u/Humblerbee

Can be for whatever reason, be it dominating neutral or zoning to keep him out, superior offense that keeps him on the backfoot, or strong defensive tools to handle his mix and beat him out, just curious if any Slayer mains have opinions on matchups they find the most difficult, or anyone in general has observations about which characters he struggles into the most, at whatever skill levels.

Appreciate it, thanks!

My first thought is that with Nori having been Minnesota’s lead assistant coach for several seasons now, where Chris Finch mentioned how when it was time to draw up the defensive schemes in the playoffs they handed it off to Nori, he’s coming straight from game planning around Gobert.

Clingan in Year 3 will be huge for the team, and you already know from everything Clingan has said about Coach Hurley that Clingan just wants to be coached hard and rise to the challenge- Nori can come to Clingan as his new head coach and say “Listen I just spent the last four years coaching a four time defensive player of the year center who is a drop coverage rim protector in exactly the mold you aspire to. I’ll show you everything I asked him to do, the only question is, are you going to push yourself to be able to do it too?”

I’d love to see Clingan continue to push his comfort zone on coming further out from the paint and working on being better at contesting and recovering with his tremendous length like Gobert- while DC might be a little slower footed, if ever he was going to do it, now after his sophomore body transformation season when he leveled up his conditioning, is when he could be doing agility drills and training his footwork and footspeed. I’d like to see DC push his comfort zone and have Nori give him too big an ask trying to see what he’s capable of, rather than letting everyone shoot over him because he doesn’t want to take too many steps out towards the arc and get burned on the cut.

While I did love Camara getting the all time charge record, I do hope Nori asks him to stay on his feet a bit more this year, focusing more on containment and being as pesky and unshakeable as possible, going for clean contests over steals or stops. Everyone has their own philosophical preferences, I think affecting opponents efficiency is a more sound strategy as opposed to focusing on winning the possession battle, in part because relying on turnovers depends on having the personnel to pull it off, and it can be very coin-flippy.

Especially with Dame in the rotation now, between him and Sharpe there are going to be weak points in our perimeter defense that we need to account for and lean on surrounding them with plus defenders in lineups to mitigate that impact. Camara, Jrue, Grant, Sidy, Murray, Thybulle if he comes back- heck Scoot if he can keep his leveled up defense. We’ll need to make sure we put other perimeter defenders out there who don’t leave any other holes, and with Clingan plus Rob cleaning up the interior, they can minimize the impact of adding old man Dame to the rotation.

Offensively, I hope we go away from the predictable drag screen every possession, I understand wanting to get Deni stampeding downhill and getting him an advantage as soon as possible with space to attack and if they force the double taking them far out of the action, but it became so simplistic and easily read by opponents because we lacked options in the toolkit.

I hope the reintroduction of Dame, and another year of seasoning on Scoot, means we can present Jrue with a simpler ask next season in terms of role and shot diet- it was awesome watching him develop his stepback three into a genuine weapon this year, but at this point in his career we’d be better maximizing Jrue if we were setting him up with quality catch and shoot three opportunities like he was getting in Boston, and letting him focus a bit more energy on the defensive end, without asking him to create so much of our offense off the dribble.

I hope we have more movement offball, and specifically more offball screens and movement along the perimeter. Tiago was a big proponent of the blender, the cut, fill the void, cut, keep moving type of “screenless” motion offense that Saint was trying to install here for Chauncey, so maybe I’m old fashioned, but screening shooters open has always seemed like a good idea to me in the past, and in general creating a step advantage getting a defender behind the play through contact is an idea that never goes out of style.

Offensive rebounding is valuable, but it’s a balance because you get cooked in transition if you over commit to the glass, and DC in particular is both the best offensive rebounder in the game arguably and also a guy you’d prefer have a head start down the court if you’re hoping he can defend the rim at the other end. I don’t have any easy answer here, and I know Nori has already declared we’re going to be a team that hits the glass, but I hope part of that is scheming to handle those transition opportunities in terms of how to slow them down as much as possible if we have a man behind the play practically by design.

Even though it’s a new coach, I hope we don’t give up entirely on the blitz, it was so fun at the start of the year to see the full court pressure driving teams crazy, and while we probably can’t maintain it, it is a fun switch up ball pressure option that I like us pulling out regularly- it was very effective when we went to it, so I’d like Nori to see if it still has legs next year.

How about you guys? Any specific changes you hope to see next season from Nori?

