SB Nation User Blog: hurryup09

IS KP LIKE A TROUT (THE FISH KIND)?

hurryup09 — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 19:26:49 -0000

The way that KP and the other NBA GM's repeatedly passed on DeJuan Blair in the late first and early second round of Thursday's draft reminded me of the feeding habits of certain species of trout. Under some circumstances, these trout will feed on anything edible that floats by. But at other times, they have absolute tunnel vision, zeroing in on a particular bug that's currently hatching--e.g. mayflies--to the exclusion of all other food.

When that happens, a fisherman lacking a mayfly imitation in his tackle box--of the exact matching size & color that the trout are looking for--might as well pack up and head home. He will NOT, under any circumstances, even get a trout to look at anything he drifts past him. The offering could be the trout equivalent of a steak dinner. No matter--if that trout is zeroed in on the trout equivalent of a hot dog with relish & yellow mustard, that's all he'll feed on.

That's what I think NBA GM's--including KP, our fearless leader--are sometimes like. Once they've zeroed in on a Pendegraph, you could offer them the next Michael Jordan and they'd pass.

Now, I realize that KP is the ultimate preparer. He has a plan in place for every continency imaginable. But this time, the unimaginable happened. After DeJuan Blair's negative knee report came out of the pre-draft camp, KP must have considered the possibility that Blair would drop to #22. But like everyone else, he apparently concluded that it was too risky to offer a guaranteed contract to an undersized four with two questionable knees. And it was probably unthinkable to KP that the best offensive rebounder in the draft would drop clear to #31--let alone #33.

So my suspicion (reinforced by Nate's post-draft comments) is that while the Blazers' braintrust certainly had done the usual basic research on Blair that they do on all players in a draft, they never did the kind of painstaking work-up they do on people they're actually targetting. I mean, the Blazers not only talk to these kids' coaches going back to AAU ball--they talk to their teammates, their neighbors, everybody who ever KNEW them. Lacking that kind of in-depth info on Blair, KP would have been loath to pull the trigger on him, even at #33.

Not so Buford over at the Spurs (picking at #37). He must have thought, "To hell with it, I'm going to take a chance. It's only a #37 pick and an unguaranteed contract, so what's to lose? And if the knees etc. pan out, Blair will be an absolute steal."

I wish KP had thought that way. But he's such a preparation guy--that would have gone totally against his grain. I suspect that KP--like his counterparts picking in the late first and early second rounds--just couldn't break with his strict protocol of drafting guys he knows inside out. Bluntly, I suspect that KP was caught with his pants down and let an impact player slip thru his fingers.

Thinking about it, this would explain some other cases of obviously talented players dropping like stones in the draft. Once a guy drops four or five slots, a different dynamic develops that causes him to KEEP falling. Now he's being made available to teams that never had him on their radar. Those team have already got other guys targeted who they've thoroughly researched. How can they pull the trigger on this guy who appears out of the blue? It's much easier to pass and figure the guy probably fell that far for good reason.

I hope I'm wrong about all this. I hope that KP had very good reasons for passing on Blair--even at #33. I hope that our genius GM--unlike those finicky trout passing on tasty morsels--didn't have a blind spot when it came to a certain deliciously beastly power forward.

Will Trout Be the Blazer's Jameer Nelson??

hurryup09 — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 08:24:21 -0000

Tonight, even after Howard missed two free throws with about 11 seconds remaining, the Magic still were up by three and had the upper hand. As long as they didn't allow a three-pointer, they'd be even in the series and the pressure would shift to the Lakers. But on the ensuing play, Jameer Nelson unaccountably played back on Derek Fisher, allowing him to drain a wide-open three-pointer, leading to an overtime victory for the Lakers. With that one boneheaded play, Nelson effectively ended his team's promising championship run. And with that play, Nelson reminded me of why I hope the Blazers trade Trout.

In fairness, Trout isn't the only Blazer player who makes lots of dumb plays. But the others are newbies, whereas Trout is now a six-year veteran. It's simply unrealistic to think his ability to think the game of basketball (see, I didn't mention "basketball IQ") will improve going forward.

