Some people were upset with me that I didn’t blog on Friday after Portland won at Golden State. I’d called them out prior to that game, talking about how important it was to break that nine-game losing streak and get it turned around down there.

Then on Friday, nothing. Well, my bad. Should have at least filed a short blog entry congratulating them on the win. It’s been a solid week of taking care of business for Portland, which you have to do when playing those teams below you in the standings. Love the way they’re playing on offense right now — excellent ball movement while getting more players involved.

This is when they’re most dangerous on offense, when they aren’t just standing around watching Brandon Roy play one-on-one. Would love to see some more intensity on defense, with more attention to contesting shots, but I guess you can’t have everything.

And I’m sorry, but there will be days when I just don’t have time for blog posts. It’s the reality of having so many jobs right now. I appreciate your support and your patience.

Tweet This Post

Tags: Brandon Roy, Dwight Jaynes, Portland Trail Blazers

Frankly, not so well. At all.

They went into last night’s game having surrendered a cumulative field-goal percentage against of more than 50 percent over their last five games. They have not been playing good defense at all.

Yes, they “held” the Kings to 43 percent shooting last night, but seriously — I haven’t seen a team miss as many open shots in a while as the Kings missed last night. The Blazers didn’t close out on three-point shooters at all — but Sacramento couldn’t take advantage of those open looks and missed 10 threes, many of them wide open.

You can say that the recent injury to Marcus Camby had an impact on the team’s defense but really, not all that much. Camby has not played real well since he got here, folks. He’s blocking some shots but he’s a turnover machine. Considering how infrequently he touches the ball, his four turnovers last night were embarrassing, considering the team had but 11. And given the slow pace, lack of fast break points and points in the paint Portland has to live with every night, it can’t afford turnovers.

I expected better play from Camby but perhaps he just needs time. Heck, he’s been playing for the Clippers, where little things like turnovers probably don’t mean much.

There are other things going on right now that are disturbing. The Kings came out obviously trying to be more physical than usual. They attempted to push Portland around a lot and had intentions of ramming the ball inside all night. Word is getting around about the Trail Blazers’ lack of muscle and strength inside.

And the other thing that must be pointed out is that Brandon Roy is still not back to being Brandon Roy. He’s needing more shots than usual to get his points, isn’t getting to the foul line as consistently as he usually does and is missing a lot of free throws. All of that is uncharacteristic.

Some of it is that he’s probably not back to being 100 percent, physically. But another contributing factor is that teams are just not letting him play one-on-one as often as they used to. Portland’s offense has gotten so stagnant it’s beginning to seem as if every shot they take is off a one-on-one move by someone — and is usually contested.

That’s not going to work well, long term. All in all, I’m very underwhelmed by their standard of play at this point of the season. And once more, I’d remind you — don’t talk so much about who isn’t playing. Talk, instead, about who IS playing. And there is enough talent out there to be playing at a much higher level than what we’re seeing.

Tweet This Post

Tags: Brandon Roy, Dwight Jaynes, Marcus Camby, Portland Trail Blazers, Sacramento Kings

Man, guard somebody. And at the other end, make some attempt at getting the ball inside. Does this sound like a broken record with the Portland Trail Blazers?

The aggressive team gets the calls and the Nuggets got more than their share all day long. And they ganged up on Brandon Roy and LaMarcus Aldridge, making it extremely tough for them to operate. At the upper level of the NBA, this is how it works. It’s a playoff preview, too — because that’s the way any good team, given time to prepare, is going to play the Blazers.

And the Blazers don’t have enough ball movement and player movement to take advantage of it. That’s where the total frustration comes in. This is not a new problem.

Tweet This Post

Tags: Brandon Roy, Denver Nuggets, LaMarcus Aldridge, Portland Trail Blazers

I wanted to get this written before Sunday night’s game against the Nuggets in Denver. I expect the Trail Blazers to at least give Denver a solid battle tonight, if not win the game.

Yeah, I know — given the records of the teams that sounds a little crazy.

But here’s the deal: Portland won 54 games last season and didn’t have as good a team as it has right now, this minute. Injuries have contributed to the Trail Blazers’ record so far this season, that and the result of those injuries – playing completely without a center for a couple of months.

But now that Marcus Camby is here, I think you can take a look at Portland’s lineup and say it’s better than the one that won 54 games last season. Seriously, Andre Miller is a big upgrade at the point, Camby is a marginally better player than Joel Przybilla, this year’s Nic Batum is much improved and well, Brandon Roy and LaMarcus Aldridge are better players this season than last — at least they ought to be.

Oh, you’re going to say this group needs time to get used to each other. Well, maybe — but I think veteran players like Miller and Camby and players with the basketball IQ of Batum don’t need that much time. Look at the Dallas Mavericks, who were overnight a better team with the trade-deadline addition of Caron Butler, Brendan Haywood and DeShawn Stevenson to their lineup.

The Mavs didn’t need a lot of time to settle in — they haven’t, in fact, lost since the acquisition of those players.

I think you’re going to see the Trail Blazers, now that everyone is healthy, begin to play better immediately. And that starts tonight in Denver.