Dame has historically been a very low turnover point guard, with relatively high ball security. (Mostly because he dominates possession and runs a high PnR game and simplifies everyone’s roles and touches as a result) There is a big corollary that Dame has traditionally thrived in the 1-5 PnR dragging a big up for him to attack and getting his C to screen and roll or pop for him and play the short roll game well.

This will be a huge opportunity for Clingan to see a natural integration into the offense- while Deni did lob to Clingan plenty, Dame has made his hall of fame career out of leveraging that PG-C tandem offensive action, and Clingan will be a potent partner for him to play with in those sets because he’s one hell of a big body to screen, he can pop and hit the three, he can roll and clean up the glass at an elite rate, and he’s a plus passer himself and actually has excellent ball security for a big with a relatively low turnover rate.

Obviously Deni is still our best player and will be the primary driver of the team, and Dame will play offball for him well while Clingan will screen, roll, and pop for him, but I do think Dame does provide a bit of that steadying hand, even post-injury, think about how long CP3 managed to remain a plus presence on teams advanced numbers, just because the Point God remained an excellent facilitator who rarely turned it over, and got his team good shots.

I don’t know what kind of shape Dame will return in, but he hasn’t forgotten anything he has learned from his time in the league, and so far, any time Dame touches the ball, it has historically led to good offense. He doesn’t need to dominate the ball the same way he once did or carry the team anymore, but if you need to cut down on turnovers, adding Dame to your rotation will help.

Preface this by saying I am a newbie and truly truly garbage at the game, just got it to play with a friend who is also a relative FG beginner.

I picked Lucy to start and my friend picked Slayer, unfortunately I don’t have the hands to make Lucy work, and he unga-bungas my ass with Slayer- and he isn’t even learning to use mappa punch or crossovers or anything, he’s just good at reading my offense to get in and whoop on me.

I know switching characters isn’t always the answer and you should just “git gud” but with Lucy I don’t have the hands to pull off her longer combos consistently enough to where I feel like I’m dealing good damage off hits, so even though it feels like I can win neutral several times and get more “turns” each round, pixie health and damage vs big body gorilla damage has felt brutal to play out. It feels like she’s meant to be a schmix-up character, but the mix ain’t mix in’ when I’ve tried her.

Characters I’m considering trying besides Lucy-
Leo
Nago
Ram
Johnny
Anji
Unika
Asuka

Back at the trade deadline teams tried to see if Kawhi is available, given the trajectory of the Clippers roster, rebuilding seems inevitable and one would think they’d like to recoup value for Kawhi while he’s still playing at an All-NBA level.

> The Warriors checked in on Leonard in the days leading up to the February trade deadline, as sources told ESPN in the aftermath. The LA Clippers, team sources said, engaged to a greater degree than in the past, but they ultimately returned to the Warriors with the same answer: Team owner Steve Ballmer said no.

While the front office might not be as opposed anymore, at the top level, Ballmer is still firmly attached to Kawhi on the Clippers.

> The problem: League sources said Ballmer has maintained a firm stance against a Leonard trade, preferring to continue building around his star forward.

Just thought this was worth mentioning here, because Kawhi has been included in the Blazers list of potential offseason targets, and it sounds like he’s less available than one would assume given the Clippers situation.

Let’s say the latest Clippers rumors are real, Giannis goes to Boston, Brown goes to Clippers, Milwaukee gets the 5th pick and a couple future firsts with Mathurin agreeing to a sign and trade.

For the sake of the exercise, let’s say Trey Murphy also isn’t on the market as New Orleans is demanding a Desmond Bane+ package for him, saying “more than four picks is the starting point” where they prefer to sit on him unless they receive a huge overpay.

Would you want the Blazers to try and get involved around the margins for Boston and Milwaukee’s ancillary pieces, like Sam Hauser and Bobby Portis?

Would you want to take advantage of Denver’s cap crunch to try and pry away Cam Johnson or Aaron Gordon, even though they’d prefer to get off Christian Braun?

OKC is facing a similar roster crunch and have to consider who to prioritize, would you want to make a play for Lu Dort, Isaiah Joe, or Aaron Wiggins?

Would you try to kick the tires on Michael Porter Jr in Brooklyn and see the price there?

If we can’t win the superstar sweepstakes, what pivot would you like to see the team make?