Returning to Nelson's disastrous brain fart: this was exactly the type of boneheaded play at a critical time in a playoff series that I've long believed Trout will someday make. I've watched the NBA for a very long time now, and I've noted that the difference between champions and also-rans is hair-thin. We're seeing that once again in this playoff run by the Lakers. They aren't significantly more talented than their opponents. They just make fewer dumb plays at critical moments.

Believe it or not, I love Travis Outlaw. True, I've complained about his lack of toughness & physicality. But I love his sweet, laid back personality, his magic jumpshot, and his ability to leap out of the gym. I realize that he's a glue guy in terms of team chemistry, and that he's won regular season games for the Blazers--quite a few of them in fact. But in the playoffs, every flaw in your team becomes magnified, and championship teams simply don't have players who consistently make dumb plays.

After Nelson's gaffe, Jeff Van Gundy was beside himself. He said the lack of basketball IQ on the part of some NBA players never ceases to amaze him. He asked how you can not be aware of the time & score? He said, "I'd like to know what was going through Nelson's mind on that play."

Please, KP, don't let us hear those words someday about a Blazer player at the critical juncture of a Finals appearance. Let it be the OTHER team that makes the boneheaded plays. Don't give Trout away. But if you can get real value for him, pull the trigger. (And if Trout proves me wrong someday and wins a championship with someone else, I'll take the blame. Because we all know that you base your decisions on BE fanposts.)

Postscript: I didn't expect a lot of agreement on this Fanpost, and I didn't receive it. But now, should my premonition come true someday, I'll have the faint pleasure of writing an "I told you so" Fanpost. Kinda like the Fanpost I wrote after the young Blazers proved to lack the necessary toughness & physicality to pass their first playoff test.

Kevin Pritchard declares, "HURRYUP'09 WAS RIGHT!"

hurryup09 — Wed, 20 May 2009 08:47:02 -0000

OK, that's not exactly what KP said (on The Fan Tuesday afternoon). What he said was that the one thing he took from the Blazers-Rockets playoff series was, "Let's get some toughness and some physicalness in here...We may need to go out into free agency and look at something like that."

Please excuse the "I told you so," but since my earliest comments & posts at BE back in '07, I've been saying EXACTLY that. In fact, I've often specifically cited the Houston Rockets as the type of team who would be able to exploit the Blazers' lack of toughness & physicality during a playoff series--when the intensity always ratchets up and the officials are forced to let a lot of contact go.

What I saw in the Rockets that the Blazers lacked was an abundance of "Maxsaps"--Millsap/ Maxiell type forwards off the bench who bring plenty of toughness and plain old muscle to the playoff fray. During the regular season, you can get away with fielding a trio of beanpole, jumpshooting power forwards like LMA, Trout, & Frye. Even during the playoffs, there's a place for a supremely talented finesse foward like LaMarcus. But you must balance him with some beef, because teams like the Rockets come at you with Maxsaps in waves.

Back when I was saying all this, a few agreed. But a lot more folks didn't see it. They felt that if the Blazers needed any added toughness, the addition of Greg Oden to the roster would fix it. I replied GO and Przy wouldn't be enough: that when the going got rough, those two would be like the little Dutch boy trying to hold back the waters with his finger in the dike. Having a big, tough center isn't enough when the refs swallow their whistles and the opponent has bruising forwards--and available fouls--up the ying yang.

My most controversial suggesting back then was that perhaps the fact that KP had been a point guard caused him to overlook the critical role that physical bigs play on championship teams. After all, the Blazers at that point were fielding four point guards (Jack, Sergio, Green, and Blake), without a Maxsap in sight. (Josh Roberts & Raef LaFrenz? Please!) I suggested this possiblity in a post entitled, "Where's the Beef," and convinced absolutely no one. Our genius GM might have a blind spot? Heresy!!

Well, perhaps KP's point guard background has had nothing whatsoever to do with his failure to field a more physical team up to this point. But judging from yesterday's comments, KP himself has come around to the view that the key missing ingredient on this talent-loaded young Blazer squad is toughness.

