As a fan of the Portland TrailBlazers the Western Conference Finals were so hard to watch. As much as Portland struggled I do know that
Golden State is just a elite team. They
showed it over and over on both ends of the court. But even with that knowledge how Portland
lost, losing big leads in three of the four games, is a hard pill to swallow. Watching Portland and their stars start
strong but fade in the second half, or in the case of last night the 4th
quarter, you have to ask why.
No matter how poorly the series went
the Trail Blazers did have a great year behind Damian Lillard and CJ
McCollum. Getting better will be tough
this offseason. Enes Kanter, Seth Curry,
Rodney Hood, Al-Farouq Aminu and Jake Layman (restricted) are all free agents
and Portland will only have about $5.7M to spend which means they’ll be largely
a non-factor in free agency. They need
scoring at forward but I doubt the money they’ll have available will be able to
net them much of an upgrade.
So barring a trade of consequence it
seems they’ll just need to get better internally. This is possible. When contrasting Golden State’s and
Portland’s offense during the series the difference was jarring. Golden State’s offense is constantly in
motion and pushing the ball while Portland ended up with the ball in one guy’s
hands trying to create while others did little.
And when the ball did get into the hands of players not named Lillard or
McCollum they were tentative and indecisive.
Those things can be taught. Many
Warriors role players look really good – partly due to playing next to great
players – but also because of the offense in my opinion. Defense is also something that can definitely
improve.
We’ll see where the offseason goes
but this really was a good year.
Portland was the #3 seed in the tough Western Conference and made the
Conference Finals for the first time since 2000. I’ve watched more of the Trail Blazers this
post season than ever before and it has been fun. I can’t wait to see what next year
brings. Maybe some of the young talent
like Zach Collins, Anfernee Simmons or even Gary Trent can make a difference
next season. You just never know.
It'd be nice if they could get out from under that terrible Meyers Leonard contract, but I don't see it happening. And I'm always a bit of a pessimist when it comes to the Blazers, so I'm gonna go on record and say that I don't think that they will be finishing nearly as high in the conference next season.
ReplyDeleteI feel ya. One more year for the Leonard contract. Is be very happy if they are the #3 seed again next year. Hard to see how this team improves but hopefully next season will still be a fun ride.
DeleteNot trying to be a Warriors hater... but I was really hoping the Blazer would end the Warriors season. The Bay Area is all about the Warriors right now, so the A's get absolutely no radio coverage. If there's a positive side... I'm listening to a lot of 80's songs instead. There's only so much Curry talk I can listen to... and I actually like the guy.
ReplyDeleteThere's always fatigue when a team wins so much like the Warriors. I have it too but I do like the Warriors players and think they are a likable team. I could see how they could drown out all the other local teams but that is a shame. I'll root for whoever comes out of the East but I wouldn't put any real money on it. And you can never go wrong with 8080's music! 🎶
ReplyDelete