Blazers vs Nuggets game thread.

[Goldbum]

James Jones being out = season spiralling out of controll.

[DaVoiceMaster]

31 baskets out of 38 made shots. WOW!!! That is pretty amazing. 3 players with 8 or more assist. WOW!!!

11 turnovers by 2 players. WOW!!!

Didn't get to see the games so just looking at the box score. Turnovers by 2 players were a problem (the rest of the team appears to have taken pretty good care of the ball). Missed free throws could have won the game or made it not so close down the stretch. Too many offensive rebounds for both teams really. Poor offensive game by Aldridge. Jones out injured.

So many little problems, but they darn near pulled it off and probably should have pulled it off. Keep the chin up! The boys are comin along just fine. So long as they learn from these games, they'll be pretty darn fun to watch next year.

[Tim Lehrbach]

This one hurt.

[PhilipNelsonFan]

F**k the Nuggets.

[waverider]

Jack is a great guard, but he has to learn how to play within himself and not let his overemotional tendencies dictate what he does in crunch situations. He needs to have more control over himself like Brandon Roy.

LMAO! You have to be kidding! Jack is NOT a "great guard", no how NO way. He is an average backup NBA combo guard. Plese, lets try to be realistic!

[Billy]

Jarrett Jack cost the Blazers the victory tonight. No debating that. But without Jarrett Jack doing a lot of what he did tonight Portland wouldn't have been in it to begin with.

This loss should have been a blowout.

The starters were atrocious in that first quarter, and only Roy and Martell really shook that off. Aldridge misfired all night and nothing could really come easy for him. That's too bad, I hope he bounces back. You can't play that bad as a PF and not have a single FT to your name though. Aldridge has to work on that.

If Travis sinks those two gifts at the end of the game, again we aren't even having this discussion. Now I don't want to beat up on Travis either, as he's clutch all the time and it took a lot of guts to miss the first and still make the second. But if that first free throw goes down as well, Portland doesn't even have to worry about Jack's bone head move.

Martell's 1-3 trip after a foul on a 3 really hurts too. To me Martell gets into Juan Dixon/Steve Blake syndrome from time to time. He can be an excellent shooter percentage wise overall, but his misses come at the most inopportune (not always necessarily late game or OT) times. To his credit without his scoring in the 3rd quarter Portland would never have sniffed a win to begin with. We need to run more screens for this guy.

Jarrett Jack is a frustrating individual to watch this year. You love him when he's on, you hate him when he's off. I'm teetering back and forth between starting to really dislike seeing this guy come off the bench and still being glad that there is that scoring punch we can fall back on.

But I don't see anyway you can blame this on a single person. The Blazers as a whole stunk it up.

[Wizenheimer]

Jarrett Jack cost the Blazers the victory tonight. No debating that. But without Jarrett Jack doing a lot of what he did tonight Portland wouldn't have been in it to begin with.

This loss should have been a blowout.

The starters were atrocious in that first quarter, and only Roy and Martell really shook that off. Aldridge misfired all night and nothing could really come easy for him. That's too bad, I hope he bounces back. You can't play that bad as a PF and not have a single FT to your name though. Aldridge has to work on that.

If Travis sinks those two gifts at the end of the game, again we aren't even having this discussion. Now I don't want to beat up on Travis either, as he's clutch all the time and it took a lot of guts to miss the first and still make the second. But if that first free throw goes down as well, Portland doesn't even have to worry about Jack's bone head move.

Martell's 1-3 trip after a foul on a 3 really hurts too. To me Martell gets into Juan Dixon/Steve Blake syndrome from time to time. He can be an excellent shooter percentage wise overall, but his misses come at the most inopportune (not always necessarily late game or OT) times. To his credit without his scoring in the 3rd quarter Portland would never have sniffed a win to begin with. We need to run more screens for this guy.

Jarrett Jack is a frustrating individual to watch this year. You love him when he's on, you hate him when he's off. I'm teetering back and forth between starting to really dislike seeing this guy come off the bench and still being glad that there is that scoring punch we can fall back on.

But I don't see anyway you can blame this on a single person. The Blazers as a whole stunk it up.

I defended jack this summer at times and will occasionally register an objection to the tsunamis of hate directed at him, but it's difficult to defend 7 turnovers. To be fair, the non-called force out off the long rebound was a neutral turnover.