Brandon Bass, Big Baby?? I don't know who our Maxsap is going to be, but you can bet that the '09-'10 Blazers will be featuring a back-up forward (or two) who NO ONE is going to shove around. And that will pay big dividends in next season's playoffs.

"LOOK OUT HOUSTON: NOW CANZANO'S YOUR PROBLEM"

hurryup09 — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 00:13:59 -0000

In today's Oregonian, John Canzano wrote an obnoxious column aimed at the Rockets, entitled "Look Out Houston: Now It's Your Problem." Basically, Canzano called the Rockets a bunch of chokers and stated that if they should lose Game 6 in Houston on Thursday, the series is as good as over.

What a crock. First, the Rockets aren't chokers. The reason they haven't gotten out of the first round in years is that they're an injury-prone team of average talent playing in the tough Western Conference. Second, even if the Rockets should lose Game 6, Game 7 is no lock for the Blazers. The Rockets have shown they're quite capable of winning in the Rose Garden.

Most of all, Canzano's column annoyed me because I feel for Yao. Yes, I know he's the 7-6 giant standing in the way of the Blazers' manifest destiny. And yes, Yao couldn't foul out of a game if he took a gun out on the court. Still, as Wilt Chamberlain said, "Nobody loves Goliath." And poor Yao has more pressure on him than anyone can imagine. Greg Oden has had to deal with unreasonable pressure, but Yao has the pressure of living up to the dreams and expectations of BILLIONS OF HIS COUNTRYMEN. If you ever watched the documentary "The Year Of Yao," you have to have some compassion for this poor guy.

Am I rooting for the Rockets to pull out this series? Of course not. But having a classless, bandwagon-hopping attack dog like John Canzano piling on Yao when he's down is enough to make me ill.

Still, it's like President Lyndon Johnson famously said when asked why he didn't fire J. Edgar Hoover: "Better to have him inside the tent pissing out than outside the tent pissing in." At least, for the moment, Canzano is Houston's problem, not Portland's.

That was depressing, but it was just Game 1

hurryup09 — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 06:46:01 -0000

True, that was a bummer. But in some ways a blowout loss is better than a one-point heartbreaker. Realistically, the youngsters had to get initiated into playoff basketball, and now they have been. Contrary to what the ESPN announcers were saying, tonight's result was not a shock. Or at least it shouldn't have been. "The physical, playoff-tested veteran team kicks the youngsters' butts in Game 1." Nothing new about that story.

And here's how the next chapter generally goes. First, the national media all jump off the flavor-of-the-week team's bandwagon. Even locally, many fans bail. But the veteran team relaxes slightly in Game 2, feeling that now, having "taken home court advantage," they're in the drivers' seat. Meanwhile, the youngsters regroup, their coach makes adjustments (e.g., shortening the rotation and fronting Yao), and the team comes out with a focused, determined effort in Game 2. No more "deer in the headlights"; they probably win going away.

After that, though, the story of this series is hard to predict. The Blazers have serious problems matching up with the Rockets, and now they have to win a game in Houston--as well as the rest of their home games. Still, if the Rockets do relax enough to lose Game 2, they may be in trouble. That's because what "home court advantage" in the playoffs is truly about is the right to play a Game 7 at home. Losing an early game at home isn't that big a deal if you're talented enough to win one on the other team's floor, and I think the Blazers are. Conversely, it's almost impossible to win a Game 7 on the road. (Mainly because of home cooking, in my opinion.)

So this idea that the Blazers have now "lost home court advantage" is really a misconception. If the Blazers win Game 2, their whole psychology will change, and they'll likely go into Houston and win one. They won't be playoff newbies anymore; the nerves and shock at the physicality of playoff basketball will have worn off. And they'll still have the huge advantage that home court in a Game 7 brings.

Still, there's those pesky matchup problems. The Blazers couldn't deal with the Rockets' physicality during the regular season. So how are they going to do so in the playoffs, when officials allow more aggressiveness? While I still think the Blazers will defy the new overnight media consensus by making this a series, they probably will need another year of maturation--and the addition of a "Maxsap" or two--before they can make a serious playoff run. No worries; this team (unlike the suddenly over-the-hill Celtics) is built for the long haul.

