NBA GM's Diss the Blazers

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Predator said:
Who gives a rat fuck about bench scoring. We have plenty of options offensively if we need buckets.

Bench scoring isn’t going to win championships. Having a bench that isn’t going to consistently blow leads is going to help much more. How? Well, harder to blow a lead if you actually stop the other team. Improved defense leads to improved shot opportunities and easy buckets, which is one way we can “replace” the scoring of Kanter/Melo. But you know what is impossible? For Kanter / Melo to “replace” the defense of a superior defensive player. As the saying goes, defense leads to offense. Offense doesn’t lead to defense. O and defense wins championships.

The idea that the #1 offense or whatever from last year is suddenly going to have scoring issues is not very well thought out imo.
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We added “superior defensive players”? So right now you are assuming we will be a better defensive team like I am assuming we will be worse off offensively it sounds like. We will see.
You almost lost me when you said you didn’t give a fuck about bench scoring. Well when you have a history of injuries to your starters…..you better start giving a fuck about it.
 
Phatguysrule said:
The prior bench didn't have good enough offense to make up for their ample defensive deficiency.
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Fair point. I just know you gotta get buckets. I think Melo and Kanters offense and rebounding and ability to get to the line WON more games than their defense cost us is all.
 
THE HCP said:
Well quite a few on here seem to think the injury prone Zeller is going to do more for us than Kanter this season…..I just don’t see it.
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Certainly, injuries could derail everything.
 
Phatguysrule said:
His offense isn't enough to overcome our bad defense though.
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right

but this is really going down a tangent because I was talking about Kanter's nearly elite offense, and that a big issue with his defense was that he was part of a 2nd unit that included Melo & Simons. Making it worse is that at the top of the 2nd and 4th Q's, it was usually CJ, Simons, and Melo on with Kanter

metal-sieve-with-a-plastic-handle-picture-id505335640
 
wizenheimer said:
right

but this is really going down a tangent because I was talking about Kanter's nearly elite offense, and that a big issue with his defense was that he was part of a 2nd unit that included Melo & Simons. Making it worse is that at the top of the 2nd and 4th Q's, it was usually CJ, Simons, and Melo on with Kanter

metal-sieve-with-a-plastic-handle-picture-id505335640
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Sure, but Kanter has been consistently bad defensively. On several teams. To the point that they wouldn't even play him. If you built enough good defenders around him you might be able to hide his deficiencies... but I think good teams would still take advantage of him to the point that you'd have to take him off the floor.

But you're right, that unit was TERRIBLE defensively.
 
Phatguysrule said:
Sure, but Kanter has been consistently bad defensively. On several teams. To the point that they wouldn't even play him. If you built enough good defenders around him you might be able to hide his deficiencies... but I think good teams would still take advantage of him to the point that you'd have to take him off the floor.
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kind of funny that it wasn't an issue in 2018-19 when the Blazers made it to the WCF with a much better bench defensively. Of course, Kanter was the starter then. Still, that team's defensive rating was 16th in the league...with Kanter. Kanter wasn't so bad defensively that he couldn't be played back then

where Kanter is really bad is at sticking his fingers in the dyke and stopping the tsunami of opposing perimeter players getting by the perimeter defense of the Blazers

you know what?...I'm going to call a partial bullshit on the "Kanter can't play in the playoffs" narrative.... Portland was 29th in the NBA in defense last year giving up 116.0 rating. Kanter hardly played in the playoffs; only 11 minutes a game and a DNP-CD. Yet, against a team missing their starting back court and 2nd best offensive player, the Blazers gave up a defensive rating of 123.4. They were 7.4 points worse in the playoffs than in the regular season, and that's with Kanter playing only playing 38% of the minutes he did in the regular season. IMO, Kanter became the scapegoat of a failed defense, and he was not the one most responsible
 
