I think people are really sleeping on this team based on the record Portland had that stemmed from the first 56 games of last year where we started Noah Vonleh. It took a while to sort out the identity, but this coming year roles should be defined much more quickly.
Especially with the addition of Evans, Portland is moving from a team run by 20-25-year-olds to 23-28-year-olds. If you think that transition has no impact on the wins and losses, you don't remember what it's like to be 20 like Vonleh was last year.
Agreed 100% on people sleeping on this team. I think predictions of 46 wins are way too low, for the reasons you mention, and others. Of course, the consensus among the "experts" this time last year was 27 wins, and through Christmas, that wasn't looking too far off. Through Christmas last season, the team was 11-20, a 29-win pace. Then something happened. This young team started to gel. After Christmas, they went 33-18, a 53-win pace. Those 51 games are a significant sample size, almost 2/3 of a season.
Given how young our roster was, I think 56 wins is a perfectly reasonable expectation. Not a single member of our returning core has yet to reach his peak. Ed Davis, who turned 27 after the season ended, is our oldest returning rotation player. Plumlee is 26. Aminu turns 26 tomorrow. Dame turned 26 in July. C.J. turned 25 yesterday. Crabbe and Leonard are 24. Harkless is 23. Vonleh just turned 21 less than a month ago. These guys, individually, and as a group will continue to improve.
I think most "experts" are missing the point of our off season acquisitions. Evan Turner was not brought in to be a scorer. He was brought in to be our secondary ball handler/distributor. That's playing to his strengths and addressing a major weakness we had last year that was especially exposed in the playoffs. Last year, we didn't have a single ball handler coming off the bench that played significant minutes. Our backup PGs were Tim Frazier and then Brian Roberts. Between the two of them, they only played in 51 games, and when they did play, they only averaged 7 MPG. It was even worse in the playoffs when Roberts averaged only 3.6 MPG, almost entirely in garbage time.
And there's a reason they didn't play more. Both are generously listed as 6'1" (and Frazier isn't even close to that). Given that Dame and C.J. are both just 6'3", playing one, or the other, with Frazier or Roberts left us severely undersized in the back court.
Enter Evan Turner. At 6'7", Turner can easily play with Dame, or C.J., or both. This is the real reason we brought in Turner. Most in this forum seems to understand this, but many in the national media do not. Anyone who says Turner isn't a good fit, has entirely missed this point. Last year, when either Dame or C.J. sat, we were left with one ball handler on the court -
and that one ball handler happened to also be our best/primary scorer. Do you know how easy that is to defend, especially at the NBA level? Just swarm the heck out of the guy handling the ball and you shut down not only his scoring, but your entire opponent's offense.
Turner gives us a 3rd ball handler/distributor. That means we can always have 2 of the 3 of Dame, C.J. and Turner on the court. No longer will Dame or C.J. be left on an island when the other rests. That's a HUGE improvement. It also lets Dame and C.J. both play off the ball more, which will result in more, higher percentage, catch and shoot opportunities. The player Turner is replacing on the roster is Gerald Henderson. Henderson was a decent scorer off the bench, but like our other leading bench scorer, Allen Crabbe, he is not a distributor. His 8.2 AST% is only about 1/3 of Turner's 23.9. And, we don't really sacrifice much in scoring. Although he isn't a primary scorer, Turner's scoring rate and efficiency was only slightly lower than Henderson's. The real benefit of adding Turner is more catch and shoot opportunities for everyone else, not just Dame and C.J. Add Crabbe, Meyers and Aminu to that list.
We also added a legitimate rim protector in Festus Ezeli. That was our other biggest weakness last year. As much as I love Mason Plumlee's energy, his narrow build and short arms will never make him an elite, or even above average rim protector. Same, to a slightly lesser extent, can be said about Ed Davis. Again, I love the effort and work ethic, but if Ed Davis was an elite rim protector, he'd be getting max money. Ezili, when healthy, is an elite level rim protector. Of course, we are all aware of his injury history, but if he can play in ~ 60 regular season games at about 16 MPG, that would be a huge improvement for our team defense. Ideally, he can play limited minutes during the regular season so he can be healthy for the playoffs.
As much as Dame gets bashed for his defense (rightfully so, it's by far the weakest part of his game), having a legitimate rim protector behind him, along with increased individual effort, will help a lot. Last year, Dame's DBPM was a terrible -2.2. The year before, with Robin Lopez behind him, his DBPM was an almost average 0.0. That doesn't put him at an elite, or even above average level, but combined with his explosive offense, that's very acceptable. It puts him in the same class as guys like Steph Curry and Tony Parker, guys who aren't great individual defenders, but also don't suck so bad on defense that they kill their team.
Evan Turner is also an above average defender. Having him and Ezeli on the court will help Dame a lot. He wont be exposed at much, but hopefully we will also see increased individual effort from him on the defensive end. Maybe with Turner handling more of the ball handling and distribution duties, Dame will be able to apply more energy on the other end of the court.
