I've been seeing basically this same point being made by multiple posters and I think that the logic behind it is flawed for two reasons. The first is that it's only considering the offensive side of the game. While Dame and CJ are certainly the Blazers two best offensive players, they're far from being top notch defenders. The Blazers lost two good defenders in Aminu and Harkless who used to cover up a lot of the guards' perimeter defensive deficiencies. Bazemore is okay, but Carmelo is never going to get out to the three point shooters the way Chief did. How many open threes are opponents getting this year? It seems like every game the opponent is putting up season highs for three point percentage. The second flaw in the thinking is that while it's true that the Blazers are still starting a credible team, the injuries have sucked the depth out of the bench. Most games the bench is getting outscored by the opponent's bench by enough to account for the margin of the loss. The last point I'd make is that there's value in consistency in the NBA. Last year, the Blazers were able to play the same group of starters most of the season. This year because of injuries to multiple starters, the Blazers have never had time to develop the cohesive team play that is dependent on developing chemistry by playing together.
