The Blazers now have the statiscally worst defense in the NBA

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Wizard, I don't believe our schedule has been tough at all. We've played two very bad teams and two very good teams. We've played two road games and two home games. Our strength of schedule currently ranks 20th in the league by BBReference. The Blazers have only played one opponent who ranks in the top half of the league offensively; the Rockets who are 5th at 108.9 points per 100 possessions.

Your numbers are listing PPG instead of points per possession. All of the teams who give up more PPG than the Blazers play at a faster pace so their offense has more chances to outscore the other team and still win. Those teams are the 76ers, Clippers, Lakers, Mavs and Wizards.

I expect the Blazers to eventually have a better defense than some team in the league, but the results so far have been extremely discouraging and I'm not sure how anyone can be content with our defense to date.
 
Synergy has us at #25 giving up .96 points per possession. We are scoring .95, which is #7.
 
good point. Where did you find SOS? Sagarin says our schedule has been the 6th most difficult:
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/nba/sagarin/2014/rating/

Draco said:
Wizard, I don't believe our schedule has been tough at all. We've played two very bad teams and two very good teams. We've played two road games and two home games. Our strength of schedule currently ranks 20th in the league by BBReference. The Blazers have only played one opponent who ranks in the top half of the league offensively; the Rockets who are 5th at 108.9 points per 100 possessions.

Your numbers are listing PPG instead of points per possession. All of the teams who give up more PPG than the Blazers play at a faster pace so their offense has more chances to outscore the other team and still win. Those teams are the 76ers, Clippers, Lakers, Mavs and Wizards.

I expect the Blazers to eventually have a better defense than some team in the league, but the results so far have been extremely discouraging and I'm not sure how anyone can be content with our defense to date.
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Food for thought: How shitty is your defense when people start pining for Nate-ball?
 
One thing to look at is how they have played on D. Yes we have allowed a lot of points and we look lost at times but just looking at the energy that is expelled on D is a lot better then last year. We are trying and just failing instead of watching and failing like we were last year. That might not seem like something big but since the effort seems to be there, we just now have to turn that effort into results.
 
After 6 games were 4-2. While still not world beaters, we've significantly improved from a Drtg of 110.7 to 107.5.

btw, our Ortg is 111.2, good for 3rd in the league. The 2 teams ahead of us? Miami and LAC which both have a worse Drtg than we do.
 
Yeah our defense rates much better now. Definitely helps playing the Kings twice HAHA. It'll be interesting how we do tomorrow especially on the boards against a Detroit team with some legit rebounders.

Then we play the Suns followed by some struggling teams on a 4 game east coast trip so while I was very encouraged by the last two games I'm going to be a bit cautious in any optimism until we've played better competition at the end of the month.
 
Wizard Mentor said:
After 6 games were 4-2. While still not world beaters, we've significantly improved from a Drtg of 110.7 to 107.5.

btw, our Ortg is 111.2, good for 3rd in the league. The 2 teams ahead of us? Miami and LAC which both have a worse Drtg than we do.
Click to expand...

So the more/faster you score, the more opportunities your opponents has to also score.
 
Draco said:
Yeah our defense rates much better now. Definitely helps playing the Kings twice HAHA. It'll be interesting how we do tomorrow especially on the boards against a Detroit team with some legit rebounders.

Then we play the Suns followed by some struggling teams on a 4 game east coast trip so while I was very encouraged by the last two games I'm going to be a bit cautious in any optimism until we've played better competition at the end of the month.
Click to expand...

Things will come around. Help defense takes timing. Lopez is starting to get the timing down; which helps protect the paint. Wes is seriously playing out of his mind right now and I think that will be contagious. But all we really need is a good win streak. Winning motivates!
 
Drtg and Ortg are points per 100 possessions, so they're pace independent. That's why many on this board think they're a better measure of defense/offense than ppg. I have finally come around to their thinking.

Pinwheel1 said:
So the more/faster you score, the more opportunities your opponents has to also score.
Click to expand...
 
Everyone has always recognized that "points for" sucks as an offensive measure, and "points against" sucks as a defensive measure. PPG differential is a different story, of course. And these new pace stats are good.
 
Wizard Mentor said:
Drtg and Ortg are points per 100 possessions, so they're pace independent. That's why many on this board think they're a better measure of defense/offense than ppg. I have finally come around to their thinking.
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I agree, that is much better.

However I would imagine that style of play is still is a factor. It will be interesting to see when Miami and the Clips start to win more consistently, if their Drtg gets dramatically better. Or if it stays poor.

Even though it is based on 100 possessions, maybe their opponents get into a better offensive rhythm because it is a more wide open style. They still will lose to the better team, but their offensive stats may be better while racing up and down the court.
 
I've always looked at anomaly teams like the Heat as winning when most teams aren't prepared to play against that style. I think now that Miami offense has been learned, the other teams are much better prepared to deal with them. It doesn't mean the offense won't win them more titles, just that it will get much harder for them. Also, great coaches like Phil or Pop have changed their offense throughout the years, so teams can't prepare for them. I don't know if Spoelstra has that ability.
 
magnifier661 said:
I've always looked at anomaly teams like the Heat as winning when most teams aren't prepared to play against that style. I think now that Miami offense has been learned, the other teams are much better prepared to deal with them. It doesn't mean the offense won't win them more titles, just that it will get much harder for them. Also, great coaches like Phil or Pop have changed their offense throughout the years, so teams can't prepare for them. I don't know if Spoelstra has that ability.
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Hmmm I don’t really agree with this. I’d really say the opposite, NBA teams don’t disguise what they are doing, its not football with trick plays. After 40 games everybody knows what the other team is going to do its just a matter of being able to stop it or not. The Pacers knew when and where LeBron would get the ball last year. Miami knew Hibbert and West would get the ball inside. When Miami lost to the Mavs they knew when and where Dirk was getting the ball. But when you have to stop a LeBron or Dirk just knowing doesn’t help too much.
 
Draco said:
Hmmm I don’t really agree with this. I’d really say the opposite, NBA teams don’t disguise what they are doing, its not football with trick plays. After 40 games everybody knows what the other team is going to do its just a matter of being able to stop it or not. The Pacers knew when and where LeBron would get the ball last year. Miami knew Hibbert and West would get the ball inside. When Miami lost to the Mavs they knew when and where Dirk was getting the ball. But when you have to stop a LeBron or Dirk just knowing doesn’t help too much.
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Of course you know, but are your players prepared like they should? A team like Indiana may weather the summer, having the offense of Miami and how it won. They can prepare for the next season much easier, knowing what they played against in the playoffs.
 
A little perspective might help here . . . There are 17 other teams playing tonight, and we have a better record than 14 of them.
 
Pinwheel1 said:
I agree, that is much better.

However I would imagine that style of play is still is a factor. It will be interesting to see when Miami and the Clips start to win more consistently, if their Drtg gets dramatically better. Or if it stays poor.

Even though it is based on 100 possessions, maybe their opponents get into a better offensive rhythm because it is a more wide open style. They still will lose to the better team, but their offensive stats may be better while racing up and down the court.
Click to expand...

Interesting, here's a little more perspective:
The Blazers have four new players in their 9-man rotation.
The Blazers weren't healthy enough to have their starters play together for even a single game in the preseason.
The Blazers are fairly young.

Sprinkle these together and add a little homerism and it's easy to conclude we'll probably be a much better defensive team by the end of the year.

Shooter said:
A little perspective might help here . . . There are 17 other teams playing tonight, and we have a better record than 14 of them.
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I always enjoyed you fresh perspective :)

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