Game 6 Rd 2 Portland vs Denver 7:30pm Thursday ESPN

[d-train]

The remarkable accomplishment of this series is winning while losing on the boards. The boards were about even tonight, but I think we lost the battle of the boards every other game this series. I think we are going to do much better against either Rockets or Warriors.

[zzaj]

Honestly, I've been wildly impressed with the Blazers ability to play grind-it-out games this postseason. Thats not something I can remember from this Blazers for a long long long time in the playoffs. So I'm not worried about them playing that style, I'm worried about the bench not being able to match what Denvers bench will almost undoubtably bring.

I just meant in terms of relying on calls and FTs in a grind it out game 7. The NBA wants Denver to win on their homecourt.

The Blazers have excelled at half court, non fast-paced basketball since Lillard took the reins at PG...and really have played mostly that style since McMillan started as head coach.

The Memphis and Pelicans series would beg to differ with that assessment imo. I also don't think there's been much of any carryover from Nate to Terry.

I also disagree with the idea that "the NBA wants Denver to win". I'm just not that conspiratorial.

That's not to say that there haven't been BETTER half court teams...both the Pelicans and Memphis were.

Portland has been last or close to last in fast break points for years now. And yes, there are huge differences between Nate and Terry...but by design, they both have/had their teams playing deliberate, slow paced basketball.

[Wizenheimer]

* Bad Hood: Hood has been so good in this series he's probably climbed well above what Portland will be able to offer this summer...damn

Do you think? I mean, he's had a good series, but by-in-large has been fairly up and down with everything else. I'm skeptical such a short span has pushed his value that high yet.

That said, I'm also fairly bullish on the Blazers chances this summer of not losing absolutely everyone. I'm willing to be more optimistic about what the team can accomplish this summer and their ability to get creative.

I think how a player performs in the playoffs, the deeper it is, counts for a lot. Now, Hood was a vanishing act against OKC and he was up and down in the regular season. But I still think where the ceiling is for what Portland can offer might be too low

they can certainly try to convince him to operate on some good faith. That way, they could give him a shade over 4.1M next season, and 7.2M the year after...then they'd have full Bird rights. They could also give hm a 2 year deal with a player option (if that's legal) so he'd have some protection against serious injury. But I'm guessing that would be a discount over what he could get elsewhere. How much of a discount I don't know. I also don't know how much he likes his situation in Portland

he is looking real good in this series

[DusterBuster]

I'm sure some will consider it sacrilege, but if I was GM I'd think long and hard about promising Hood the starting SG job and trying to sign him to a reasonable offer. Meanwhile, I'd package CJ and a FRP for a clear upgrade at SF or PF. That might go a little way in being able to retain Kanter as well...

I think Hood fits much better alongside Lillard than CJ does in the starting lineup.

I don't think it's sacrilege as much as just bad karma to do something like that. Word would leak to the media, it would spread to the team probably first... and that's how you end up with a situation as bad or worse than the Celtics. I just thinks really bad business to do something like that to undermine your employees like that.

Thats not even to say I disagree with your end-point. If a no-brainer CJ deal came along and Hood became the Blazers starting SG, I would be totally fine with that, but I don't think you throw a guy under the bus with a promise like that to another player.

For sure it'd have to be a delicate procedure...

As we all know, trading CJ is a moot point at this stage anyway, for a myriad of reasons. The big one being Olshey is in love with CJ and he's getting a lot of ammo for his bias in these playoffs.

Lets also not discredit Dame and CJ's connection on and off the court. Those two are super close. This board loves to focus on Olshey, but I honestly believe that's just as big of a reason for CJ not being traded than Olshey.

[Wizenheimer]

speaking of Hood:

Watch on YouTube

[zzaj]

I don't think it's sacrilege as much as just bad karma to do something like that. Word would leak to the media, it would spread to the team probably first... and that's how you end up with a situation as bad or worse than the Celtics. I just thinks really bad business to do something like that to undermine your employees like that.