Tweet This Post

Tags: Andre Miller, Brandon Roy, Dallas Mavericks, Dwight Jaynes, LaMarcus Aldridge, Marcus Camby, Nic Batum

Man, down a dozen at the half and coming on strong in the third quarter. Andre Miller, Brandon Roy, Nic Batum, Marcus Camby — man, that was a frenzy in the third quarter. Love it when that team shares the ball.

I keep telling you, Batum does a lot of things. The kid’s instincts are amazing. Sometimes he does good things without even thinking about them — like cutting to the basket just as Brandon Roy is losing the ball, leading to a dunk and an and-one. Talk about the perfect fit on this team — Batum starting and playing extended minutes is much like adding a new player in a trade.

Of course, it doesn’t hurt to go 19-for-19 from the foul line, either.

This could be one of those springboard wins, coming at the end of a long road trip. Several times this season I’ve thought the team was ready to take off on a win streak and I’m thinking it again now. It’s as healthy as they’ve been all season and the schedule is favorable.

I think that game Monday could be a launching pad.

Tweet This Post

Tags: Andre Miller, Brandon Roy, Dwight Jaynes, Nic Batum, Portland Trail Blazers

A former Trail Blazer coach, after a rather narrow win over an inferior opponent, told me that he was feeling pretty down about the game for a little while.

“But I told myself before I ever took this job that you should never feel bad about winning a game,” he said. “So I try to feel good about every win.”

In this case, it may not have been easy. Watching a team with five total wins this season march down the Trail Blazer lane like hungry men steaming through a Taco Bell drive-through in pursuit of a chalupa, was a little depressing there in the second half. Portland’s defense, other than poor, outnumbered Nic Batum, was horrible.

By the way, all you people out there defending Nate for not starting Batum, what can you say now? So was Nate wrong? By the way, the only problem now is that the kid needs more minutes. Your only good defender needs to play more than 23 minutes on a night when one of the worst shooting teams in basketball is firing at a 49.3 percent clip.

By the way, McMillan said before the game that Batum would be the starter at small forward for the remainder of the season. Not sure why a coach would commit to something like that. There’s no reason. Most coaches would not paint themselves into such a corner.

And watching another center go down wasn’t pleasant, either. Folks, this whole thing about injured centers isn’t just a Portland thing. It’s seemingly harder and harder to keep the big guys healthy. Look around the league. It’s dangerous with all that traffic inside. (That said, this franchise is one historically unlucky place when it comes to centers).

And if your biggest shot of the night is a three-pointer from Andre Miller, you know that things reached desperate levels.

But on the other hand, seeing Brandon Roy out there very close to 100 percent is the best thing that could happen to this team. Without Roy, the playoffs are an impossible dream.

It will be interesting tonight to see what this team has left for a back-to-back.

Tweet This Post

Tags: Andre Miller, Brandon Roy, New Jersey Nets, Nic Batum, Portland Trail Blazers

For me, it all came down Sunday night to that play — and I really shouldn’t call it a “play” because it wasn’t one — where Portland needed a three-point field goal to tie the game in overtime.

The inbounds pass went directly to Brandon Roy, who stood one-on-one against Deron Williams with really no chance of getting off an uncontested three pointer. Yes, he can make threes under duress. He’d even made one to begin the overtime.

But man, if you’re the coach you owe him more than that. Do you realize how difficult it is to get a good three in that situation? Unless your name is Kobe or Lebron, it’s pretty much impossible. Man, there are several things you can do there but the worst is to just inbound directly to Roy.

See, you have only such a small portion of the court to work with when you need a three. And penetration and kicking out to a shooter for a three isn’t going to work — the defense isn’t going to leave someone open.

Run Roy off a pick. And most likely, the Jazz will switch every pick, which would make it even harder to get him open. Put him on the baseline and run him up the lane — at least he can get a defender running at him hard, enabling a ball fake and a possible foul, or at least a more wide-open shot than he got. Better yet, inbound to someone else and let Roy run a little off the ball — if you get a switch from an off-ball screen, at least you probably have a better chance of him getting open against a lesser defender.

My point is, this team continues to use “We need another guy who can get his own shot in the fourth quarter” as a convenient excuse for not coaching. Man, watch the Jazz and see how often they just hand the ball to a player and ask him to beat the defense by himself. It just doesn’t happen.

And watch how easy it is for the good defensive teams — like Boston and Utah in the last two games — to lock in on Portland’s stagnant offense. You’ve got to move the ball and move bodies, which the Blazers so infrequently do, to get good shots.

My goodness, the Jazz had 50 points in the paint. It’s not because they’re handing it to one guy and letting him create his own shot, either. It’s because they pass, cut and move the ball.

Blowing a 25-point lead in the third quarter? It can’t happen unless a lot of things go wrong. Portland made only four of its last 27 shots over the fourth quarter and overtime. The Blazers, including Roy, missed a lot of big free throws.

And Nate McMillan continues to be so stubborn in regard to putting Nic Batum in the starting lineup. What is he waiting for? Batum had 14 points and seven rebounds in the first half. But by the time he made it on the court at the very end of the third quarter, McMillan had managed to cool him off. What kind of crazy stuff is going on here?

