Game 3 Portland vs LA Lakers 12:30pm Root+, NBAtv

[monopoman]

Love seeing Portland start 3-0! I didn't expect it, particularly after a woeful preseason. These early wins while integrating the new additions last year with Dame and the new additions this year are fun to watch. There's clearly lots of room for improvement, but Portland winning three close games in which they trailed in the 4th quarter has been awesome. They've been pretty unflappable, and that's a good sign.

No matter how many times I tell myself preseason doesn’t matter, I never listen to myself.

Loving this team so far! Such a better product on the floor than in the past few years.

Low key, Josh Hart has continued to be amazing. That dude just does everything. 16 freaking rebounds… what?! And Grant has been a phenomenal fit. I was skeptical with him at PF or that his numbers in Detroit were a fluke, but dude has been legit. Best forward the Blazers have had since Aldridge, and it’s probably not close.

Grant has been very good for us so far. He's playing exactly the role he should be.

I'm very critical of our lack of big man depth, but when Hart grabs 16 boards in a regulation time game, it helps make up for the lack of depth!

If this team looks damn good we might see a move at the trade deadline to get this team more help. Maybe pulling a noteworthy big man from a team that might be looking at a rougher season and getting a top draft pick instead of competing.

[DusterBuster]

No matter how many times I tell myself preseason doesn’t matter, I never listen to myself.

Loving this team so far! Such a better product on the floor than in the past few years.

Low key, Josh Hart has continued to be amazing. That dude just does everything. 16 freaking rebounds… what?! And Grant has been a phenomenal fit. I was skeptical with him at PF or that his numbers in Detroit were a fluke, but dude has been legit. Best forward the Blazers have had since Aldridge, and it’s probably not close.

Grant has been very good for us so far. He's playing exactly the role he should be.

I'm very critical of our lack of big man depth, but when Hart grabs 16 boards in a regulation time game, it helps make up for the lack of depth!

If this team looks damn good we might see a move at the trade deadline to get this team more help. Maybe pulling a noteworthy big man from a team that might be looking at a rougher season and getting a top draft pick instead of competing.

This or I could see them grabbing a big off the waiver wire after the deadline.

[PDXKnight]

Dame looks like a new man!

Simons really should come off the bench, start payton at the 2 or little at the 3 and keep Hart starting either way. Move simons to a 30 mpg 6th man type

[monopoman]

Dame looks like a new man!

Simons really should come off the bench, start payton at the 2 or little at the 3 and keep Hart starting either way. Move simons to a 30 mpg 6th man type

Watching his interview he says this is the best he has felt since his 2nd year in the league, a year where he looked like an Iron Man and played every game.

Watch on YouTube

Really good look at how this team was thinking about things before the season began.

[CDM_Stats]

A 3-0 start is certainly a surprise but it was so nice to see Lillard go off. Especially against the Lakers who may be the best location for him if we go that route. But if the start of the season is any indicator, no reason to go that route

[DaVoiceMaster]

Gotta love what we are seeing so far. Simon's was just awful tonight, but they still found a way to win. Nurk is just gonna piss me off all season so I guess I better get used to it. I wonder if we will see Sarr (I think that's his name) when he returns from injury.

Billups is going to need to figure out who can score in the second unit (Eubanks, Winslow, Little, and Sharpe). When Simons sucks and they run 4 out of 5 plays for him in the second unit, Lillard is gonna have to have more 40+ point games. They really didnt look at Sharpe at all. Why not throw a play his way when Simons is so off?

Loving what Hart does all over the court. I'm curious to see how Payton II fits in.

[Wizenheimer]

yeah...what a great idea some of you have: trade Dame and build around Simons....

[Blazinaway]

Some y'all so negative. Good win! Lakers are a good defensive team. Didn't expect us to start 3-0. I'll take it.

LOL I hear ya, so much negativity, we are playing sloppy and still winning and have some guys like Ant who will play a lot better and GP has not played yet. Hart is a fukkin stud/glue guy, SIXTEEN friggin rebouds.

[red_power]

Tbh Hart-Grant is exactly that pair of forwards Blazers missed badly 5 years ago when GSW were blatantly exploiting the limitations of Hark and Aminu.