Milwaukee:

(Assuming MIL primarily wants draft assets back and young players to start their rebuild)

MIL has AJ Green who is a sharpshooter roleplayer that could be targeted in a possible Giannis trade, at 26 he's around that Deni/Camara cores timeline. Not unlike trading for Vit, the goal would be finding a movement shooter bench piece.

MIL also has Myles Turner, a seven footer who can space the floor and defend the rim, who as a center on the other side of 30 wouldn't be in Milwaukee's rebuild plans. I'd personally rather keep RWIII as our backup center, but Turner is certainly an option with a different skillset.

MIL can offer Bobby Portis as another vet at 32 rumored to be on the way out in a Giannis deal, who can shoot it and get you buckets, but he's not a good defender as a PF and in the twilight of his career he's getting less boards, getting to the rim less, and burned on defense more. Basically downgrading from Grant in the trade but still finding a bench scorer forward who can space the floor a little for some lineups.

MIL is unlikely to part with Cormac Ryan as given his hot shooting they probably view him as part of their rebuild and not want to include him in any trades. He's already cleared the 50/40/90 mark and would give the team a bench shooter who can be the spot minute flamethrower.

Miami:

(Assuming MIA primarily wants to keep Bam, Powell, and Wiggins to play with Giannis)

MIA wants to ship out Tyler Herro who has been rumored to be on his way out the door for ages, who is a volume movement shooter in exactly the vein the team has been missing. When it comes to a kickout target for Deni, Herro is exactly the kind of option who could leverage the shot opportunities he creates.

MIA in terms of blue chip prospects will want to talk up Kel'el Ware, a seven footer who can space the floor and theoretically defend the rim, as a plus shooter for his size with great agility he would give you a long term option at C to pair with Clingan in terms of giving you the switch-hitter mixup option of being able to run more switch heavy schemes and play out to the perimeter and recover, depending on matchups.

MIA has an upside play with Kasparas Jakucionis, whose box score stats might not pop but has elite touch indicators, a great AST/TO ratio, and if there is one guy on their roster who could pop besides Ware, I think Jaku is that guy, and if we're talking shooters for the team I think he profiles as exactly that going forward.

MIA has Simone Fontecchio who is a bench piece that gives you floor spacing with some size, though he largely gives up what he gets on the other end, but can help to ensure your rotation has shooters deeper into the roster, and isn't good enough for MIA to pushback much on him as an inclusion.

Boston:

(Assuming BOS primarily wants to keep Tatum, Pritchard, and White to play with Giannis)

BOS has Jaylen Brown as the linchpin of their Giannis package, and for good reason. All-NBA second team, All-Star, 28/7/5 as the number one option on a team that had postseason aspirations. He's already won Finals MVP and is a do-it-all two-way wing who is a good shooter on top of everything else.

BOS would be loath to lose Sam Hauser, who is a sharpshooting three point specialist with size who would be an easy complement to the roster. With several seasons with elite efficiency, it's easy to see why he might be a valuable target to try and pry away when deals are being hashed out. Whether we could get him in the deal without being swindled by Brad Stevens is a difference question.

BOS might not weigh Baylor Scheierman the same way, but after a 45/40/90 season, it's clear he's got the shooting chops to help, and could be a helpful rotational bench piece as a backup guard. Of course we risk buying high on the shooting of guys getting hot coming from the highest 3PT shooting squad in the league, but that's a risk you might want to take given how it is such a need for our squad.

BOS also finally has one last guy I'll mention, Jordan Walsh might not be thought of as much of a 3PT specialist or anything, but he's only 22 and just had a season where he massively improved his efficiency- if that improvement was real, he's one of the better defenders we could come away with, so if he could shoot too that'd be a great guy to have as a sort of "Temu Camara" mold. (Not me wishing we drafted Carter Bryant instead of Yang Hansen still and being bitter about not having "Too-mani Camara's", no sir.)

Assuming there isn’t a major trade, the team’s frontcourt starters seem locked in- Deni is our best player by a large margin and offensive engine, Camara is our best defender and backbone of the team’s defense, and Clingan is our center of the future.

However, the backcourt starters is much more of a question mark. Dame and Jrue are hall of fame level guards, whereas Scoot and Sharpe are 22 & 23 with extremely up-and-down performance through their young careers, they show promising flashes but neither has exactly exploded the way Deni did and made it clear they’re core to the team’s future.

Scoot had high highs and low lows in the playoffs, he looked like one of our best players for a game in the series and then an absolute dud to end it, whereas Sharpe was coming back from injury and lost Tiago’s trust in the playoffs due to his lack of defense, so he couldn’t see the court.

