This post is for you Rip City, it's for sticking by your team no matter what, holding your head high even after hard to swallow defeats such as tonights, and realizing that this is just the beginning of something special being built here in the beautiful rose city. This is not about disappointment, or resentment. I cannot and will not blame anyone for these losses, we simply came up against a better and more experienced team ( as much as I hate to admit it ), and sometimes that happens.... and the thing that most people don't realize is, that its GOING TO BE OK.... The Portland Trailblazers average age is 25.7, and if you take away the outliers of Earl Watson and Mo Williams, it drops down to about 24.5, This goes without saying, we are one of the youngest teams in the league rip city. We have a borderline superstar in Lamarcus Aldridge, and a poised young point guard who is also on the verge of stardom at age 23 whose name I don't even need to mention because... well.. he's just that guy. The injury bug seems to have disappeared for now, and our offense is arguably one of the elite offenses in the league behind an offensive mastermind in Terry Stotts (http://www.oregonlive.com/blazers/index.ssf/2012/08/blazers_coach_terry_stotts_known_for_his_offensive.html ). The main problems for the Blazers at this point is their bench, which is slowly but steadily seeming to improve, and probably most glaring is their defense, which seems to give up far to many easy buckets. Now these are two large problems, but they are what I believe to be quite fixable.
Lets start with the bench. Portland seems to have a couple potential developing bench players in Will Barton and Thomas Robinson. Both of these guys have shown flashes of their athleticism in games, but haven't seemed to quite put it together yet ( don't worry, they have time as they are both only 23 years old ). They also have an experienced scorer in Mo Williams, who isn't quite what he used to be, but still can provide a spark off the bench. Adding one more proven bench player to the mix could really go a long way for this team... preferably someone who likes to play defense, and if GM Neil Olshey can put together a few creative moves, which he has proven to be able to do ( got Robin Lopez and Thomas Robinson this offseason for basically nothing ), then our bench may not seem like the weak point of our team anymore next season. Realistically, I would say our bench problems should be an afterthought within 2 seasons, this will give our young players some time to develop and our GM some time to make some moves and bring in a couple more proven bench players to add to the mix. As my mother always told me... Patience is a virtue, and a damn tough virtue at that.
DEFENSE......ok the caps might have been a little bit overkill, but I felt the need for it to stand out because I believe it to indeed be our biggest downfall. When you look at this team on paper... it seems as if they would be a decent defensive team. We have two great perimeter defenders in Wes Matthews and Nico Batum, a decent post defender in Robin Lopez, and two extremely athletic players in Lamarcus Aldridge and Damian Lillard ( Lamarcus actually plays quite good post defense, and Lillard is young and I expect him to develop with more training summers from his fellow Oakland PG Gary Payton Aka... "Glove" ). The problem isn't with our one on one coverage, it is with our team/help defense and rotations. Rarely in the NBA do you get to play simple one on one D, there are far to many screens, both off and on ball, and the game is to quick, so teams must be able to rely on rotations, switches, and help defense etc. The San Antonio Spurs are a perfect example, they may not have the greatest one on one defenders in the world, but they have bought into Coach Popovich's defensive sets, their rotations are flawless, and in the end it results in suffocating defense down the stretch, as we all just saw first hand. Popovich demands that his players trust the defensive system, and that is the exact type of attitude needed ASAP here in Rip City! Terry Stotts is an offensive mastermind, but defense definitely isn't his strong suit ( he's not Mike D'antoni bad, but he's not where he needs to be on a defensive level ). Bring in an assistant with a proven defensive track record ( pray for Lionel Hollins or Mike Brown... although neither is likely to happen ), who has defensive sets in place and knows how to get the best out of his players defensively, and I believe we will quickly see a much better defensive team here in Portland. Basically what I am saying is, we have all the ingredients for a good defense, we are just missing the recipe... Terrible analogies are my thing.. get used to it. We had by far the worst defensive efficiency out of the remaining 8 playoff teams, and history has shown that without a good defense it is extremely hard to win NBA Championships ( even the 2011 Dallas Mavericks stepped up their D in crunch time ). Defense is key, and if we can break the top 15 in defensive efficiency, with this offense as dangerous as it is, our team will be one that no one wants to see come April.
After my rants on bench improvements and defense I'm sure many people are still disappointed that we still lost by 20 points in a 5 game series, and thats reasonable, nobody wants to see their team lose like that to end the season. For all of the fans with your heads down right now please look at this way. We were picked by most to finish 11th-13th in the West, with anywhere from 35-40 wins predicted by most analysts. The Blazers ended up 5th with 54 wins, and a first round playoff victory, we exceeded expectations in every way imaginable.... let me re-phrase myself... we SMASHED expectations! Instead of keeping your head down and wondering what if, look at the accomplishments and great strides this team and this city has made in one season. If we can even match half of that improvement next season then we will be in the discussion of an NBA Finals berth in the very near future. This is our Team, they are young, poised, and the arrow is pointing no where but up here in PDX.... so do the same everybody and as Tupac says... KEEP YA HEAD UP! #ripcityforlife #neversaydie!
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