[Case2012]

Blazers are 7th in defense so far and 23rd in offense. I would have to guess the defense will get even better when GP2 comes back and Simons starts playing better… 34% fg and 20% from 3 with a per of 5. That’s obviously going to improve.

[mighty_duck]

Blazers are 7th in defense so far and 23rd in offense. I would have to guess the defense will get even better when GP2 comes back and Simons starts playing better… 34% fg and 20% from 3 with a per of 5. That’s obviously going to improve.

A third of our games were against the LA bricklayers, and playing against them will make any team look like defensive geniuses.
Another third were against Sacramento.

Still, a good sign nonetheless. Last season we would be losing those close games.

[JasonStern]

What a clown show. Lillard's ego ball is so irritating. Pass the ball out to the open 3 point shooter for chrissakes

He nearly scored half of the team's points.

The team has options on offense, which is great. They just need to understand that some games Dame will be hot, some games Grant will be hot, some games Ant will be hot, some games Nurkić can make a jump shot, etc. Then play the hot hand/take advantage of mismatches. Where the team punches itself in the face is trying to let players shoot out of slumps instead of going with what works. But it's early in the season, and the team is 3-0 so I can't really complain too much.

[JasonStern]

How many more times will Dame have to will the Blazers to a win in the regular season.

Predicted 41-41 so 38.

The reality is that Dame has carried us to two of our 3 wins.

That is literally what he is paid $42M a year to do.

If Nurk goes down, it’s gonna be all small ball with Winslow and Eubanks off the bench… not great.

Yeah. I am fine that we overpaid Nurk. But there's no reason he couldn't have taken $3M/season less to let the Blazers sign a veteran backup big given Nurk's injury history.

Question for Wizenheimer - we're pretty close to that luxury tax. I know there are weird loopholes for veteran minimums. If we needed a 15th player, could we sign one? Does prorating the contract by deferring until later make any difference? If it makes no difference, then picking up a Whiteside/Kanter now so that they are ready to go should the Blazers need them makes sense.

Tbh Hart-Grant is exactly that pair of forwards Blazers missed badly 5 years ago when GSW were blatantly exploiting the limitations of Hark and Aminu.

I would gladly welcome back Harkless on vet minimum contract. Just doesn't fit the team's current needs.

[Case2012]

I think one of the reasons Nurkic got that deal is because of how it could be used in trades. Playing with the trade machine, it’s hard to make a lot of trades work based on the contracts. Nurkic happens to be making exactly what OG and Turner make, which isn’t to say we’ll trade for them (I wish), but it’ll be easier to move Nurkic for another player without combining other deals. I really doubt he’ll be here after the deadline.

[Tim Lehrbach]

Not sure where else to put this, but the Blazers are a very strong 3-0.

Defense hasn't been predicated on any individual shutting down a top scorer, but rather on hustle, gang rebounding, and playing as a unit. There's room for improvement when the team's biggest stopper, GPII, takes the floor and takes minutes from Dame, Simons, and Sharpe.

Offense has been a mess, but Dame shows he's still up for heroics. One might take this as cause for concern, but I see upside. I am not a huge Simons guy -- he's no CJ, for instance -- but I think he's got scoring instincts enough to at least do better with his turns at attacking the defense than we've seen so far. We haven't seen the team get lucky with deep shooting yet, which will come in spurts.

I'm impressed.

[Village Idiot]

What a clown show. Lillard's ego ball is so irritating. Pass the ball out to the open 3 point shooter for chrissakes

He nearly scored half of the team's points.

The team has options on offense, which is great. They just need to understand that some games Dame will be hot, some games Grant will be hot, some games Ant will be hot, some games Nurkić can make a jump shot, etc. Then play the hot hand/take advantage of mismatches. Where the team punches itself in the face is trying to let players shoot out of slumps instead of going with what works. But it's early in the season, and the team is 3-0 so I can't really complain too much.

Your hindsight is 20/20 but this was a game thread and my post was made early in the game during a sequence where Dame was chucking guarded 3s and going on unsuccessful drives down the heavily guarded lane. I can see why nobody bothers doing heat of the moment posts on game threads here.