I posted this over at SS&R. But it was deleted for being inflammatory. [I thought I presented some factual content and complimented the Lakers as a usually excellent defensive team, Oh Well]. I do not want to represent BE badly on other forums and am going  to desist from further posts. If any of you think there is reasonable content here and want to give it a shot, feel free. At any rate, I'm posting back in BEdger land, with the preface that it was originally written towards Laker fans. 

I am a Blazer fan and am not trolling. I came over to SS&R after the game to get your perspective. I was surprised to see so much discussion on the FT disparity and conducted quick analysis. I post this material to get your feedback.

Disparity in FTs vs Disparity in Fouls called.

• Q1: POR 3 fouls, LAL 2 fouls; Brandon Roy leaves game with 5 minutes left in quarter after being called for two fouls, and yet POR ends quarter up 30-24. Blame the refs?
• Q2: LAL bench racks up 5 quick fouls in first 4 minutes of quarter. After which LAL only gets called for 4 more fouls in quarter. Total fouls LAL:9, POR 4; Score at end of quarter 55-43. Blame the refs because the LAL bench picked up quick fouls?
• Q3: POR 3 fouls, LAL 2 fouls; Score at end of quarter 81-71. Blame the refs?
• Q4: Score with 06:29 left in 4th quarter, POR 94, LAL 74. Fouls called in quarter at this point; Odom+LAL bench:4, POR:2; Blame the refs for the lead ballooning to 20 points?

Final count
 - LAL: 22 fouls (24 less 2 deliberate fouls in last minute)
 - POR: 15 fouls
The disparity in trips to the line, do not match up to disparity in number of fouls called. Maybe its more about getting fouls called in bunches and being in the penalty too soon. Discounting the 2 deliberate fouls in the last minute, the starters only got called for 11 fouls. The LAL bench on the other hand, played just 45 minutes and got called for 11 fouls (ie a foul every 4.1 minutes of PT).

Maybe the LAL bench is a little too foul prone. Maybe even that the LAL bench are taught to play like bruisers. Brown and Mbenga picked up 9 of the 24 fouls themselves. After all, Blazer fans recall the painful throw down that Trevor Ariza put on Rudy Fernandez last year after the game was well out of reach. BTW, Rudy has suffered from a back injury ever since and recently underwent back surgery as a direct outcome of that throw-down.

I do think that the Blazers played some inspired defense last night. Repeatedly, the defense got to spots a step ahead of the offense. The Lakers have been known to play similar excellent defense, and invariably the FT disparity in those games are tilted in their favor. For fans of a team that usually plays great defense and has been the beneficiary of FT disparity, you've got to give the Blazers credit when they do get it right. [And you've got to acknowledge that the Lakers have not been playing inspired defense for several games now].

Martell played the best defensive game ever. The team did a great job of double teaming in the post (or showing double teams) especially on Bynum and quite often on Kobe. Usually when Brandon (and, yes Brandon is a superstar) gets well defended it results in very few shot attempts because Brandon's nature is to give the ball up. You dont see Brandon tossing up 37 attempts. Even last year, he scored 52 on 14/27 shooting. Kobe on the other hand, often manufactures some fantastic shots, and he is therefore more prone to forcing shots. Kobe shot 38% and the rest of the Lakers shot 47%. Maybe he should have given the ball up more often.

A final telling stat, the Blazers were called for two offensive fouls. Not a single offensive fouls was called against the Lakers. Were the Lakers not trying hard enough on offense? 

On the Blake vs Miller debate. A prevailing sentiment is that Nate is withholding the obvious for perverse reasons. Hey, what if he's just as frustrated as us? What if he too, has a  vision for a promised land, but is finding it hard to get us there? Or maybe he's just more practical and knows where he wants to go, and is being deliberate in getting us there.

• PRE-SEASON STARTS: Lousy pre-season. Brandon is coasting. LMA distracted by contract issues. Batum and Rudy are resting. Cant seriously practice with the RAMBO unit. Young team thinks we can could flip a switch and be back to "a 54 win team".
• PRE-SEASON MIDDLE: Play RAMBO starting unit. Its a disaster. The high expectations dont automatically fall in place. Second unit is totally stuck. What a mess. How to straighten out a mess? Go back to what you know works. Joel and Greg were pretty much interchangeable, so its not a big switch to start Greg. At least get the team back to last seasons model.
• SEASON START: Aaaaand Batum goes down. Fine, lets put Martell in. But Martell is real rusty. Our defense has gaping holes. Our bigs (all three Greg, Joel, and LMA) are getting in foul trouble.
• GAME 6: Lets try three guard. Phew. Little better. Might not be ideal, but let out a deep breadth, its working for now. Lets get back to business of the promised land.
• GAME 11: Aaaaaand Travis goes down. Now our tried and true "starting line-up for the fourth quarter" is disrupted. GoshDangIt!  That was one staple we could rely on.  How are we supposed to develop any continuity? Lets stick with three guard. We're starting well, building strong leads with our first unit, but our second unit is stagnant, we're having fourth quarter issues, and an undermanned GSW team tears us apart. Coises, foiled again. [Nate's hair isn't even long enough to pull out in handfuls.]
• GAME 15: Put Martell back in as starting SF, he's shaken off some rust. We still need lot of three guard because we dont have a backup SF. Travis used to be our backup PF and we would play small ball. Juwan cab be a replacement for some matchups, but he is too slow for faster teams. Can the rookie Dante step up? Hey, look Dante's worked for a couple of games. Will he still have it, once opposing teams have scouted out his primary moves? [Nate's fingers probably hurt from keeping them crossed aaaallll the time]. And look we actually get to squeeze in some time for Roy and Andre to play together, even if its only with Roy as SF. 

