{"id":920,"date":"2016-09-30T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2016-09-30T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonprobasketball.com\/?p=920"},"modified":"2016-09-29T19:11:22","modified_gmt":"2016-09-29T23:11:22","slug":"keys-portland-trail-blazers-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2016\/09\/30\/keys-portland-trail-blazers-season\/","title":{"rendered":"Two Key Factors to a Successful Portland Trail Blazers Season"},"content":{"rendered":"

During the 2016-17\u00a0NBA<\/strong>\u00a0season, headlines will be dominated by\u00a0Kevin Durant<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0and the\u00a0Golden State Warriors<\/strong>\u00a0on a daily basis. However, having a super-team doesn\u2019t guarantee a championship; just look at the 2012-13\u00a0Los Angeles Lakers<\/strong>. Everything can change and anything can happen in the NBA. A team can implode, the injury bug could strike, or a team simply might not play to its potential. In this\u00a0Last Word On Pro Basketball<\/strong>\u00a0series, we\u2019ll break down which two key factors will determine the fate of each NBA team in the upcoming season.<\/em><\/p>\n

In this edition, we\u2019ll take a look at the\u00a0Portland Trail Blazers.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Two Key Factors to a Successful Portland Trail Blazers Season<\/strong><\/h1>\n

The Trail Blazers did\u00a0well to re-sign all of their restricted free agents, along with\u00a0acquiring excellent players in\u00a0Evan Turner<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0Festus Ezeli<\/a><\/strong>. They also extended the contract of head\u00a0coach\u00a0Terry Stotts<\/strong>\u00a0until 2020, after Stotts finished\u00a0a close second to\u00a0Golden State Warriors\u00a0<\/strong>coach\u00a0Steve Kerr<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>in the NBA’s 2015-16\u00a0Coach of the Year<\/strong> vote. After losing four starters, 2015-16 was expected\u00a0to be a season of re-building for Portland. However, Stotts and the Trail Blazers managed to achieve\u00a0a 44-38 record, clinching\u00a0the fifth\u00a0seed in the Western Conference<\/strong>. Portland can only have grown from that\u00a0experience; the\u00a0two key factors below\u00a0could propel the Blazers\u00a0even further.<\/p>\n

First Key: Portland’s Abundance of\u00a0Depth<\/strong><\/h2>\n

This year,\u00a0Trail Blazers are spoiled for choice. Before the 2015-16 season, losing four important players meant that Portland needed to bring in the right young players to help them become contenders\u00a0over the next few years. Many experts projected them to finish outside of the top eight in the Western Conference. Instead, the Trail Blazers made it to the second round of the Western Conference playoffs under the tutelage of Terry Stotts.<\/p>\n

This astonishing result proved that the Blazers\u00a0had indeed found the right players, which meant that this season would\u00a0be\u00a0about adding\u00a0more\u00a0pieces\u00a0to make an immediate impact. Now, it seems that Stotts will struggle to distribute his minutes among his players, while attempting\u00a0to both win games and develop players. This coming season,\u00a0Damian Lillard<\/a><\/strong>, C.J. McCollum<\/a><\/strong>, Al-Farouq Aminu<\/a><\/strong>, Allen Crabbe<\/a><\/strong>, and\u00a0Mason<\/strong> Plumlee<\/strong>, as well as the\u00a0aforementioned Turner and Ezeli,\u00a0will all be vying for a starting role. This does not even take into account the impressive play of\u00a0Maurice Harkless<\/a><\/strong>,\u00a0who eventually won a starting spot\u00a0come the end of last\u00a0season.<\/p>\n

The Addition of Evan Turner<\/strong><\/h3>\n

This article does not even go into depth about\u00a0the addition of Ezeli, who is an elite center in his own right. Evan Turner is just such a good addition on his own, so let’s focus on why. With C.J. McCollum sure to start in the shooting guard position, Turner, if he was to start, would most likely occupy the small forward role. But competition is high for this position as well, with Aminu starting to shoot the deep-ball more efficiently and Harkless also proving his worth\u00a0as a starter late in the season. However, this competition can only mean good things for Portland.<\/p>\n

Turner offers different abilities\u00a0than both Harkless and Aminu, both of whom are\u00a0primarily valued for their perimeter defense. Defenders\u00a0would sag off of Aminu and Harkless\u00a0to focus their attention on Lillard and McCollum last season, making\u00a0the former two\u00a0rather impotent on the offensive end.\u00a0Turner will be able to alleviate some of the scoring and play-making pressure from McCollum and Lillard, which Portland desperately needed\u00a0last season, particularly\u00a0in the playoffs.<\/p>\n

