Game 41: Portland vs Chicago 6:00pm Chargetv and KUNP

[zzaj]

Hard to be mad at a W that comes from Scoot, Sharpe and Deni...although from a lotto balls perspective it would be even better if they didn't have Ayton and Grant contributing and it was an L.

Hopefully this game puts the nail in the Simons starting coffin. Sadly, it likely won't happen, even if Scoot has outplayed Simons pretty considerably, lately...

[JRoy]

Can’t lose em all.

[DusterBuster]

Not a fan of the win (but also w/e at this point … out of the top 4 worst race, so it’s a lottery ticket in the biggest sense now), but… seeing Scoot getting the start and producing numbers…

Please, for the love of god… just start the rebuild. And to me that means just move Simons. Nothing against him, and he will such an asset to another team, but at this point, he’s subtraction by addition. Hes worth more than I would trade him for (who is old man GMing), but just moving him to open up the spot and getting Ant on a winner is worth more than getting 17 FRPs back. Legit, as long as it’s not a worse contract, just move him. If it’s only a few seconds, w/e. Make the move.

Grant and Ayton at this point are lost causes. Front offices don’t stock-market players like we do here….

They don’t value a player off of the last 10 games. But… the teams that were interested are taking on those deals have opted for cheaper options already and aren’t taking on a 30+mil or 15% of cap option contract. Maybe a desperate team, thinking they are on a cusp and one move away (Cleveland?… Portland with Afflalo)?

[PDXKnight]

Hard to be mad at a W that comes from Scoot, Sharpe and Deni...although from a lotto balls perspective it would be even better if they didn't have Ayton and Grant contributing and it was an L.

Hopefully this game puts the nail in the Simons starting coffin. Sadly, it likely won't happen, even if Scoot has outplayed Simons pretty considerably, lately...

Short of a trade i fear you are right.

As wiz pointed out the hypocrisy is real, benching Sharpe in the absence of simons to boot all because Sharpe "doesn't play defense." And I'll bet my arse simons starts once he returns

[Shem]

Sharpe loses his starting spot tonight because of his defense

meanwhile, by far the worst defender on the team, bar none, Anfernee Simons, has started 174 straight games (when available) for the same coach who is benching Sharpe because of defense.

It's unfortunate issue around the NBA. Young players on rookie contracts are treated differently than players on bloated contracts. Guarantee if this was down the road where Sharpe has graduated from his rookie contract and was resigned for way more money, this doesn't happen. That's the political reality of the NBA.

[PDXKnight]

Not a fan of the win (but also w/e at this point … out of the top 4 worst race, so it’s a lottery ticket in the biggest sense now), but… seeing Scoot getting the start and producing numbers…

Please, for the love of god… just start the rebuild. And to me that means just move Simons. Nothing against him, and he will such an asset to another team, but at this point, he’s subtraction by addition. Hes worth more than I would trade him for (who is old man GMing), but just moving him to open up the spot and getting Ant on a winner is worth more than getting 17 FRPs back. Legit, as long as it’s not a worse contract, just move him. If it’s only a few seconds, w/e. Make the move.

Grant and Ayton at this point are lost causes. Front offices don’t stock-market players like we do here….

They don’t value a player off of the last 10 games. But… the teams that were interested are taking on those deals have opted for cheaper options already and aren’t taking on a 30+mil or 15% of cap option contract. Maybe a desperate team, thinking they are on a cusp and one move away (Cleveland?… Portland with Afflalo)?

Ayton will be tradeable as an expiring at the next deadline as will ant. I do agree just get ant off the team. Maybe there's value maybe there's not, olshey should know what that number is, just get a reasonable deal (not taking worse money back or getting assets for bad contracts) and clean our hands of this

I fear we missed our window on grant, teams are increasingly realizing how little value these big contracts have. May be stuck with him 2 more seasons but I'd imagine he will need to take a back seat to younger players eventually ala reshard Lewis in his later days.