When do we get to do what we really want to do?

Designs look great on paper. But players are not plug-and-play parts. They are not automatons that are casually switched around and everything falls in place. Change takes time.

Early last year, it was a similar story. Nate's plays were predictable. The fanbase was imploring Nate to grow some imagination. It was about this time last year, that I made the appeal to BlazersEdge to give Nate time, that he was a young coach and learning in a lot of ways; that the team was young and they too were learning sets for the first time, given that they did not have the luxury of having learnt them with other teams; that there is very little time in between games to groove new plays.

When the season ended last year, we were top in offensive efficiency, we were blowing out top teams. We might still have been predictable, but it was winning predictability. Even the Lakers could not overcome the predictability. Very few had realistically put us down for 54 wins. Give Nate credit for having a vision of what he wanted to accomplish and making it happen. [It might not be our vision, we were last in fast breaks, etc etc, but it was a winning vision].

Still last year, we did not matchup well against some teams -- GSW, PHI, DAL, HOU. And we got caught like deer in the headlights in our first playoff experience. We needed to improve to advance to the next level. Our mantra was defense. Dont look now, but aren't we Top in Defensive Efficiency, Top in Opp FG%, Top in Def Rebounding. True the competition hasn't been the best. But, once again give Nate credit for having a vision and driving to it. You can bet that Nate knows that last years team was good, but not good enough.

Nate has a vision for the promised land, and it is not the same starting five as last year. But it will take many small steps to get to the desired end result. Change takes time. Give Nate time. And while Nate is young as a coach, and does not have a resume ala Phil, Pop, or even Adelman. Give Nate credit for what he has accomplished. And give Nate time to show you what he will do for you next.

[Tried this as a fan-shot, and lost all my paragraph markers. Posting as a fanpost -- hope its not too unqualified] Sharing a few random thoughts from attending the 2nd preseason game in Sacramento.  

At the moment, the Kings are more like a D League team, whole new coaching staff, plenty of new players, they've got a long, long way to go. Still they're playing with hustle and energy, so it was certainly fun to be there. They were no match for the Blazers. We rested Joel, Rudy, Nic, and Travis (two of last years starters and two of last years leading bench scorers) and still absolutely toyed with them. For some stretches, I think Nate was just buying time with 2nd quarter line-ups of something like Bayless, Miller, Cunningham, Collins and Howard. Merely treading water and burning up some clock. Sure that Kings will get better, much, much better; but right now this was almost summer league.  

Greg was a beast. He had 8 points in the first 8 minutes. [Kings scoreboard does not show individ ual rebounds, so didn't know how many he had corralled by then]. Early in the game there was a short oh-oh, where on three consecutive plays, he was called for travelling, defensive foul and then offensive foul; but Nate let him play and he was just great. Talk of conditioning and agility, this was second of back-to-back and he was running up and down the floor right till the end of the game with no signs of fatigue or slow-down. He looks good. 

LMA was disappointing. He was playing against the same undersized Kings as Greg was. Why couldn't LMA beast as well? LMAs outside shots are always smooth, and he is a player. But, his rebounding was off as usual. And there were many, many times when he had the ball around 6 feet from the rim, and couldn't make something of it -- invariably passing out. It seems like you've got to get him angry before he plays with authority. If LMA wants to make some noise for AllStar consideration, he will need to bring that fire every day. Wonder if any part of this message enters into the contract discussions... 

Niftiest pass that I saw was to Andre from Juwan. Almost Sabas like big man passing. And he tossed up couple of good lob entry passes to Greg, where both bigs start around the key, and Greg gets to the rim. GO was fouled at the rim on both occasions. 

Seems like a lot of doom and gloom. Seems like we see the Andre Miller signing as "the best we could do".  
How about shifting our mindset?

1. Trust Management

Andre was brought in at $7M and Steve Blake was brought in at $4M. Surely the Blazers are expecting value for their money, and that Andre ought to be far better than Steve Blake. I’m suggesting that management might know more than us, and would not throw $7M without some expectations. They have been too deliberate, too careful with their assessments. They have shown that they will try to improve the team, but they have shown that standing pat is a very viable option for the brain trust -- remember last trading deadline. So if they gave up their cap-space to bring in Andre, you better beleive that this was no "best we could do" move.

2. We upgraded a 54 win team.

We have *two* additions to last years 54 win team. 