I like Kanter, would've brought him back...as far as comparing him to Zeller, let's see how Zeller plays as a Blazer for a few months before we decide that...Melo left quickly in the offseason without waiting for the Blazers to shuffle some pieces before bringing him back...Melo wanted to be a Laker. Of the two, I'd have kept Kanter....reality is Kanter got so many offensive boards off the bench because of some poor shooting off our bench....we shoot better there just won't be that many offensive boards. The title of this thread is wrong...GMs dissing the Blazers? Show me where you get that impression....the only dissing is coming from agents and GMs who want Lillard in a big market...the media will undersell the Blazers every preseason....HCP is so pumped for the Lakers that he's jinxing the Blazers roster this season? Lot of bench hate bro
 
wizenheimer said:
kind of funny that it wasn't an issue in 2018-19 when the Blazers made it to the WCF with a much better bench defensively. Of course, Kanter was the starter then. Still, that team's defensive rating was 16th in the league...with Kanter. Kanter wasn't so bad defensively that he couldn't be played back then

where Kanter is really bad is at sticking his fingers in the dyke and stopping the tsunami of opposing perimeter players getting by the perimeter defense of the Blazers

you know what?...I'm going to call a partial bullshit on the "Kanter can't play in the playoffs" narrative.... Portland was 29th in the NBA in defense last year giving up 116.0 rating. Kanter hardly played in the playoffs; only 11 minutes a game and a DNP-CD. Yet, against a team missing their starting back court and 2nd best offensive player, the Blazers gave up a defensive rating of 123.4. They were 7.4 points worse in the playoffs than in the regular season, and that's with Kanter playing only playing 38% of the minutes he did in the regular season. IMO, Kanter became the scapegoat of a failed defense, and he was not the one most responsible
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Yeah, I don't think he was most of the problem either. Specifically because of his elite rebounding.

But if you're looking to improve on defense he's one of the players you'd look at.
 
Kanter can play in the playoffs situationally. Against teams that don't have the types of perimeter players that can hunt mismatches and exploit them and that sort of offensive philosophy, sure, he can at least body up his man and provide some resistance.

If the Blazers could somehow play, say, the 76ers in the playoffs, I wouldn't consider Kanter unplayable at all. Let him bang against Embiid, maybe use up 5-6 fouls while making Embiid work on the other end. If the Blazers are up against the Warriors, in the playoffs? Totally unplayable. Every possession would be Kanter's man screening for Curry or Klay or Poole and then either Kanter getting completely roasted because he can't move laterally or the entire Blazers defense being in crisis mode. Nurkic has similar issues, just not quite as pronounced because he has better defensive instincts. Every center that isn't highly mobile has this issue to some extent, Kanter is just particularly bad at it. That's where the meme that Kanter can't play in the playoffs came from--it emerged in this heavy screen action, mismatch hunting era.
 
I've often thought that Kanter played his best with the starting unit....that's when we went to the WCF...he had Chief to bail him out defensively on that team...bit different from playing next to Melo off the bench
 
Just as an aside, I find it interesting how the definition of "good defense" has changed over the decades I have been following the sport. Rebounding used to be considered an important part of defense for a big man. Rebounds = possesion, and that means you can score and the other team can't. Pretty straight forward.

I'm not sure when or why the importance of rebounding became secondary.
 
It seems the Blazers are getting a lot of respect here... it's a team that hasn't gotten anything of consequence from the draft in years, has an unproven coach, and has two of three of its best players either consistently hurt (Nurk) or choking in the playoffs (CJ). That the Blazers are considered to be a playoff team in spite of it all is pretty remarkable.
 
Buffalo Custard said:
Just as an aside, I find it interesting how the definition of "good defense" has changed over the decades I have been following the sport. Rebounding used to be considered an important part of defense for a big man. Rebounds = possesion, and that means you can score and the other team can't. Pretty straight forward.

I'm not sure when or why the importance of rebounding became secondary.
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There’s no rebound to get if the other team makes the shot. On the other side of the court, his offensive rebounding was very helpful.
 
Buffalo Custard said:
Just as an aside, I find it interesting how the definition of "good defense" has changed over the decades I have been following the sport. Rebounding used to be considered an important part of defense for a big man. Rebounds = possesion, and that means you can score and the other team can't. Pretty straight forward.

I'm not sure when or why the importance of rebounding became secondary.
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Rebounding well isn't as effective when the other team doesn't miss because they get layups past your immobile big.
 
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