Thats not even to say I disagree with your end-point. If a no-brainer CJ deal came along and Hood became the Blazers starting SG, I would be totally fine with that, but I don't think you throw a guy under the bus with a promise like that to another player.

For sure it'd have to be a delicate procedure...

As we all know, trading CJ is a moot point at this stage anyway, for a myriad of reasons. The big one being Olshey is in love with CJ and he's getting a lot of ammo for his bias in these playoffs.

Lets also not discredit Dame and CJ's connection on and off the court. Those two are super close. This board loves to focus on Olshey, but I honestly believe that's just as big of a reason for CJ not being traded than Olshey.

That's fair, although I don't feel any additional credit is due to their on court connection. It's fine, but it's not some magical, storied connection or chemistry. In fact I wish there were MORE of a symbiosis between their on the court games.

It's only my opinion, but I'd call it about the same as the Murray/Harris connection in Denver.

[DusterBuster]

* Bad Hood: Hood has been so good in this series he's probably climbed well above what Portland will be able to offer this summer...damn

Do you think? I mean, he's had a good series, but by-in-large has been fairly up and down with everything else. I'm skeptical such a short span has pushed his value that high yet.

That said, I'm also fairly bullish on the Blazers chances this summer of not losing absolutely everyone. I'm willing to be more optimistic about what the team can accomplish this summer and their ability to get creative.

I think how a player performs in the playoffs, the deeper it is, counts for a lot. Now, Hood was a vanishing act against OKC and he was up and down in the regular season. But I still think where the ceiling is for what Portland can offer might be too low

they can certainly try to convince him to operate on some good faith. That way, they could give him a shade over 4.1M next season, and 7.2M the year after...then they'd have full Bird rights. They could also give hm a 2 year deal with a player option (if that's legal) so he'd have some protection against serious injury. But I'm guessing that would be a discount over what he could get elsewhere. How much of a discount I don't know. I also don't know how much he likes his situation in Portland

he is looking real good in this series

I'll never discredit teams doing dumb stuff in FA after a player has a good playoff series. I still remember Jerome James - about as mediocre a player could be - having one good series for the Sonics and then the Knicks give him a billion dollars to be mediocre to awful for the rest of his career. So yeah, I get it.

I'm still just trying to live in the moment and ignore any of the offseason stuff and just hope in blind faith that after this run, guys would be willing to come back for another run at it. I understand thats probably and dumb and naive viewpoint give the dollars and cents of it all, but I'm fine with that.

[Moonbeam]

I was only a few years old enough to drink when they did a game 7 hehe. Holy crap Sunday is going to be insane 3 game 7's all on Sunday, assuming Houston wins the next one.

Same here - I was 23 in 2003. Very happy for Portland to have another one!

[zzaj]

speaking of Hood:

Watch on YouTube

I had to chuckle at him talking about "fans all season long", lol...

[d-train]

* Bad Hood: Hood has been so good in this series he's probably climbed well above what Portland will be able to offer this summer...damn

Do you think? I mean, he's had a good series, but by-in-large has been fairly up and down with everything else. I'm skeptical such a short span has pushed his value that high yet.

That said, I'm also fairly bullish on the Blazers chances this summer of not losing absolutely everyone. I'm willing to be more optimistic about what the team can accomplish this summer and their ability to get creative.

I think how a player performs in the playoffs, the deeper it is, counts for a lot. Now, Hood was a vanishing act against OKC and he was up and down in the regular season. But I still think where the ceiling is for what Portland can offer might be too low

they can certainly try to convince him to operate on some good faith. That way, they could give him a shade over 4.1M next season, and 7.2M the year after...then they'd have full Bird rights. They could also give hm a 2 year deal with a player option (if that's legal) so he'd have some protection against serious injury. But I'm guessing that would be a discount over what he could get elsewhere. How much of a discount I don't know. I also don't know how much he likes his situation in Portland

he is looking real good in this series

I think the scouting report on Hood takes his whole career into account. I notice he is good against smaller finesse players like Nuggets have. He struggles against bigger tough players like OKC has.