Andre+Steve > Steve+Sergio. 
Batum+Martell > Batum+Outlaw

Yes, Martell's recovery is still TBD. But to the extent that he fully heals, he is the equivalent of a "free agent" pickup. Outlaw plays better at PF than as SF. So even though their stats may be similar, we are stronger at SF with Martell instead of Outlaw

3. Who did the L@kers fear most last year?

The Blazers of course. They were scared. Phil Jackson started his mind games before the playoffs even began -- remember how his leg hurt him too much to fly up to Portland. Yeah right, just that one game. If we actually won a playoff series and beat Houston, we were a huge threat -- we would have had nothing to lose, and yet would have had the self belief of being able to win in the playoffs. 

Artest for Ariza appears about even. But against the Blazers, it's deadly. In Artest, the L@kers now have a Brandon stopper, without Kobe working on defense. Brandon took it to Kobe last year, in the last 4th quarter that they played up here in Portland.

Andre gave the Lakers fits. Our upgrades tip the scales back in our favor.

4. Remember Hedo

No, not that he turned us down. But remember we were wondering "what is management thinking of with this move". The Blazers need a PG, and a backup PF, why increase the logjam at SF. Eventually we came around to the idea. The in your face shake up forced us to re-examine our viewpoint and we bought off that a big shift would take place in team dynamics, and playing style. 

Bringing in Andre does not force an in-your-face re-examination of our viewpoint. Wake up. Bringing in Andre is not as subtle and insignificant as we are perceiving it. You might underpay your starting unit because they are still on rookie scale. But you do not pay $7M/yr to a veteran to be backup to $4M/yr veteran. We need to reexamine our viewpoints and explore how the team will change with Andre as point guard for around 30 minutes, and getting major burn with the starting unit.

Steve Blake is in the final year of his contract. What is the scenario under which the Blazers re-sign him next year? If Blake is re-signed, its because Andre was a bust and was shipped out, or because Bayless showed that he could not even be backup PG in his 3rd year. If instead Bayless shows he can handle the team, would it not be likely that he becomes backup PG around Feb trading deadline and we trade Blake's valuable expiring contract? Then next year Bayless is firmly esconced as backup PG, and gets to show whether he can take over from Andre. [Team option for Year3 becomes a thing of beauty in this scenario -- giving Bayless one more year before he takes the team over].

5. Our PG defense *has* upgraded

Half our PG defensive weaknesses are against *stronger* not faster PGs. 

In last years playoffs 6 teams had stronger/bigger PGs: L@kers/Fisher, Nuggets/Billups, Mavs/Kidd, Jazz/DWill, Hawks/Bibby, Pistons/Stuckey. [Miami/Wade+Cook would make 7th team and Sixers/Andre would have made 8th team] vs 5 teams with faster PGs: Spurs/Parker, Rockets/Brooks, Hornets/CP3, Bulls/Rose, Celtics/Rondo. Considering Cavs/MoWill, and Magic/Alston as on par -- doesn't take away from point anyway.

Bigger PGs post up Steve Blake and create as much propensity for foul trouble for our bigs. Andre is not going to get posted up as easily. We have upgraded our PG defense against half the playoff teams. In addition, its nice to be on the plus side, and have a PG that can do some posting himself. Making Brooks and others works on defense is also a way of containing their impact. 

6. Expect more from Andre & Nate

Cmon, the Blazers have got to stop being a jump shooting team. Just dont see this changing with Blake as our floor general. Our bigs have got to be the focal point of our offense. They need to be getting their shots from closer to the rim, and Brandon creates magic, when the initial options dont work. We cannot continue having Brandon as our primary option all game long and have the team stall when he is double teamed.

Brandon Roy is great. But he is also the reason we play more pick-and-pop than pick-and-roll. By no way is this a knock on Brandon. Brandon is fantastic at creating shots for himself and for others on the team. However, with Brandon’s creativity, he gets to the rim, and other’s get the ball when they are well set and shoot from outside. He is our 4th quarter guy, or when the game needs that superstar boost. But at other times, we need our bigs at the rim.

So our PG should marshall the bigs and get them firing at point blank range. Passing off the dribble, alley-oops, slash and dish, whatever, we've got an awesome front line, lets get the opponents into foul trouble. We feared opposing PGs, now let them fear ours.

We complained all last year that the Blazers didn't run the fast break, that our offense was simple and predictable. Nate now has a PG that can run the break (and trust at other times). He has a veteran floor general that can run a team. If they dont deliver, this would have been a bust. But now that Andre is here, expect more. Get excited about it!

7. A parting comparison

Superstar: Larry Bird   -- Brandon Roy
Elite Fwd: Kevin McHale -- LMA
Elite Center: Robert Parrish -- Oden
Sharpshooter: Danny Ainge -- Martell
PG (lousy 3P%): Dennis Johnson -- Andre Miller

That Celtics starting unit won the title in 1986 with Bill Walton as 6th man. In 1984, this team also won the title with Ainge as 6th man and Henderson as sharpshooter. These were slow, half-court oriented teams that beat Magic's Lakers, and Houston's Twin Towers. We're not there yet, but we have the talent; and we have youth and athleticism. Maybe in Andre's 3rd year...

This was a 54 win team last year. We have upgraded it significantly. Lets give the team time to gel. Lets get excited!

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