But it's also true that without jack portland would have almost certainly lost in regulation.

And the blazers had a passel of dumb plays and bad stretches. One more point for portland or 1 less point for Denver and portland wins the game without going into overtime.

Channing didn't have to throw that halfcourt pass at the end of the 3rd quarter. Nate didn't have to go to zone...again...in the last 4 minutes of the 3rd that resulted in portland giving up about 5 consecutive baskets in the paint off of baseline drives...the weakness of that zone. Travis didn't have to drive into bad positions 3 times in the 4th and overtime. LMA didn't have to stand flat-footed and watch Denver grab 4 offesnive rebounds within 6 feet of where he was standing.

And Portland didn't have to settle for jumper after jumper when Camby was not playing, resulting in a 60-20 points in the paint advantage for a smaller denver team. 60-20....geeezzuzz

But then KP didn't have to put together the 3rd youngest team in NBA history that has to learn all these things the hard way. I'm glad he did though, and I think they are smart enough to learn from this. It will just take time to apply what they've learned.

[Charlie78]

I think saying our playoff chances are out the window is a bit harsh. We have plenty of easy games coming up and during this slump we have still managed to go 5-7 despite a seven game road trip. I really feel this team can still make the playoffs but they have to get back to playing the way we did during our winning streak. I think this game despite the loss was a big step in that direction. We didnt win but we seemed to have our offensive flow back in the second half. If we can just build on that we should be okay. The problem is that our four game road trip before the break is brutal. I would not be surpirsed if we lost them all and i dont know if our team can handle that mentally. I think going .500 on this next trip is absolutely key to our playoff chances. I look to the houston and indiana games as really must wins .

[southnc]

+/- for Guards in Denver Game:
+9 Blake
+6 Roy
-6 Jack
-10 Sergio

[sabi]

-= original quote snipped =-



LMAO! You have to be kidding! Jack is NOT a "great guard", no how NO way. He is an average backup NBA combo guard. Plese, lets try to be realistic!

well I was trying to refer to him doing some great things sometimes. You know like getting 17/9/9 is great. Didn't want to say he was great, probably didn't notice it when I wrote it. Anyways my only freaking point is that he gets too damn excited when he gets the ball and that's why he makes to many mistakes. He tries to play an up tempo pace when we could probably play better at the pace of Brandon.

[Mr Odd]

Jacks game is pretty good when he doesnt
have to make decisions with the ball.. .

Its not that hes a dumb player, not at all.
Its just he forces things to much.. .

Blake no doubt should of been playing
at the end of this game & infact blake
should be playing at the end of all
games. Blake does not force things
and he will give the ball up to players
that he knows should be having the
ball. Blakes a better shooter aswell.

I think Jack has some good talent.. .
and has a lot of upside, its just I dont
see him working out with this team on
the court wise. I think if you put him on
the right team he'll be pretty damn good.

Jack has shown signs of being really good
but it seems he always makes a bonehead
play to cancel it all out.. .

[Napoleon7]

Jack was the catalyst that got this team going and back into this game.
Jack was also the culprit that lost this game with turnovers, especially at the end.
But everyone doesn't this represent Jack to a "T".
You take the good with the bad.

This one hurt...

I still wish Jack would of backed the ball out on that last possession and let the Blazers set up to go for the last shot.

[swede]

Man, everytime I hear these discussions about Jarret all I can think about is that Billups bounced around forever and I like Jack at his stage more then Billups at his 3rd year. Not like I remember paying attention to Chauncy at the time but in hindsight looking at numbers.. another player I have the mindset of get 'em signed cheap ASAP and we're set. If we get Outlaw, Tell, Frye & Jack all under decent contracts we should be fine. We want to be able to have a free roster spot every season to add veteran help ala Spurs.

[The Emcee]

Wow look at everyone jumping off the bandwagon! To say we are definitely out of the playoffs is ludicrous IMO. I'm not guaranteeing we make it, but I still think we have a fair chance.

Every team goes through rough patches. We just gotta hope they bounce back.