Scoot’s got better facilitating, defense, and 3pt shooting, but Sharpe is a better scorer with a bit more size and self-creation capital, if you need someone to go get a shot or bucket against a set defense, Sharpe thrives more there, he’s a better finisher, elite around the rim and in transition. Sharpe’s size means you can use him more interchangeably as a 2/3 whereas Scoot is a 1 and you don’t want to pair him with other small guys, but paradoxically Scoot is the better defender off motor and muscle.

To me, the big question mark is what level of play Dame comes back at. Last time we saw Dame in Milwaukee he was still playing at an All-Star level, and as an all-time top 5 Blazer at worst, he’s a returning franchise legend who provides the teams biggest need on the court, floor spacing, shooting, and a steady offensive facilitator who will help cut down on the team’s turnovers which was a league worst.

Essentially Dame would need to fall off pretty hard to not get the starting spot at least at the beginning of the season, and then if you ask who to put next to Dame in the backcourt, well, Dame+Scoot is too small, Sharpe is also a bad defender which we already have to hide Dame on defense so that Dame+Sharpe pairing seems problematic, which leaves you with Dame+Jrue together, the best defender of our backcourt options, also the second best shooter so helps with our spacing woes, and he’s got the accolades and resume to get the vet bump as starter over the young guys. BUT! If one of Dame or Jrue is coming off the bench, is it Scoot or Sharpe who you think would be rising to that starter spot, and why?

TLDR: Which is more likely, Scoot or Sharpe beating out one of Dame or Jrue to earn the starting spot for next season? Coming out of training camp, which do you see as a more likely outcome?

On today’s locked on Blazers Mike was bringing up how more than 60% of the Spurs playoff minutes were coming from players they drafted, compared to less than 20% for the Knicks with much more of their minutes trade and free agency leaning. Well, for the Blazers, despite spending several years bottoming out after trading away Dame, they still resemble a much more Knicks style distribution of key contributors coming from trades.

Or, to put a finer point on it, our first playoffs since the rebuild shows we haven’t made much of our time at the bottom of the standings in terms of converting those down years into meaningful roster contributors through the draft. And it’s not like those traded for players came at the expense of our draft assets, we drafted every year of the rebuild prior to this one, and they were available this postseason, we just haven’t had ping pong ball luck or developmental luck in a way that showed up in the teams first playoff berth since the Dame era.

Scoot popped for the first three games and then had disastrous showings in games four and five- why?

Shaedon Sharpe barely saw the court and struggled to have an impact, was it the lingering injury issues, tough playing into San Antonio’s high level defense, or his bad defense that saw him yanked in a playoff series where they were desperate for contributors?

Donovan Clingan got massively outplayed by his backup and their backup, it wasn’t just Wemby, he struggled on both ends of the floor regardless and looked nothing like the DC that was breaking out in February and March. What gives?

Camara is on balance a good shooter, the season he just had shows it, but man the playoffs were painful because he was back to ice cold and we really needed his shooting which just wasn’t there in the post season.

Obviously Deni acquitted himself well and we saw he rises to the moment with the way he dragged the team into and through the play-ins, and was actually surprisingly good into what was a terrible matchup in San Antonio, he just had little help and the lingering back issues hamper him despite playing through it.

But yeah, any observations you have about the playoff games, performances, takeaways, and specifics about any of our young guys and what you learned from their first postseason run. If you watched or re-watched our post season with a specific eye on our young “core”, what would you learn?

The primary trade package being advertised has been the Blazers ability to leverage the Bucks picks to maybe make a big move, paired with sending out likely Jerami Grant and potentially Shaedon Sharpe. However both Grant and Sharpe were buns in the playoffs and tanked their trade value with their play compared to the season they had, and the internal opinion that Cronin has of them where he clearly ranks them as valuable.

Essentially he might view it as “People are clamoring for us to trade for shooting, Jerami Grant is the model of a switchable efficient shooter 6th man for this team and one of our best floor spacers. They want a young upside scorer, Sharpe at 22 was taking on 30+% usage and maintaining his efficiency, showing he is a scalable walking bucket.” Flaming out in the playoffs puts those guys at low points in value, making it harder to get an effective return.

Trader Joe loves to preach patience, and he might prefer to simply keep the guys currently on the roster, knowing Sharpe is only taking up less than 15% of the cap, and it wouldn’t take that crazy of a trajectory for him to outperform that contract.