Spend Those 12 Fouls, Nate!!

hurryup09 — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 19:32:10 -0000

I've never written an anti-Nate fanpost, and I'm not about to start now. McMillan is a very capable coach, and I figure there are reasons for most of the things he does. But I do question one thing: what's the good of having two bonafide NBA centers, with 12 available fouls between them, if you're afraid of using those fouls?

Sunday's loss to the Rockets was no embarrassment: Houston is a tough, talented team with an impressive home record. And it's not like the Blazers got blown out: they were in the game until nearly the end. But the game followed a familiar, disturbing pattern of Blazer losses this season. Namely, one or both Blazer centers gets in early foul trouble, and while they're both on the bench the opponent takes control of the game. At game's end, the good news is that neither center has fouled out. But the bad news is that the Blazers have lost the game.

It's as though Nate were deathly afraid of having both GO & Przy foul out, forcing him to play Frye in the post. So his solution is...to play Frye in the post! It's almost as though, in his gut, Nate fears losing both of his centers to fouls more than he fears losing games. Ridiculous? Well, then consider this: the two centers have yet to both foul out of a game this season, but the Blazers have lost a number of games protecting against that eventuality.

As a child, I was told that a rich aunt of mine had been so emotionally scarred from growing up in the Depression that she hoarded her money and died of malnutrition. (I later learned this was a bit of a family myth, but never mind that.) Nate reminds me of that aunt. Like most NBA coaches, he's seldom had a legit NBA center, so even now that he has TWO of them, he lives in mortal fear of finding himself center-less.

Really, though, Nate's case is worse than that rich aunt's. Because a person who dies without having enjoyed the benefits of their money can at least give it away to their offspring, whereas unused post fouls (and minutes) are simply wasted.

The Blazers possess a rare weapon: two legit centers with energy and fouls to burn. Unless matchups dictate otherwise, it seems to me that one of those guys should be on the floor every single minute of every game. If, once in a blue moon, both of them happen to foul out, at least Nate will have gotten his money's worth. Then and only then should he send in a back-up finesse forward (Frye) to do a center's job.

Poll

Is Nate overly concerned with having GO & Przy foul out?

Yes: Nate has 12 center fouls available and he should spend them.

230 votes

No: Nate's being prudent in making certain he has at least one center available in crunch time.

53 votes

283 votes | Poll has closed

The Mavs' Last Hurrah?

hurryup09 — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 19:00:42 -0000

OK, last night's loss to the Mavs was a bummer. It was pretty tough having to watch Terry's airplane celebration and whatever in the world that thing was that Dirk did with his shorts. But think about it: when was the last time the Mavs were that excited to beat the Blazers? You'd have to go back to the 'sheed/Sabonis heyday at least.

I think that says a lot about the rise of the young Blazers (as well as the decline of the aging Mavs). Our guys are viewed with fear & loathing around the league these days. It isn't just us Blazer fans who believe this is the last season for the foreseeable future that the Blazers won't be a serious threat to win it all.

Even now, the Rose Garden is the third-toughest gym in the league for road teams. Imagine the house of horrors it'll be going forward. For the Mavs to win last night required a perfect storm: practically EVERYTHING had to go right for them and wrong for the Blazers.

So lick your wounds, Blazer fans, and be comforted by the thought that the once-mighty Mavs may have a long wait before they walk out of the Rose Garden with another win. These two franshises are moving in opposite directions--and fast.

Poll

How many times will the Mavs beat the Blazers next season?

once

61 votes

twice

18 votes

thrice

5 votes

zero, zip, nada

44 votes

128 votes | Poll has closed

Does Greg Oden need to "man up?"

hurryup09 — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 22:34:52 -0000

Reasonable people can differ about whether GO has game, or whether he's injury-prone. (For the record, my view is that he obviously has plenty of game, and that the sample size is still far too small to conclude he's injury-prone.) But now I'm seeing a lot of posts and comments to the effect that GO lacks toughness or desire: that he's unwilling to "man up" and play thru an injury. Sorry, but this is NOT something that a reasonable person would say.