[PDXKnight]

I feel like we will find a way to lose in the closing stretch. The Blazers have always been pretty blatant with their tanking

[zzaj]

Not a fan of the win (but also w/e at this point … out of the top 4 worst race, so it’s a lottery ticket in the biggest sense now), but… seeing Scoot getting the start and producing numbers…

Please, for the love of god… just start the rebuild. And to me that means just move Simons. Nothing against him, and he will such an asset to another team, but at this point, he’s subtraction by addition. Hes worth more than I would trade him for (who is old man GMing), but just moving him to open up the spot and getting Ant on a winner is worth more than getting 17 FRPs back. Legit, as long as it’s not a worse contract, just move him. If it’s only a few seconds, w/e. Make the move.

Grant and Ayton at this point are lost causes. Front offices don’t stock-market players like we do here….

They don’t value a player off of the last 10 games. But… the teams that were interested are taking on those deals have opted for cheaper options already and aren’t taking on a 30+mil or 15% of cap option contract. Maybe a desperate team, thinking they are on a cusp and one move away (Cleveland?… Portland with Afflalo)?

Duster, Blazers are only like 4-5 games out from a Top 2 pick…it’ll be a race to the bottom for quite a few teams, and Ws like tonight don’t help that cause…but there’s still a lot of season left to lose.

[Wizenheimer]

Continue to like what I am seeing from Scoot, is it possible he has "really" turned the corner? Sharp was benched for bad D effort which is fine, but how can you justify starting one of the worst defenders in the league - ANT?

for a lot of young players, progression can be sporadic. Sometimes, 2 steps forward, 2 steps back. What you want to see is is 2 steps forward, 1 step back. Kind of like climbing stairs with occasional landings and the steps back end up on a little higher plateau than before. We may be seeing that with Scoot. His last-4-games and January passing numbers are probably sustainable; maybe likely sustainable.

But in the last 4 games, he's shooting 57% on FG's and 53% on threes. In the 10 games of January it's 50% on FG's and 44% on three's. I'm pretty skeptical those numbers are sustainable. Scoot isn't Steve Nash. Just have to hope when/if the regression happens he ends up on that higher plateau

[zzaj]

Continue to like what I am seeing from Scoot, is it possible he has "really" turned the corner? Sharp was benched for bad D effort which is fine, but how can you justify starting one of the worst defenders in the league - ANT?

for a lot of young players, progression can be sporadic. Sometimes, 2 steps forward, 2 steps back. What you want to see is is 2 steps forward, 1 step back. Kind of like climbing stairs with occasional landings and the steps back end up on a little higher plateau than before. We may be seeing that with Scoot. His last-4-games and January passing numbers are probably sustainable; maybe likely sustainable.

But in the last 4 games, he's shooting 57% on FG's and 53% on threes. In the 10 games of January it's 50% on FG's and 44% on three's. I'm pretty skeptical those numbers are sustainable. Scoot isn't Steve Nash. Just have to hope when/if the regression happens he ends up on that higher plateau

Agreed that he won't maintain these shooting averages, although his shot selection has looked a bit better for a while now.

I did a comparison to comparison to Kemba in the "done with Scoot" thread, as a high-end outcome for Scoot. Scoot came into the league 2 years younger than Kemba...and of course Kemba's 3 years at UCONN are a little different than the value of Scoot's Gleague experience, lol.

Will Scoot end up the 24.5/4.5/6 player that Kemba was in his best season? I find that highly unlikely. But I could blur my eyes and see him in the 15/4/6 range...

[Walton1one]

Sharpe loses his starting spot tonight because of his defense

meanwhile, by far the worst defender on the team, bar none, Anfernee Simons, has started 174 straight games (when available) for the same coach who is benching Sharpe because of defense.

Yeah this was ridiculous, not b\c Sharpe didn't deserve a wake up call, but b\c the hypocrisy of benching him for defense, but not Simons who is once again among the league's worst

BTW, Sharpe's DRTG is 120.7 (Stat Muse), which is 6th worst in the NBA, Simons (who is 5 years older) sits at 121.6, good for 3rd. So, yeah POR backcourt is a sieve on defense. I give Sharpe a little benefit of the doubt b\c of his age, Simons though? No excuse.

