2021-22 ESPN Predicts 43-39, 8th in the West

[BNM]

https://www.espn.com/nba/insider/story/_/id/32178544/nba-predictions-win-loss-records-lakers-clippers-warriors-every-western-conference-team

2020-21 actual: 42-30, 6th in the West
2021-22 ESPN: 43-39, 8th in the West

Last year the Blazers won 42 games over a 72-game schedule, and that was with Nurkic missing 35 games, CJ missing 25 games and only 27 games of Norman Powell.

POR will have a much better bench this year. Last year, the Blazers had the 3rd worst bench in the league - only CLE and HOU had worse benches than POR.

http://www.hoopsstats.com/basketball/fantasy/nba/opponentstats/21/7/diffeff/1-1

Their starters outplayed DEN's starters in the playoffs, but their bench got killed - worst bench performance, by far, of any playoff team.

http://www.hoopsstats.com/basketball/fantasy/nba/opponentstats/21/7/diffeff/8-1

Melo and Kanter "anchoring" the 2nd unit was horrendous to watch. Other teams scrubs scored at will.

So, with an additional 10 games on the schedule, reasonable health and a better bench, I see them easily topping 43 wins. Even with the same **** bench and same injuries, I just don't see how they go the equivalent of 1-9 over the additional 10 games.

Thoughts? Predictions? General ESPN hate?

[PDXKnight]

Sounds about right honestly. We didn’t improve much if at all, yeah we made some minor shake ups but i doubt its enough to get us past 50 wins as a best case scenario

[Epicurus]

In that on a 82 game season the Blazers won the equivalent of 48 games are they predicted at 43 wins? Given normal health of key players and the upgrade of the bench, how is this not at least a 52 win team?

[BNM]

Sounds about right honestly. We didn’t improve much if at all, yeah we made some minor shake ups but i doubt its enough to get us past 50 wins as a best case scenario

They didn't predict we'd win 50 games, only 43 over a 82 game season after we just won 42 over a 72 game season with Nurk missing half the season and CJ missing 25 games.

We also get a full season of Norm and even if our bench is only incrementally better (it will be WAY better defensively), I don't see how we don't do better than 1-9 over those extra 10 games.

[Goldbum]

54 wins...

[GEE]

Meaningless really, imo. It's soo difficult to predict how Portland will perform. Lots of pressure for Chauncey and his staff to win early, to ease Dame into believing in Olshey's putrid plan of running out Dame, CJ and Powell, AGAIN 1 through 3, while expecting a better outcome. Good luck with that.

If Dame's happiness again becomes an issue, 43 wins might become generous. There's also the Simmons drama, with us being rumored there (with odds).

Maybe just poor judgement on ESPN to make such early predictions in the first place. Let's first see who makes it out of training camp please.

[Wizenheimer]

I"m not high at all on Portland's chances, but I'd guess they will be a lot closer to 50 wins than 43

4 teams are clearly better, at least at this stage and that's Jazz, Suns, Clippers, and Nuggets

if Klay Thompson returns to hi norms, the Warriors will likely be better too. The Lakers are a quandary but if they can stay healthy and Westbrook develops any mesh at all with the big-2, they could be there with the other top teams

that would leave Dallas, Portland, and Memphis battling for the two remaining seeds

[BNM]

I"m not high at all on Portland's chances, but I'd guess they will be a lot closer to 50 wins than 43

4 teams are clearly better, at least at this stage and that's Jazz, Suns, Clippers, and Nuggets

if Klay Thompson returns to hi norms, the Warriors will likely be better too. The Lakers are a quandary but if they can stay healthy and Westbrook develops any mesh at all with the big-2, they could be there with the other top teams

that would leave Dallas, Portland, and Memphis battling for the two remaining seeds

I'd swap LAC and LAL on your list of four teams clearly better. Kawhi had surgery on his ACL a month ago and is expected to miss much, perhaps all, of the regular season. Typical recovery time is 9 - 12 months, but can be as little as 7 months. Given Kawhi's history of "load management" when healthy, he doesn't seem like the type that will rush his return when he just had a major surgery. Plus, the Clippers resigned him for 4 years $176 million. I doubt they will risk a re-injury by pressuring him to come back too soon.

