Scout says Blazers better without Oden

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Aldridge at the 5 won't get the Blazers to the finals... ever. That's what the scout neglected to say.

I've been quiet, but to me the pressure should be on both Nate and the players to integrate Oden and Miller into the Blazer offense. Nate took the easy path sitting Miller after a rather unremarkable preseason. Now there's talk of trading Miller, which seals the future path of the Blazer team. You'll have to embrace BRoy being your de facto PG, and having some combo-guard like Blake compliments him. There will be no pure PG, as that ship has sailed.

That's not the end of the world, but it does mean that Roy has to learn to be happy with less scoring... and keeping his bigs happy. Having a pure PG making smart passes would have solved that problem, but Roy wasn't ready or perhaps willing to work without the ball.
 
Forcing the ball through a player (Oden) who clearly isn't ready to be a primary scorer does bog down the offense. On offense, I absolutely agree that the Blazers are better offensively with Oden as a rebounder vs. the primary post-up player. Whether that changes or not depends on the expansion of Oden's offensive game. At this point today, however, it is clear that better offensive players are taking a hit in production by slowing the game down to get Oden the ball.
 
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If I were a scout for a rival team to Portland I would do everything I could to get the Blazers to play Oden less.

That's what this guy did. Good for him.

Too bad for him Portland isn't going to waste a whole lot of time listening to a rival team's scout.
 
http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/POR/2010.html

Oden's got the 3rd highest offensive rating(only Jerryd and Dante are higher, and those are some small sample sizes), and the lowest defensive rating on the team. Combined his ratings come out to +21 and the only guy even close is Cunningham's +16, take out Dante, Jerryd, and Juwan for lack of playing time and the closest player is Aldridge with a +10 or not even half as good as Greg.

He's 3rd on the team in overall +/- and according to 82games we're +77 total with him on the court and +31 total without him, considering he's played in 51% of the minutes for us it's pretty simple to see the greater than 2-1 ratio advantage he gives us.

Pretty much all the publicly known efficiency/overall production metrics I'm familiar with say that Oden is our best player when he's on the floor, PER of 23.2, EFF of 18.45(which isn't per minute), and a roland rating of 9.8. No one, not even Roy, is higher in any one of those measures.

But this anonymous scout thinks we should be playing with an Aldridge/Outlaw frontcourt... dumbass.
 
PapaG said:
Forcing the ball through a player (Oden) who clearly isn't ready to be a primary scorer does bog down the offense. On offense, I absolutely agree that the Blazers are better offensively with Oden as a rebounder vs. the primary post-up player. Whether that changes or not depends on the expansion of Oden's offensive game. At this point today, however, it is clear that better offensive players are taking a hit in production by slowing the game down to get Oden the ball.
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I agree that things don't exactly develop quickly with Oden in the post, but with his ability to pass out of the post or find cutters through the lane I have zero problem with what he's done since they've started establishing him on the block. The only way he's really going to get better is with touches in live game situations. If it means more losses and struggles for the team in the short run for better inside-out play later (even if "later" ends up being next year and beyond) then that's a trade-off I'm happy to make.

You can't keep pushing Greg's burgeoning offensive game off 'til "tomorrow" because there will always be more excuses to keep putting it off.

It might also be worth noting that this is a contract year for Greg; it's pretty important to establish himself as a go to guy for this team for his sake and for the team's sake to know what they've got.
 
angrypuppy said:
I've been quiet
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Angrypuppy!! You are back. I never really connected with you, but I read your posts on ESPN. I figured you were here under a different name. About a month ago on this board, someone described your posts well, but couldn't remember your screen name. Neither could I, so I didn't respond. I was thinking it was angry dog or something. The discussion was about something in the past, I don't remember.
 
jlprk said:
Angrypuppy!! You are back. I never really connected with you, but I read your posts on ESPN. I figured you were here under a different name. About a month ago on this board, someone described your posts well, but couldn't remember your screen name. Neither could I, so I didn't respond. I was thinking it was angry dog or something. The discussion was about something in the past, I don't remember.
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I was going to reply to your post here, but I can't remember what I was going to say.

barfo
 
PapaG said:
Forcing the ball through a player (Oden) who clearly isn't ready to be a primary scorer does bog down the offense. On offense, I absolutely agree that the Blazers are better offensively with Oden as a rebounder vs. the primary post-up player. Whether that changes or not depends on the expansion of Oden's offensive game. At this point today, however, it is clear that better offensive players are taking a hit in production by slowing the game down to get Oden the ball.
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But it's an adjustment that needs to be made eventually, wouldn't you agree? Eventually this team is going to have to learn to play with Oden. I think he is definitely developing as an offensive weapon. He might not be as polished as an Aldridge or a Roy, but he's coming along. That's something to be positive about. I would rather we take the time to integrate Oden now, rather than later.
 
The "scout" must be a Laker fan. No one wants Oden to dominate. No one wants Oden's confidence to keep going up. No other team wants to face a Oden that is without "foul trouble" and no one wants to let the Blazers know they are better with him on the floor. Whomever this lackluster scout, probably Minny's scout since those guys couldn't scout their way out of a paper bag, must have been taking some massive LSD drops and watched.
 
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