Then, to top it off, they changed the draft lottery to where the bottom 3 teams have much worse odds and tanking is disincentivized through greatly flattened odds- which, again, hurts the value of being able to hold the Bucks picks hostage in a potential Giannis trade, because previously they could console themselves with the aspiration of chasing the race to the bottom to get highly raised odds at a blue chip elite prospect. The increased randomization of the draft means even getting their picks back, the Bucks would have less control of their future than before the changes, and so our package to be the other or the third team in a Giannis deal is less valuable.

TL;DR- Trades cost assets, but hope is free, our assets might be less valuable after recent events, so Cronin might choose to hold pat, maintain flexibility, and gamble on internal development while keeping the Bucks picks for ourselves.

Currently, the Blazers have Deni, who is a fringe all-star/all-NBA third team type talent. When he was healthy he was good for 28/7/6, basically a go-to engine of the offense type who showed in the play-in’s and playoffs that he was absolutely a top 20 player in the league. We also had Camara, who was all-defense last year and this year recorded the league record for offensive fouls drawn, he is an elite stopper on the defensive end and a plus floor spacer on the other end as a 37+% shooter on 7+ 3PA a game. Outside of that, we’ve got Jrue and Scoot who promise good defense paired with plus floor spacing as guards, and Clingan/RWIII as interior rim deterrents.

Sharpe is a mediocre efficiency high volume scorer who is easily stymied from more efficient looks and who can’t leverage his athleticism to create for teammates. He is reliably able to self-create, but those looks don’t convert at a rate that inspires confidence, so instead he is a mediocre efficiency self-creator in the vein of Cam Johnson. He has to attack into the teeth of a set defense so there is always going to be an efficiency adjustment to account for the lack of viable alternate options, but ultimately Sharpe doesn’t do enough to justify why he is value added to an offense as a ceiling raiser rather than a floor raiser- that is, does Sharpe do enough on a good team with good scorers to justify his existence, because he isn’t a plus defender, passer, or shooter.

Toumani Camara made an all-defense team last year, while Rob Williams, Jrue Holiday, and Matisse Thybulle have previously all made all-defense teams. Donovan Clingan has a reputation as a dominant rim protector and deterrent as a giant patrolling the paint, while Deni Avdija, Jerami Grant, Kris Murray, and Sidy Cissoko are all switchable athletic forwards with size and length who either currently or at points in their career have been considered defensive stoppers. Even at the PG spot Scoot Henderson and Blake Wesley have both gotten praise for their junkyard dog ballhawk energy as defenders even despite their size, defense has been listed as a plus for both.

That’s eleven guys, we’ve basically named the majority of our roster. Why are we such a mediocre defense if we have so many guys who are purportedly plus defenders? Did you feel any of the above mentioned guys particularly underperformed defensively to the point where they contributed to the defense being below expectations? Did you feel it was a schematic issue? Is it our bad offense bleeding over into more opportunities for opponents with our high turnover rate, low offensive efficiency, and tendency to crash the offensive glass all contributing to teams running out on us?

If you had to say, why do you think our defense wasn’t better, given the level of defensive talent on the roster?

[[Baral, Chief of Compliance]]
[[Ertai, Wizard Adept]]
[[Ertai Resurrected]]
[[Ertai, the Corrupted]]
[[Aang, Swift Savior]]

Technically Veto’s Interceptor is closer to a [[Summary Dismissal]] but the general idea is that he’s a character defined by being able to counter and shut down the opponents abilities and snipe them when they try to use them.

Blazers have Jerami Grant or Jrue Holiday as vet big money to send out, likely attached to one of Shaedon Sharpe or Scoot Henderson as a young asset with some upside, and then a plethora of picks that would likely be the main conversation of how much is fair to both sides. Blazers would probably prefer to send Jerami Grant+Shaedon Sharpe to keep their better perimeter defenders, attaching Kris Murray or Yang Hansen or Blake Wesley or whatever to make the money match, and then the specific picks that it takes to get the Clippers on board.

From the Blazers perspective, their new owner has said he would like to make a splashy trade and is very much “win-now” and has an appetite for risky big swings, but the GM Joe Cronin has been an incredibly measured presence who advocates patience, like with the Dame trade he’s not someone whose hand is quick to be forced. They have a two-year window while Deni is still on a far below market contract and the twilight years of Dame’s career, plus they have a number of vets they lean on, so while their “core” is young, their window isn’t as far out as might be thought.