It’s already pretty much established that this is a developmental season — the team’s not going to the NBA Finals. So let’s get the kid in the starting lineup, playing with the best players, as much as possible — and get Martell Webster in his likely future role as a sixth man, shooter off the bench.

But at certain times this season I just shake my head. McMillan spent an NBA career as a bench player and he seems so overly concerned with his “second unit.” Man, it seems like a PE class out there some nights as he uses 10 players before the second quarter is over. Is he trying to make sure these guys get their varsity letter?

Seriously, trim that rotation. This season is getting down to the serious games and your team has already lost more home games than any other Western Conference playoff team.

Man, those McMillan-Jerry Sloan matchups are starting to remind me of the McMillan-Rick Adelman matchup we saw in the playoffs last season. And that’s not a pretty sight.

Tweet This Post

Tags: Brandon Roy, Dwight Jaynes, Jerry Sloan, Nate McMillan, Nic Batum, Portland Trail Blazers, Utah Jazz

It’s an interesting dynamic going on with Roy and the Trail Blazers. It seems as if Brandon isn’t really sure about whether he should be playing or not. He’s still in pain. And Nate McMillan has admitted he gave Roy a push to play Tuesday against the Los Angeles Clippers.

It is not very common these days for athletes to be pressured into playing with injuries. It used to be at one time. And that old macho mentality of players used to mean they played frequently when they probably shouldn’t have played.

But nowdays, with the huge investment teams have in their players, they don’t risk such things. But it almost seems to an outsider as if the Blazers believe Roy needs to move past some imagined mental hurdle, or that he needs to just push himself a little harder.

I’m not in a position to know anything about Roy’s medical situation or his mindset. But I do know this, if he goes out there and tears that hamstring, whoever gave the OK for him to play, whoever encouraged him to play, whoever pushed him to play — whether we’re talking about a team doctor, a trainer or a coach —  is in danger of losing his job. At the very least.

Tweet This Post

Tags: Brandon Roy, Dwight Jaynes, Nate McMillan, Portland Trail Blazer

The Trail Blazers just didn’t bring much last night in that 89-77 loss to Oklahoma City — in a game that most of us thought was extremely important.

Look, nobody expects miracles out of these guys with Brandon Roy and the two centers on the sidelines. But what we saw Tuesday night against the Thunder was unacceptable, considering the importance of playing a division and playoff rival.

It was the worst exhibition of trying to feed the post I’ve seen in the NBA in maybe, well, forever. Twenty-four turnovers by a team that doesn’t run? Ridiculous! Over and over in the fourth quarter, players ran from open shots to try to force the ball into others.

The Thunder, statistically and every other way, is so much better defensively than the Trail Blazers that it’s ridiculous. And that’s a little scary given how young that team is.

And really, how often is Portland going to win when it goes 3-for-20 from the three-point line? The team is too dependent on jump shots as it is, but when it totally craps out from deep, there’s simply no way it can win — given the fast-break points are never going to be there to make up for it.

LaMarcus Aldridge had another one of those games where it was difficult to figure him out. He played 43 minutes and finished with 15 points and 15 rebounds. He was swarmed by the Thunder all night, double and triple-teamed. But that said, there were times when he seemed so reluctant to mix it up. He’d take a dribble or two toward the basket, draw a crowd and then kind of just bail out — stepping back out of harm’s way.

He looked contact shy, as if he just didn’t want to challenge anyone in a physical way. At one point, he was booed when he backed the ball out of the post area.

I don’t know, maybe they’re all just tired. I hope that’s it, because a nice rest is near. The alternative is that they’ve just run out of ways to win without Roy. And I guess I could understand that.

But man, that one was ugly.

Tweet This Post

Tags: Brandon Roy, Dwight Jaynes, Oklahoma City Thunder, Portland Trail Blazers

Finally, there is no other choice.

Yet it’s still taking some measure of agony, apparently, to get that starting lineup changed. Martell Webster to shooting guard, Nic Batum sliding in at small forward, right? What other choice is there with Brandon Roy out?

Yet, here we are again, with Coach Nate McMillan doing the same old waltz when it comes to an obvious lineup change. Just do it, man. What’s the delay? What are we waiting for?

This should have been done a couple of weeks ago, but hey — what do you expect. Lineup changes around here come hard. At the start of the season, if Andre Miller had just been put into the starting lineup alongside Brandon Roy — one point guard, not two — the team would have probably picked up three to five more wins by this point of the season.

Instead, we were subjected to all the hand-wringing involving Steve Blake and the problems of the “second unit” and who Brandon Roy could play with best. All of it was silly. The best point guard was Miller — from Day One. But it sure took a long time to get there.

Batum was the starter all last season and his improvement this season is obvious. Man, he’s needed at both ends of the court and he needs to get a lion’s share of his minutes alongside Miller — who will reward all his off-the-ball movement.

Just do it, Coach.

Tweet This Post

Tags: Brandon Roy, Dwight Jaynes, Martell Webster, Nate McMillan, Nic Batum, Portland Trail Blazers, Steve Blake