Folks making those "manly" statements might have--or should have--noticed that everytime GO has gotten hurt, going back to his college days, he's tried to play through the injury--even to his detriment.

E.g., back in college, GO came back from his wrist injury early and played essentially one-handed for the remainder of the season. Some felt that, as a result, the wrist never did heal properly. During Greg's rookie year in the NBA, he grew impatient with the endless rehab and snuck out (against doctor's orders) and played at 24-Hour Fitness. Then this season, when GO injured his ankle on opening night, he stubbornly played on, dragging his leg up and down the court until it became obvious that he was a liability out there. Same thing recently after Greg chipped his patella in a collision with Cory Maggette. He gimped it around the court until halftime, refusing to listen to what his body was telling him.

Hello! Anyone with eyes can see that this guy is DYING to play, and it clearly kills him when he has to sit out. How anyone could suggest he's dogging it mystifies me. No wonder some athletes feel that fans just see them as pieces of meat.

If Greg Oden ultimately elects to play out his rookie contract and go help another team win championships, Blazer fans will be getting what they deserve. No doubt they'll while away the playoff season every year writing angry fanposts about how the Blazers blew it by letting their franchise center get away. But sports historians will write about how the city of Portland looked the ultimate gift horse--the 5.3% miracle of the '07 draft--squarely in the mouth.

Did tonight's loss have a silver elbow--er, lining?

hurryup09 — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 05:03:30 -0000

Anyone else notice that tonight's Blazers' comeback took off when Roy hit Artest with an "inadvertent" elbow? Anyone think that elbow was actually inadvertent? Could that elbow turn out to be more valuable than tonight's loss was costly?

Sure, that elbow was "inadvertent," as Mike & Mike termed it (or "accidental" as the B-team in the studio pronounced it). Just like Kobe's flailing fists and feet to Bruce Bowen & Raja Bell's anatomy are "inadvertent"--or like Isiah Thomas' famous shot to Karl Malone's face was "inadvertent"--or like Mutumbo's elbows to [pick a victim] were "inadvertent."

When an offensive player is getting popped every time he gets the ball, he has three choices: 1) turn the other cheek; 2) appeal to the officials; and 3) dish out some punishment in return. As you may have observed, the only reponse that ever works--at least on the road--is option #3. The trick is to retaliate in a sufficiently sneaky way that you won't get called for an offensive foul or--worse--get ejected from the game.

Kobe, Isiah, and Mutumbo are/were masters at the technique--call them Black Belts (literally, in Kobe's case). Chris Paul is already a Brown Belt. Judging from Roy's masterfully delivered elbow tonight, he may finally be learning the art. If so, I'd say that tonight's loss may have had a silver lining. Going down the stretch of this season, games are going to be increasingly physical. The Blazers' ability to deal with other team's aggressiveness will be key to their making the playoffs. In particular, their ability to make defenders leery of guarding too closely and physically will be critical.

Now, if the Blazers' skinny young forwards can just figure out how to box out the likes of Scola, Artest, Hayes, and Battier...

Before you slit your wrists, think of the Mighty Celtics

hurryup09 — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 10:37:50 -0000

Yes, that was a horrible road trip. The guys should have gone 0-3. There's something seriously wrong with the team at the moment--probably multiple things. But if you'll recall, the Mighty Celtics recently went thru a stretch when they couldn't beat a YMCA team.

The Blazers have talented players, and they have a good coach. All are capable of recognizing that things aren't working and making adjustments. As hard as tonight's game was to watch (I wanted to scream at times), we Blazer fans need to have a little faith. It's a long season, and even the top teams experience rough spots. Whatever is broken at the present time will probably be fixed before long.

So put away that razor blade; back off that ledge. Focus on other interests for a little while. This too shall pass. The Blazer team we know and love--the one that whips teams like the Thunder--will be back soon.