It's a classic boy-who-cried-wolf scenario.

There is nothing surprising or one-sided about the officiating so far.  Houston's had a strong defensive philosophy of contesting without fouling for years now.  They consider it a blown defensive stand when they give up free throws.  Our guys foul every time they think they're beat.  We consider it a blown defensive stand when we give up a dunk/layup, and since we're not good enough defensively to stay in prevent interior scoring without fouling, we end up fouling a lot.

Have there been some bad calls/non-calls?  Yes, but I've seen plenty of examples on both ends.

But making all this fuss now, when the officiating has been pretty fair according to pretty much any perspective other than total homers, yall lose all credibility when a horror show like the 2000 WCF or the 2002 WCF happens.  When we get royally screwed in the WCF against the Lakers in a couple of years because Bennett Salvatore lets Kobe live on the line but lets BRoy get mugged, yall are going to have zero credibility when yall rant and rave about it, since you're crying wolf this year.

is that this site is an echo chamber of uncritical cheerleaders.  Any criticism of the team, anyone pointing out that this is a good team, not a great team, and isn't ready to sit at the grownups table with the Cavs, Lakers and Celts gets shouted down.  Anyone pointing out the obvious, that Oden folds under pressure and Aldridge is as hard as wet tissue, that Trout will gun you into trouble as much as gun you out of trouble, that Blake is an ideal backup but a very unideal starter, that depth is a nice to have asset for regular season wins but not a recipe for titles, gets shouted down as apostates here.

Maybe now, when we talk about the things we need to do to be competitive for a title, like make some smart trades for vets who've faced adversity and playoff level intensity or to get tougher interior players or point out that Nate does some good things but may not be a championship level talent as a coach, you cheerleader types might try hearing us out instead of automatically dismissing us, eh?

When Nate was a player, he was a very good defender, got on the all-defense second teams a couple of times on the basis of his very quick hands.  He led the league in steals once and was often among the league leaders, very impressive considering that he generally played backup minutes for most of his career.

As a coach, Nate talks a lot about defense.  So what have his results looked like?

Defensive rating (points allowed per 100 possessions)

2000-01 Sonics - ranked 24th of 29 teams

2001-02 Sonics - 17 of 29

2002-03 Sonics - 17 of 29

2003-04 Sonics - 27 of 29

2004-05 Sonics - 27 of 29

2005-06 Blazers - 28 of 30

2006-07 Blazers - 26 of 30

2007-08 Blazers - 17 of 30

2008-09 Blazers - 28 of 30 so far

Not very good, with no teams above average, and many teams in the cellar.

So can we please stop being surprised at what a godawful mess our teams are on defense?  Twice is coincidence, three times is pattern, and nine times is dna, blueprint, determinism, whatever.

The reality is that Nate being a talented defensive player has nothing to do with being able to coach a lick of defense, any more than Isiah was able to coach brilliant ball control, unselfishness, and clutch scoring.

(stats from basketball-reference.com, natch).