As far as GSW, Klay is not expected back before Christmas, and when he does return it will be over two and a half years since he last played. He's coming back from two major injuries - a torn ACL followed by a ruptured Achilles (one of the most difficult injuries to overcome). I doubt if he'll ever be the same player he was, and even if he eventually is, it's going to be several months before he's playing at a high level. Plus Draymond, while still good isn't nearly the same player he was when GSW was winning championships and they don't have a bench full of min contract veteran ring chasers like they did back then.

Those ring chasers now jump on the Lakers bandwagon. The Lakers will be good, but given the ages of many of their players, I expect a lot of load management and basically coasting through the regular season. Still, they have enough depth to capture a top 4 seed without really trying very hard.

[PDXKnight]

Sounds about right honestly. We didn’t improve much if at all, yeah we made some minor shake ups but i doubt its enough to get us past 50 wins as a best case scenario

They didn't predict we'd win 50 games, only 43 over a 82 game season after we just won 42 over a 72 game season with Nurk missing half the season and CJ missing 25 games.

We also get a full season of Norm and even if our bench is only incrementally better (it will be WAY better defensively), I don't see how we don't do better than 1-9 over those extra 10 games.

I said 50 as a best case scenario, I think 43 is a good baseline prediction as there’s a lot of questions going forward & it feels like the new coach could go either way and certainly is no lock to make us better (more like a coin flip). My personal prediction is more like 46-47 all i was getting at is 43 is probably a realistic prediction that isn’t too far off. If we stay healthy and bring powel or cj off the bench we hit the higher end of 50-52 wins, if we have injuries & start 3 tweeners probably the lower end 43-45

[Wizenheimer]

I"m not high at all on Portland's chances, but I'd guess they will be a lot closer to 50 wins than 43

4 teams are clearly better, at least at this stage and that's Jazz, Suns, Clippers, and Nuggets

if Klay Thompson returns to hi norms, the Warriors will likely be better too. The Lakers are a quandary but if they can stay healthy and Westbrook develops any mesh at all with the big-2, they could be there with the other top teams

that would leave Dallas, Portland, and Memphis battling for the two remaining seeds

I'd swap LAC and LAL on your list of four teams clearly better. Kawhi had surgery on his ACL a month ago and is expected to miss much, perhaps all, of the regular season. Typical recovery time is 9 - 12 months, but can be as little as 7 months. Given Kawhi's history of "load management" when healthy, he doesn't seem like the type that will rush his return when he just had a major surgery. Plus, the Clippers resigned him for 4 years $176 million. I doubt they will risk a re-injury by pressuring him to come back too soon.

maybe

but the Clippers won 4 playoff games without Kawhi last season which is twice the number that Portland won while healthy. They beat Utah and made it to the WCF without Kawhi playing after the series was tied 2-2. They also added Eric Bledsoe and Justice Winslow

As far as GSW, Klay is not expected back before Christmas, and when he does return it will be over two and a half years since he last played. He's coming back from two major injuries - a torn ACL followed by a ruptured Achilles (one of the most difficult injuries to overcome). I doubt if he'll ever be the same player he was, and even if he eventually is, it's going to be several months before he's playing at a high level. Plus Draymond, while still good isn't nearly the same player he was when GSW was winning championships and they don't have a bench full of min contract veteran ring chasers like they did back then.

they were without Klay the entire season and still only ended up 3 games worse than Portland. And that's with Curry and Green sitting out 9 games each. And Wiseman missed 33 games. He should be back. They will have great depth because they signed Otto Porter and Nemanja Bjelica after drafting Jonathon Kuminga and Moses Moody

now, all these teams will be relying on players with extensive injury histories, so there's lots of thin ice out there. But the Blazers have Nurkic, Zeller, and Nance and all three of those guys have extensive injuries themselves

as I said, I think 43 wins is projecting low for Portland. I don't think 8th seed is an unreasonable projection though. The last time the NBA had a full season, the 8th seed in the west had 48 wins

[BlazersBroncos]

Seems about right. We are fodder.

