Keep Climbing, Portland Trail Blazers
By Josh Eberley
Damian Lillard and the Portland Trail Blazers are defying all expectations.
The Portland Trail Blazers are hopping one bar at a time, one game at a time, one shot at a time.
You can’t put this Portland Trail Blazers team in a box. Many have tried; I tried. Before the season I speculated the Blazers would be horrid but thrilling. I believed wholeheartedly they’d play entertaining basketball with little to no team success.
I had hopes for a remarkable individual season from Damian Lillard, a season similar to that of Allen Iverson in 2005-06. Iverson averaged 33 points per game but he took a crazy 25.3 attempts per contest. It was staggering, entertaining to no end, but not good basketball.
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In summation, I predicted Lillard and running mate C.J. McCollum would lead all backcourts in field goal attempts, resulting in a subpar season for the team.
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I was half right, the tandem’s 38.2 attempts a night is leading all backcourts, but it’s working. I didn’t account for something with my hypothesis, I underestimated the fight in this youthful Blazers core. Despite the Blazers starting the season 11-19, the Blazers weren’t overreacting and there backcourt wasn’t just “chucking.”
It’s not often you get a true Cinderella candidate in the NBA, but the Blazers might just be that squad. Nobody keeps up with the Golden State Warriors; they might hang in there for a while but the Warriors have the league’s best weapons, the “Splash Brothers.”
However, Friday, Feb. 19, at the Moda Center, this was not the case. But hey, add it to the long list of accomplishments this Blazers team wasn’t supposed to accomplish.
Since Christmas the Blazers are 19-8. They’ve been a totally different team and it shows. It’s breathtaking basketball, news worthy basketball, and it’s competitive basketball. The offense is firing on all cylinders and it’s not just raw volume. It’s a beautiful thing and it should be embraced to the fullest.
The Blazers top four offensive players before and after Christmas:
| Name | PPG Before | TS% Before | PPG After | TS% After |
| Allen Crabbe | 10.2 | .558 | 11.8 | .586 |
| Meyers Leonard | 8.1 | .494 | 8.7 | .611 |
| Damian Lillard | 24.6 | .545 | 26 | .579 |
| C.J. McCollum | 20.1 | .537 | 22.3 | .545 |
stats via basketball-reference.com
A narrative is a funny thing, sometimes the tale is pure fiction. Fueled by the media and carried out by the sheeple they plague the sporting universe. Other times, the narrative fits the big picture. Originally not a believer in the, “Lillard has a chip on his shoulder that fuels him” story, I’ve come to see the light.
Coming into the season none of the experts had the Blazers making the playoffs, Lillard is having a career year and yet, he was again excluded from the All-Star Game. On top of it all, there are NBA stat heads who don’t want to give McCollum the Most Improved Player award.
The claim is that McCollum’s success is due to increased minutes and not play, but that’s a huge assumption considering he has shattered his per 36-minute projections from the year previous. Keep doubting NBA community, the Blazers are soaking it in.
On to the more solemn note of this column, the Blazers aren’t going to win a round in the playoffs and they are going to lose their draft pick. That’s my belief and the likely reality, though, the Blazers might have me right where they want me. The Denver Nuggets own the Blazers pick, the pick is only top-14 protected. So essentially, if the Blazers make the playoffs, they lose their pick.
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Stuck in the dreaded, “not good enough to compete but too good to draft at the top,” the Blazers are in a tough spot.
Do not lose hope, Oregon natives, defiance is a beautiful thing. The Blazers could’ve laid down, they could’ve trudged through this season with their hands up and no one would’ve blamed them. They lost four starters this offseason, including mainstay and perennial All-Star LaMarcus Aldridge. Every single win from Portland is a big ol’ “we don’t give a damn what you think.”
The Blazers could’ve tanked, maybe that would’ve been the correct direction for a franchise that can’t truly contend and yet what fun is that? Call me old school but losing when you don’t have to is grotesque and shameful. The Blazers are competing, they have a franchise player that’s electric, and they have a young core that fights hard, a core that has shown drastic improvement.
No, it might not be the best decision long-term but maybe Portland needs this. What if they aren’t just proving they’re capable to the world but to themselves.
The Blazers are young, really young. They’ve had 10 players top 800 or more minutes and the old man of that group is Gerald Henderson at 28. Momentum and confidence are powerful allies headed into the postseason and they are invaluable assets to a team looking to nurture a championship unit.
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The Blazers may spend a season in the middle but the climb is less daunting midway up the mountain.