His MTD% (via 3steps) is 19% - Meaning he is worse than 81% of players

Mixed team defense ranks Shaedon Sharpe based on how much he prevents the opponents from scoring as a team as well as stopping them on the individual defense.
STL: 0.8, BLK: 0.3, DREB: 3.2, Team defensive efficiency: 120.2

Simons is @ 15% - 119.1 (3 steps) - Sharpe shows 120.2 DRTG on 3steps
Scoot is @ 19% -118.8 DRTG

[Walton1one]

Missed the game, watched part of the replay, but that didn't start until after 11pm, so watched about 3Q, then gave up. Notes below

1Q
Scoot’s defensive intensity has really picked up these last few games

Looks like Ayton decided to play with effort tonight

Sharpe coming off the bench, first two shots 3pt, both misses

Murray’s aggressive drives are good to see, and he’s finishing, a quick 7pts to start out

Scoot with a slow start, knowing what he ends up with, interesting

Grant looks rough out there

2Q
lol, Avdija rotates a pass out to the perimeter but there is no one there. He’s looking around at his teamates with his hands raised up

Buzelis has blocked Banton twice now 6’10 on 6’9, then next possession Deni drives into the lane and just manhandles him.

I like Buzelis, but he has got to fill out, has good springs, though, and good effort. Needs to keep working on his shot

Where in the heck was that pass going from Sharpe? That pass was like into the 20th row

Scoot with a nice board and then the pass to Ayton for an easy score

Scoot back to back 3’s, and now Grant joins the party, hits a 3.

Buzelis’ springs and anticipation on defense is impressive, unfortunately, that is about the limit of things that are impressive for him right now

Trade thought of the night, would you trade Ayton\Thybulle (both 2yrs) straight up for Lavine (3yrs)? Not to say that I would, but I could see Cronin do it b\c he apparently values acquiring players over picks & prefers retooling over rebuilding. Looking at CHI/POR rosters, they have a lot of big contracts that are close in $$$

Scoot with a better half than I thought while watching

3Q
Avdija keeps the possession alive twice, leads to Grant 3

Josh Giddey, woof, the passing is nice, but the rest? Not good at all.

Nice floater by Scoot

Grant showing that he can in fact score that’s good to see, for a trade value, we hope

Ayton, rim check, rebound, then misses easy put back

Deni 5pt run, just extremely active on both sides of the floor

Deni bulldozed Buzelis again, easy score, then nice past for an easy score

[Norm2953]

How did Buzelis look?

[Walton1one]

I thought Buzelis looked ok, definitely needs to bulk up\get stronger, looks very light out there. He had several moments where Deni just drove down the lane and bulldozed him out of the way, now Deni does that to a lot of players however, Buzelis got obliterated, he seemed very easy for POR players to move through on the defensive end.

What surprised me was his length\athleticism on defense, he had two nice blocks on Banton, who is a lengthy guy and usually just drives\shoots over his defenders, Buzelis blocked him twice.

Offensively is where he needs the work, he was pretty passive offensively. he had one play where he drove into the paint, was wide open for a 6\8ft shot and then just passed it right back out, just wanted no part of taking the easy shot.

Curious to see what he is like in a few years, wonder if he will take a leap like Gradey Dick did this year, I suspect it will be more like 3 years or so before he starts to come into his own. I liked him, of course I liked him in the draft as well.

[Wizenheimer]

Not a fan of the win (but also w/e at this point … out of the top 4 worst race, so it’s a lottery ticket in the biggest sense now), but… seeing Scoot getting the start and producing numbers…

Please, for the love of god… just start the rebuild. And to me that means just move Simons. Nothing against him, and he will such an asset to another team, but at this point, he’s subtraction by addition. Hes worth more than I would trade him for (who is old man GMing), but just moving him to open up the spot and getting Ant on a winner is worth more than getting 17 FRPs back. Legit, as long as it’s not a worse contract, just move him. If it’s only a few seconds, w/e. Make the move.

Grant and Ayton at this point are lost causes. Front offices don’t stock-market players like we do here….

They don’t value a player off of the last 10 games. But… the teams that were interested are taking on those deals have opted for cheaper options already and aren’t taking on a 30+mil or 15% of cap option contract. Maybe a desperate team, thinking they are on a cusp and one move away (Cleveland?… Portland with Afflalo)?

