jaynes nails it..
People constantly ask me why I have concerns about the Trail Blazer coaching staff. Hey, Nate’s a Coach of the Year candidate, right? And they won all those games in the face of a rash of injuries.
Well, I have never thought you judge coaches only on how many games they win. Expectations differ by talent level of the teams. Winning games is one thing, but how a team plays is quite another. All season long, it wasn’t as if the Trail Blazers lacked talent — you judge talent of teams by who is playing, not who is NOT playing. Portland was never totally without talent. This was never a Clippers or Warriors situation.
But put that aside, what I saw Thursday night out of the Trail Blazers in Denver is what drives me nuts. And this happens not just in Denver but whenever the Trail Blazers play a good team with a chance to prepare for the game — in other words, teams and situations the franchise is going to face in order to ever get to a championship level.
There’s Brandon Roy out there at the top, dribbling the ball around helplessly trying to beat his man one-on-one against a defense stacked against him. This is what the coaching staff thinks is going to carry them to the next level? Seriously? Look, I’m not saying Brandon Roy isn’t an all-star — I’m saying he isn’t Kobe Bryant or LeBron James and he can’t just repeatedly manufacture good scoring chances by himself.
Why isn’t there a system in place to help him get good shots? Yes, there’s that pick-and-roll. And by now aren’t we all sick of watching a “big” set a screen for Roy and him not using it? And the big not driving hard to the basket, rather than just drifting a few feet to the side for a long jumper?
I just can’t stand the fact that so much of what the Trail Blazers do comes strictly off one-on-one play. That stuff is fine for a possession or two late in a game but you can’t play that way all night. You’ve got to move the ball, move bodies, set picks and make plays for each other. And man, when Charles Barkley on TNT calls you out almost every week for your inability to have any sort of inside or post-up game, don’t you at least listen? I mean, even Chuck knows what’s wrong and nobody is taking this to heart?
On so many nights against good teams with a chance to prepare, this is what we see.
And oh, don’t even get me started on what the team does on the defensive end. Good grief, you can’t expect to continue to give up uncontested three-point shots and dunks and have a real chance to consistently win big games. It’s so funny to hear TNT commentators who are supposed to know basketball talk about Portland’s defense being solid, based on the archaic “points-against” statistic rather than anything useful.
It’s not a good defensive team, particularly in playoff or playoff-like situations (when teams have a chance to get prepared). Portland does not contest enough shots. It does not help well enough inside.
And these problems at both ends of the court are institutional. They have to do with how this team is being taught — or not being taught — to play.
You can continue to be satisfied with how many games are being won and all that. You can congratulate the team for continuing to play hard in spite of adversity, but really — if it continues to play the way it is, it’s never really going to get anywhere in the post-season.
Unless it draws a team in the playoffs that pays less attention to detail than it does. And that’s not too likely.
