I’ve been preaching to my friends and colleagues that the early-season successes for the Blazers are suspect at best. While the Blazers have a respectable 11-5 record, they’ve played one of the softest starts to the season of any team this year, playing a field that is currently sitting at a combined 75-90 record. While this might not seem all THAT bad, keep in mind that the Blazers have played the lowly Minnesota Timberwolves (1-13) three times, and have faced a potpourri of other bottom feeders like the Memphis Grizzlies (5-9), Charlotte Bobcats (4-9) and the Detroit Pistons (5-9). The Blazers will continue their early-season cakewalk tonight against the New Jersey Nets – the only team in the league that hasn’t managed to win a game all season. While the Nets have struggled mightily with injuries (playing much of the season without Devin Harris), even fully healthy they gave the Timberwolves their only win of this young season on opening night.
While this Blazers team came into this season with lofty expectations (which they assuredly still retain), this weak schedule has been a blessing for the team. Although many expected the Blazers would pick up right where their stellar team chemistry left off last season, the Blazers have found themselves searching for their identity and tinkering with their lineups and style of play. We’ve seen up-tempo and slow-down offenses, we’ve seen traditional lineups and two point-guard backcourts, and we’ve seen injuries to key pieces to the puzzle in Travis Outlaw and Nicolas Batum – requiring the Blazers to adjust accordingly. Certainly these factors require some exceptions for even the harshest of critics and fan expectations.
But it isn’t the friendly schedule that has me doubting the progress of this Blazers team. What has me most concerned has been their track record thus far against good teams. The Blazers are just 3-4 against teams that are .500 and above, including two losses to Atlanta, one loss to Denver and one loss to Houston. Granted, the Hawks are playing some of the best ball of anyone so far this season (with wins against Cleveland and Boston as well) and the Nuggets are playing at a high level behind the rejuvenated Carmelo Anthony. But still, only three wins against +.500 teams leaves many question marks as to where this team ranks amongst the league’s elite. The saying goes, “good teams should always beat the teams they are supposed to beat, and occasionally the teams they aren’t.” For the most part, the Blazers have been able to beat the teams that they are clearly supposed to beat, but it’s the losses to teams that they “occasionally” should beat that have me a bit on edge.
While the Blazers have a spattering of tough games here and there over the next week, I don’t think we will really see the true colors of this Blazers team until their highly difficult road trip in late December. Starting on December 19 they will play four games over five nights at Orlando, Miami, Dallas and San Antonio, and return home to face Denver in their first game back. Every game right now counts, but I think we will have a clearer picture of the Blazers overall level of play once they are through that stretch.
Is the level of success that the Blazers have achieved so far this season more or less than you had been expecting?
While the Blazers are just 3-4 against those winning teams (Houston x2, Atlanta x2, Denver, San Antonio and Oklahoma City), those four losses have been by a combined 17 points, or about 4 per game (including an OT loss in Atlanta). Their point differential in those 7 games is actually positive, +13. I would argue they have played well enough to be 4-3 or 5-2 in those matchups if a couple bounces went their way. So like you said, it’s early, and I don’t think we’ve seen enough games to make any claims about the Blazer’s ability to beat the good teams just yet. Just my take