[Case2012]

Regular season doesn’t matter. We’ll make the playoffs, just like we always do… And we’ll lose in the first round, just like we always do.

[BNM]

but the Clippers won 4 playoff games without Kawhi last season which is twice the number that Portland won while healthy. They beat Utah and made it to the WCF without Kawhi playing after the series was tied 2-2. They also added Eric Bledsoe and Justice Winslow

I place little stock in such a miniscule sample size. It's not uncommon for other players to step up short term when a star goes down with an injury, but that isn't sustainable wen you're missing your best player for an entire 82-game schedule.

LAC have had a lot of roster turnover. They traded Lou Williams for Rondo at the trade deadline and then traded Rondo and Pat Bev for Bledsoe. Is Bedsoe a better player? Two years ago yes, but he was pretty awful in NOP last season. Was that a situational anomaly or decline? I guess we'll see. All his advanced stats were down significantly.

Will they start Bledsoe (6'1") and Reggie Jackson (6'2") together in the backcourt, which would make them even smaller and equally defensively challenged as POR's starting backcourt, but with far less offensive fire power, or will Jackson back up Bledsoe with Batum starting. Either way, their starting 5, without Kawhi looks significantly worse than POR's.

The big difference, of course, will be the absence of their best player for (likely) the entire regular season. I just don't see how they overcome that.

[JasonStern]

I"m not high at all on Portland's chances, but I'd guess they will be a lot closer to 50 wins than 43

I honestly have no idea and take no slight at being projected as an 8th seed.

First time head coach.

Doubling down on this "play 6'3" or smaller" guards philosophy by retaining Powell, not trading CJ, and signing McLemore.

Letting Kanter, a flawed but healthy regular season big go, in order to sign a backup big that averages ~30 missed games a season to backup a starting center in Nurkić that misses ~30 games a season. Trading DJJ for an injury prone big suffering from Crohn's disease that misses ~30 games a season.

So the coaching staff is unproven, the guards are talented but undersized, weakness at the wing position wasn't addressed, and the bigs have historically been injury prone.

It certainly could work out beautifully. But I think it's far from a guarantee. Weird to see Wizenheimer being the optimist and me being the pessimist.

[HoopsFanAZ]

ESPN can pound sand.
Closer to 50 than to 40 is a pretty easy call. For simplicity, 50-32.

[monopoman]

I mean we were on a better win pace that 43 wins last season if it was a 82 game season like normal. Last season gave us major injuries to both Nurk and McCollum, and despite that we were on a win pace far beyond 43 wins in a 82 game season.

I think we could easily be a 50 win team this season, a number of the teams they have above us in win totals are not clearly better than us. Now if Lillard starts getting unhappy, and that causes a rift in the team that might lead to more losses but I don't think that is happening.

[red_power]

Regular season doesn’t matter. We’ll make the playoffs, just like we always do… And we’ll lose in the first round, just like we always do.

If Blazers dominate the regular season and reach something like 55 wins and 3rd seed, we could end up playing against a favorable matchup or simply an injury-riddled team in the first round.
The second round could be in a sight then. Though it's all this team could get with the current roster construction.

[b33nine]

We haven't seen a Dame-centric team reach 50 wins yet. I'm not convinced this is the best team they've put around him up to this point, but it certainly could be. I can understand why they would be low on us again with the lower half of the western conference getting better.

I'll be happy to be pleasantly surprised if they do reach 50 wins though.

[Norm2953]

43 games seem about right. It's the height of arrogance to expect marginal improvement would lead to a 50
win team in a conference with the Suns, Lakers, GSW, Nuggets, Jazz and improving teams like the Grizzlies.

[monopoman]

We haven't seen a Dame-centric team reach 50 wins yet. I'm not convinced this is the best team they've put around him up to this point, but it certainly could be. I can understand why they would be low on us again with the lower half of the western conference getting better.

I'll be happy to be pleasantly surprised if they do reach 50 wins though.

What are you talking about in the 2018-2019 season the Blazers got 53 wins Dame was the best player on that team by far. We didn't have LMA he had left a few years prior in free agency.

They were also one win short of 50 in the previous season, after having a very rough final stretch of games.