[DusterBuster]

speaking of Hood:

Watch on YouTube

Again, I get how naive it is, but I love believing that this is different for guys like him - especially Rodney more than Seth or even Kanter. He more than anyone knows what it's like to be somewhere where he's not appreciated or its a bad fit. Maybe it's dumb to assume he'd take less on a good-faith future deal, but I also think he's more appreciative than anyone to really know how amazing it is to be somewhere that's an amazing fit.

[DusterBuster]

speaking of Hood:

Watch on YouTube

I had to chuckle at him talking about "fans all season long", lol...

No doubt, that's such a cool moment for him with the whole crowd chanting RODNEY... and not just a few, that whole crowd was still there well after the game ended. Its pretty rare to see legit happy moments from NBA guys, but this was one.

[Moonbeam]

When will we know what time Game 7 is?

[The Sebastian Express]

When will we know what time Game 7 is?

Not sure. I'm going to guess 6:30/7:00 considering right now the other two games are 12:30/4:00..

But if they schedule this game for 10:00AM our time, there's no way we win. Just none.

[The Sebastian Express]

When will we know what time Game 7 is?

Not sure. I'm going to guess 6:30/7:00 considering right now the other two games are 12:30/4:00..

But if they schedule this game for 10:00AM our time, there's no way we win. Just none.

they also might see if Houston wins tomorrow and if they don't they might slot us into the 12:30PM ABC game, but that seems pretty wild/dangerous to do considering people need to make plans.

[Norm2953]

Great time for Hood to be playing for his next contract. He was looking for $10-12 Million /year
last summer and settled for $3.4 in a tight market. Almost certain some team will offer him more
than the taxpayers MLE and he'll like Curry will have to take the money if they want to get paid.

Meanwhile we can savor getting to a game seven. Let's hope they are competitve and apply some
pressure on the Nuggets by keeping the game close. Team has much to be proud of for most of
us wrote them off when Nurk went down. Hopefully Harkless will get out of the funk he's been in
for most of his series for the team needs them to be competitve against Millsap in order to win.

[monopoman]

If we can come out and establish an early lead of 10+ I think the pressure really mounts onto Denver. Now they obviously can come back, but if we can make it feel tough on them throughout the game it's going to take a big run for Denver to really fire the fans up.

[The Sebastian Express]

I'll be interested to see how much we commit not only to the Zach/Rodney substitutions on Sunday, but also how often we run small/small pnr/screen action to Murray to force him to work, work, work, work on defense to hopefully limit his offensive energy just even a bit. We can't stop Jokic. But maybe we can slow down Murray, and that gives us a real shot if we can.

Fingers crossed.

[d-train]

speaking of Hood:


Again, I get how naive it is, but I love believing that this is different for guys like him - especially Rodney more than Seth or even Kanter. He more than anyone knows what it's like to be somewhere where he's not appreciated or its a bad fit. Maybe it's dumb to assume he'd take less on a good-faith future deal, but I also think he's more appreciative than anyone to really know how amazing it is to be somewhere that's an amazing fit.

About 25 years ago, you were probably 8 years old, Chris Dudley signed a contract to play in Portland for about a quarter of his value. He knew he was going to make the money back on his next contract with Portland.

[DusterBuster]

speaking of Hood:


Again, I get how naive it is, but I love believing that this is different for guys like him - especially Rodney more than Seth or even Kanter. He more than anyone knows what it's like to be somewhere where he's not appreciated or its a bad fit. Maybe it's dumb to assume he'd take less on a good-faith future deal, but I also think he's more appreciative than anyone to really know how amazing it is to be somewhere that's an amazing fit.

About 25 years ago, you were probably 8 years old, Chris Dudley signed a contract to play in Portland for about a quarter of his value. He knew he was going to make the money back on his next contract with Portland.

Possibly 9 years old. Nice to see some historical precedent, but hard to compair anything 25 years ago to today.