Duster, Blazers are only like 4-5 games out from a Top 2 pick…it’ll be a race to the bottom for quite a few teams, and Ws like tonight don’t help that cause…but there’s still a lot of season left to lose.

they are also only 4-5 wins from the 11th seed in the lottery. They are on thin ice if the lottery is your focus

[DusterBuster]

Not a fan of the win (but also w/e at this point … out of the top 4 worst race, so it’s a lottery ticket in the biggest sense now), but… seeing Scoot getting the start and producing numbers…

Please, for the love of god… just start the rebuild. And to me that means just move Simons. Nothing against him, and he will such an asset to another team, but at this point, he’s subtraction by addition. Hes worth more than I would trade him for (who is old man GMing), but just moving him to open up the spot and getting Ant on a winner is worth more than getting 17 FRPs back. Legit, as long as it’s not a worse contract, just move him. If it’s only a few seconds, w/e. Make the move.

Grant and Ayton at this point are lost causes. Front offices don’t stock-market players like we do here….

They don’t value a player off of the last 10 games. But… the teams that were interested are taking on those deals have opted for cheaper options already and aren’t taking on a 30+mil or 15% of cap option contract. Maybe a desperate team, thinking they are on a cusp and one move away (Cleveland?… Portland with Afflalo)?

Duster, Blazers are only like 4-5 games out from a Top 2 pick…it’ll be a race to the bottom for quite a few teams, and Ws like tonight don’t help that cause…but there’s still a lot of season left to lose.

they are also only 4-5 wins from the 11th seed in the lottery. They are on thin ice if the lottery is your focus

On top of all that, dropping in the lottery seeds is a lot easier than moving up. Those 4-5 games from the Top 2 pick requires wins by teams in the upper spots who’ve spent the entire season losing.

[monopoman]

Hard to be mad at a W that comes from Scoot, Sharpe and Deni...although from a lotto balls perspective it would be even better if they didn't have Ayton and Grant contributing and it was an L.

Hopefully this game puts the nail in the Simons starting coffin. Sadly, it likely won't happen, even if Scoot has outplayed Simons pretty considerably, lately...

This team is vastly superior with Deni on the court and it's very easy to tell, he is a game changer that allows the team to have a more competitive dynamic.

[Wizenheimer]

Hard to be mad at a W that comes from Scoot, Sharpe and Deni...although from a lotto balls perspective it would be even better if they didn't have Ayton and Grant contributing and it was an L.

Hopefully this game puts the nail in the Simons starting coffin. Sadly, it likely won't happen, even if Scoot has outplayed Simons pretty considerably, lately...

This team is vastly superior with Deni on the court and it's very easy to tell, he is a game changer that allows the team to have a more competitive dynamic.

I'm not sure they are "vastly" better, but they are better

going by on/off for team/opponent offensive rating:

Banton +12.0
Clingan +5.9
Avdija +3.5
Murray +3.2
Walker +3.1
Scoot +1.0
Sharpe -0.3
Timelord -0.9
Camara -1.1
Simons -4.0
Ayton -4.4
Grant -5.1

how about those 3 vets that most everybody wants traded!

I suspect Banton is mostly an outlier due to limited minutes and garbage time. Clingan and Deni match the eyeball test. Murray and Walker have too limited minutes to conclude anything. And Camara is almost certainly the one player who has spent the most time on the floor with those 3 vets (who are being paid 90M), explaining his negative on/off. And I suspect that Avdija, who has only started half of the games, gets a positive bump from NOT spending as much time on the floor with those 3 as Camara does

https://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/POR/2025/on-off/

Timelord, Banton, and Avdija are the only 3 Blazers with a positive BPM

I am still skeptical that Avdija and Camara can be the starting forwards/wings on a contender. But it would b an acceptable experiment until the Blazers can land a high level 2-way wing

[monopoman]

Deni is out there typically when the game is on the line, for sure he also sees a good deal of minutes when healthy. So his +/- most accurately represents real life, the Blazer stat guy also said Deni had the best +/- overall of any of the guys seeing major minutes.

Wins also say a lot when Deni is healthy and playing I'm pretty sure the Blazers are winning more games.