all constructed similarly as they were last year, so saying their offenses aren't good is strange to me because you're choosing to ignore a much larger sample with a similar group is a bit strange to me, given that there's no reason those teams should randomly regress offensively. I agree that it's too small of a sample size to come to any conclusions because of our defensive rating, but regardless, we can see the Blazers immense defensive improvement.

 

[Wizard Mentor]

Portland playing good defense drastically lowers those teams offensive ratings when 20% of their games (or in the Clippers case, 40%) have come against the Blazers. And they're all constructed similarly as they were last year, so saying their offenses aren't good is strange to me because you're choosing to ignore a much larger sample with a similar group is a bit strange to me, given that there's no reason those teams should randomly regress offensively. I agree that it's too small of a sample size to come to any conclusions because of our defensive rating, but regardless, we can see the Blazers immense defensive improvement.

Well, it's very possible, especially at the beginning of the season, that expending more energy on defense takes away from the offense.

 

[BoomChakaLaka]

So do you ignore every time he shoots a catch-and-shoot jumper or gets a basket off a cut since you think he ONLY scores after dribbling for many seconds?

He doesn’t!

 

[BoomChakaLaka]

I hate that offense but…. You need guys like that who can create their shot anytime they want. Honestly he’s proabbly one of the best shot creators in the NBA, doesn’t mean he makes them all lol but he can get his anytime he wants come playoff time that is crucial

don’t disagree….but you’ve confirmed my primary point: Dame with CJ will not win a title together! They do not compliment one another. Dame + Powell is a better combo. Dame with Ant is a better combo. Trade CJ and get a piece we need! PF

 

[wizenheimer]

Yeah that was a quality defensive roster.

Ed Davis was a very underrated defender. And he took Zach under his wing and and the pair defended really well. Nurk was at his defensive peak. Aminu/Harkless was a solid defensive pairing as well. And Turner, Napier, Connaughton were pretty decent perimeter defenders as backups

 

[James lamphear]

This year they playing team defense something you have to do in the NBA. Plus there starting to learn how to protect the the corners and overall playing more physical as allowed the refs allowed its.

 

[Hoopguru]

This year they playing team defense something you have to do in the NBA. Plus there starting to learn how to protect the the corners and overall playing more physical as allowed the refs allowed its.

Plus we have a few more guys actually looking for their shots (Powell, Little, Simons)

 

[James lamphear]

Already have up 5 three pointers that not bold well for winning this game.