Finally, there will be more wins to go around this year. Last year, the two top teams in the Western Conference won an astonishing 140 games. That shattered the old record of 132 wins that had been accomplished twice in NBA history (in 1995-96, the year the Bulls won 72 game and in 1971-72 the year the Lakers won 69). That alone is historically significant. Not only is the 140 total wins for the top two teams in the conference 8 more than the previous record, it's also 21 more wins than the preceding 20-year average of 119 wins for the top two teams in the Western Conference. If you go back another 20 years, that average drops to 113 combined wins. Point being, not only is 140 wins a record, it's a huge anomaly not likely to be repeated, or even challenged, for a very long time (if ever). And since total wins is a zero net sum, for every fewer win the top two teams have, that's one more win to be divided among the other teams.
Yes, on paper, the Warriors, with the addition of Kevin Durant, are a better team, but they will not win more than 73 games. To win that many games takes a perfect storm of conditions, including health to all your key players (their top three players missed a combined 6 games), focus, and even a little luck. Winning 73 games took a lot out of them, both physically and mentally. That requires a LOT of focus EVERY night over the course of a grueling 82-game schedule. After winning a record 73 games during the regular season, they were challenged much more in the 2016 post season than the previous year when they practically coasted to a title.
I think being challenged by the Blazers in the second round, being down 3-1 to OKC in the WCF, and eventually losing to CLE in the finals made them realize that regular season records aren't nearly as important as being rested and focused for the post season. They will easily clinch the best record in the West, probably with 2 - 3 weeks left in the regular season. I think after losing the championship last year, Kerr will take a page out of his former coach's playbook and rest his key players, maybe even shut one or two of them down, late in the regular season when those wins will be meaningless.
They will also be trying to incorporate a very significant piece into their line up. Eventually, Durant will be a great fit and will give them a huge boost in the post season, but I do think it will take a month, or possibly two, of playing together for everyone to get comfortable. Last year, they returned their entire line up from the previous championship season. They were a well oiled machine that hit the ground running and rattled of an NBA record 24 straight wins to start the regular season. That won't happen again this year (perhaps not ever).
So, look for GSW to still be the class of the league and the No. 1 seed in the Western Conference, but I think something in the 65 - 68 win range is what we'll see from them this year.
Speaking of the Spurs, after the retirement of Duncan and with Parker, Ginobili and even Aldridge getting a year older, and losing Diaw and West, no way to they come close to 67 wins. They are still the Spurs and still coached by Pop, but I'm thinking something like 58 or 59 wins are more realistic this year.
And former 3rd seed OKC, with the loss of Durant, will also see a drop in their previous season's 55-win total. Westbrook will challenge Harden for the scoring title, but he will also likely set the NBA single season USG% record in the process, and ultimately, that will hurt his team in the win column. Two years ago, when Durant missed 59 games, Westbrook did, indeed, lead the league in scoring at 28.1 ppg. The problem is he was terribly inefficient. He had the second highest USG% (38.37) in NBA history and became only the third player in NBA history to record a USG% > 38, and by far the least efficient. The only other two USG% > 38 seasons were Kobe Bryant's 38.74 in 2005-06, when he averaged 35.4 ppg and Michael Jordan in 1986-87 with a USG% of 38.29 and a scoring average of 37.1 ppg. So, a belated congrats to Russ for becoming the first player in NBA history to combine a USG% > 38 with a scoring average < 35 ppg, and doing so by a WIDE margin. Oh, and by the way, his team missed the playoffs that year. With no KD for all 82 games this year, look for Russ to top the 30 ppg barrier for the first time in his career, but also look for him to top USG > 40 for the first time in NBA history. Also, look for his team to struggle to make the playoffs.
So, I look for last year's top 3 teams in the West to have about 25 fewer combined wins this year. That's 25 more wins for the rest of the conference to split among themselves. Sure, UTA and MIN will snap up some of those wins, but so will the Blazers. There will also be a general shuffling of the bottom teams in the conference. Some will win more, some will win less, but historically, fewer wins for the top 2 or 3 seeds means more wins for the 4 - 8 seeds. Although we won't see a regression to the 2009-10 season, when the top two teams in the Western Conference only won 112 games and it took 50 wins just to secure the 8th seed, I do think we will definitely see a narrowing of the gap between the top teams and the middle seeds in the West. We won't regress all the way back to the norm in one year, but we will be headed in that direction.
In summary: I think given generally good health of their key players, the Blazers have a very realistic shot at
56 wins and 3rd seed in the West, with a potential, if all goes well of 58 - 59 wins and challenging for the second seed.
My Reasons:
1) Continued improvement of young returning players who played at a 53-win pace over the final 2/3 of last season.
2) Addition of a secondary ball handler of size allows us to always have two ball handlers on the court at all times. Will prevent opposing defenses from shutting down our team by focusing on a single player when one of our two best players leaves the game. Will create more, higher percentage, catch and shoot opportunities for our two best players, as well as others.
3) Addition of an elite rim protector, even if it's just for ~ 16 MPG for 60 games, plus an above average perimeter defender, will significantly improve our team defense and help hide the defensive liabilities of our starting back court.
4) Fewer wins for the top 2 - 3 teams in the West means more wins for everyone else.
Predicting 46 wins this year is an even bigger joke than predicting 27 (or 23) wins last year. Last year, after losing 4 starters, there were reasons to be pessimistic. This year, after watching a very young team win at a 53-win pace for 2/3 of a season and make it to the second round of the playooffs, there are reasons to be optimistic.
BNM