Kawhi would instantly be their best player, with Deni able to carry a lot of the regular season workload, plus with Camara to handle the hardest defensive matchups, that trio of forwards would be an elite chassis to play around. Jrue/Dame/Scoot at guard, Kawhi/Deni/Camara at forwards, Clingan/Rob as your bigs, and Thybulle/Krejci as wings deeper in the rotation, with options to fill out those back of the roster spots.

What do you think it would take for the Clippers to say yes to a Grant+Sharpe+picks package, in terms of fair value?

Optimistically let’s say DC grinds it out hard over the offseason, comes back next year and can handle smallball lineups. Do you think it will be through doing what he does best, even better? Or by working on where he gets exposed so he is no longer exploitable?

Option 1- DC develops as a putback finisher and efficient scorer at the rim through improved physical strength and working on his touch and footwork around the basket, while continuing to distinguish himself as the best offensive rebounder in the league. End result is him crushing the glass and presenting a problem opponents must solve- that is, he demands opponents play a traditional big because smaller guys simply get eaten alive and he kills them too hard on the boards. Here the thought is he simply leans into his strengths to the degree that it abuses the weaknesses of trying to go small against him. He makes opponents struggle to go five-out or small against him because he simply bludgeons his way through them and uses his size to dominate the paint, if opponents can’t keep him off the glass and he’s able to convert that to points, that was basically how the young Rockets team excelled with limited spacing for the last couple years, because they dominated the rebound battle so hard.

Option 2- DC improves as a defender in space and with an additional offseason of dedicated conditioning and agility work, he continues to lean into his body transformation in an attempt to be able to step out and recover, working to be more like Gobert who has managed to develop to a fairly effective perimeter defender while still being as elite a rim protector as they get. While he will always have physical limitations, better judgement for how to position himself in terms of what type of cushion he can afford and still challenge, how to step up and being better about when he needs to move pre-emptively, part of it would have to being a little quicker on his feet and part of it would have to be developing better decision making and playing coverages as perfectly as he can within what his body will allow. Essentially the idea is that he improves at his weakness such that he is no longer as much of a matchup specific big, but is able to better defend against a variety of schemes and still be effective.

Today’s Locked on Blazers episode was a season review on Clingan, and I thought it was mostly fair, but one thing that stuck in my craw a bit was that Mike kept mentioning that Clingan wasn’t able to guard the most elite centers in the league in single coverage, and that the Blazers don’t assign him to cover the best bigs in the league.

That’s by design y’all, look at the Spurs and Thunder matchup, Wemby isn’t guarding Chet or iHart, he’s in zone coverage locking down the paint, and Chet wasn’t guarding Wemby either, they were throwing Caruso and other smaller guys at him most effectively.

Elite defensive centers aren’t elite because they can body up a big and take them out of the game, it’s because they collectively shut off one of the primary avenues of attack by being extremely difficult to challenge down low. Clingan isn’t unique in being used by floating him off the oppositions worst shooter and parking him in the paint, that’s a relatively common choice amongst teams with strong rim protecting bigs, and their mobility merely dictates the range they play free-safety within.

I also think Mike overrated Clingan’s blocks in year one by saying he was a better defender as a rookie, he undersold how valuable scaling up his role and minutes while reducing foul rate was despite retaining elite rim deterrence, efficiency impact, and rebound rate- basically Clingan has a much bigger four factor imprint now even though blocks went down, and blocks have basically zero predictive value for defense being good or bad, I fall much more on the Tim Duncan side of the coin in terms of playing fundamentally sound contests where blocks are a low priority compared to positioning and contesting without fouling.

I think Clingan should be considered inarguably a better defender today than he was as a rookie, he was much more fit and it impacted his game very positively, he played smarter, had learned better about what to engage on, how to play coverages, individual matchups, I don’t think it should be seen as “because our defense wasn’t as good as expectations preseason, Clingan regressed.”

Blazers fans eyes have been bleeding all season from watching our team with bottom of the league 3PT efficiency coupled with near top of the league 3PT attempt volume, which persisted into the playoffs where the offense was ice cold against the Spurs, and when they walled off the paint, we had no answer.

Heck we even traded midseason for Vit Krejci, who had several previous seasons of being an elite shooter, then promptly forgot how to shoot as soon as he arrived in Portland. So forget about going star hunting, Giannis-schmannis, how the hell can we solve our spacing issues???