[baas9]

Hey all again from Uganda. I hear its cold in the Northwest. Its kind cold here too for this time of year. We are all the way down in the mid 70s

I didn't get to see this game, but it sounds like it was an exciting one. I did however get to see the Cleveland game where Lebron went off on us in the 4th. It was on ESPN here in Uganda, which was pretty sweet. They kept showing pictures of Portland so that was cool to be able to see home again.

But I digress...

What I wanted to chime in about is the weakness of our current roster and how I believe that it will be taken care of next season with the players we already have or will for sure be getting. Namely Rudy & Greg.

It will be interesting to see what kind of lineup Nate will go with next year with those two coming into the mix, but I think that we could have an extremely balanced and formidable squad, even if we don't make any major changes (excepting our 1 round draft selection... which I think KP will try to target a specific player or two and move up to get them if necisary).

I believe that with Rudy and Roy on the floor at the 1 and 2 spots, the PG problems we have been experiencing will be minimalized. Both Rudy and Roy are really PG/SG who can handle the ball, distribute and create scoring oportunities for themselves. I have a feeling that Nate may experiment with that combination at the guard spots and have them essentially be interchangeable through each game depending on matchups.

If he can stay healthy, I believe that James Jones would be a good SF to compliment those two, but his shooting ability might be redundant depending on Rudy's 3 pt ability. Part of me feels that Martell would again be the starter at SF to be paired with Rudy & Roy because of his energy and overall intensity on both ends of the floor. He also is learning to play defense and rebound much more consistently, which is a bonus. But I really like the idea of Jones camping on the wing with Roy and Rudy creating and kicking it out for the wide open 3 in the corner... so I'll go with Jones as the starter. Besides, I think Martell can backup the SG spot very nicely.

The obvious starters at the remaining two spots would be Aldridge and Oden, providing a formidable post defense.

Nothing against our guys, but I see us just barely missing the playoffs and getting a high lottery pick (#13 or #14 most likely), but I also wouldn't be surprised to see KP try to package 2nd round picks and Jarret Jack in order to move up a few spots if the right player were available. If they were able to move up to #7 - #9 spot, I wouldn't mind trading Jack away if the "right" guy was on the board.

I think the "right" guy for us could be Kevin Love. He is an extremely solid fundamental player who can rebound and pass like nobody's business. Also, it never hurts to have big bodies who can take up space and grab some boards coming off the bench for a PF like Aldridge who plays more like Rasheed Wallace (away from the basket, jumpers, long rebounds, etc.). Gives the oposing team a different look and feel. K-Love can also start the fast break with the outlet pass like few bigmen can... perfect for our fast breaking second unit.

If I had my way, I would see the lineup shaping up to be something like this:

PG - Roy, Blake, Sergio
SG - Rudy, Webster,
SF - Jones, Outlaw, McBob
PF - Aldridge, K-Love, Frye
C - Oden, Pryzbilla, LaFrentz

If it went down like that, I wouldn't be upset at all.

Take it easy ya'll.

[Wizenheimer]

An article about each team's shot selection in the game. It points to a bit of a structural issue in the blazers offense. or maybe it actually points to an issue with the roster that needs to be addressed:

http://www.columbian.com/sports/blazerBanter/index.cfm?entry=1869#entry1

[mojomarc]

An article about each team's shot selection in the game. It points to a bit of a structural issue in the blazers offense. or maybe it actually points to an issue with the roster that needs to be addressed:

http://www.columbian.com/sports/blazerBanter/index.cfm?entry=1869#entry1

It seems apparent that at some point Aldridge went to Nate and said he didn't like playing on the blocks much, because he is doing it far less than he was earlier in the season. Perhaps we need to run a few clear out plays there where he really doesn't have a choice but to play down there because he is effective. Also, isolating Roy or Martell down low would probably be beneficial, particularly if a guy like Frye or Aldridge can hang out as a threat at on the outside but still crash the boards as the shot goes up.

I know this is getting repetitive, but Oden's presence is a huge part of solving this. This is probably reason number 1 why if he's only scoring 15 points per game something is dreadfully wrong. Not only does he round out the offense, but other than Bynum, Duncan, Shaq and Howard, is there anyone out there in the league that he won't have either a huge strength advantage, a huge athleticism advantage or a huge skill advantage on?

[Tim Lehrbach]

Oden's first drop step next year will surpass the total number we've seen all season so far.