Turner struggles with his deep shooting, but he possesses a knock-down mid-range shot and can burn defenders driving to the rim. This offers an extra dynamic to the shooting guard position, with the other alternative, Allen Crabbe, driving to the basket just 1.2 times per 36 minutes, compared to Harkless’s\u00a03.2 and Turner’s 4.9. In\u00a0Boston, defenders would also sag off of\u00a0Jae Crowder<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0Marcus Smart<\/a><\/strong>, forcing Turner to weave his way through multiple defenders\u00a0in the paint. With McCollum and Lillard spreading the floor and drawing defenders to the perimeter, Turner will have more freedom and should therefore become a more efficient scorer.<\/p>\n

With the addition of Turner, Portland has\u00a0added dynamism to their roster. Last year,\u00a0when Harkless became inefficient on the offensive end, Stotts’ only alternative was to play Crabbe, who struggled on defense. So it was a choice between\u00a0offense and\u00a0defense, but not both at the same time. Turner is a very good perimeter defender. Last season, Turner ranked in the top five\u00a0of guards<\/a> in the NBA for defending three-point shooters (minimum 65 games played). The opponents who Turner guarded on the perimeter shot 35 percent from deep, and his mid-range defense also puts him in the elite defensive category, with only a 4.5 percent\u00a0difference. With that being said, we will now take a look at the second key for Portland next season.<\/p>\n

Second Key: The Guards Must\u00a0Defend Better<\/strong><\/h2>\n

It would be easy to argue that Lillard and McCollum are the in the top three\u00a0for offensive back-court tandems in the NBA. McCollum blossomed in his starting role last season and went on to win the league’s Most Improved Player<\/strong> award. Lillard not\u00a0making the All-Star Game<\/strong> was an injustice, and he proved as such,\u00a0especially towards the second half of the season. Together, the two\u00a0combined for 45.8 points and 11.1 assists per game. It is harder, however, for me to argue that they are in the top three\u00a0back-court duos when assessing their defensive efforts.<\/p>\n

Last Season<\/strong><\/h3>\n

After losing four of their starters going into the 2015-16 season, after\u00a0ranking in the top five to ten defensively\u00a0the past two seasons, the Trail Blazers seemed especially deficient on the defensive end. There is no doubt that Portland is\u00a0an elite team offensively – possibly efficient enough to contend for the title. But for all Portland’s\u00a0offense, it has always been proclaimed that defense wins championships<\/a>. The Blazers\u00a0ranked 21st in defensive efficiency last season. While their rim protection was stable enough, Stotts’ team struggled at closing out on three-point shooters.<\/p>\n

Although we saw slight improvements on the defensive end, Lillard remained one of the game’s worst defenders by both the eye test and advanced stats. He and McCollum finished 13th and 12th, respectively, among Blazers players\u00a0in defensive box plus\/minus (BBPM). Furthermore, three\u00a0Portland players were among\u00a0the ten\u00a0worst three-point defenders in the league – more than any other team. Gerald Henderson<\/a><\/strong> occupied the worst spot in both three-point defense percentage (46.4%) and\u00a0percentage point differential (10.7%). Fortunately, Henderson has been replaced by Turner, who occupies the opposite end of both of these statistics. Crabbe was a particularly bad perimeter defender last season (40.7% defensive field goal percentage) and Lillard was not too far behind him in that same category (40.1%).<\/p>\n

Moving Forward<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Towards the end of the season, Stotts made a few changes to his rotations, which improved Portland’s\u00a0defense ever so slightly. Harkless saw his minutes double, Noah Vonleh<\/a>‘s<\/strong> minutes were cut by a third, and\u00a0Meyers Leonard<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>faced a lengthy spell on the sideline due to\u00a0injury. As a result, the Blazers became slightly more efficient on the defensive end. Before those changes, they had been giving up 108.7 points per 100 possessions; that number\u00a0improved to 107.4 for the final 11 games after the lineup changes.<\/p>\n

This defensive improvement is not drastic by any means and can still hardly be considered ‘good’ defense. It’s also hard to draw any conclusions from 11 games down\u00a0the stretch, and the improvements might not have even been a direct result of the lineup changes. But one thing is for certain:\u00a0Turner and Ezeli will bring added defensive coverage, as well as rebounding. Even if Turner’s defensive contribution is average, this will still be a huge upgrade over\u00a0one of the worst defensive players last season (sorry, Gerald Henderson).<\/p>\n

Ezeli’s Defensive Impact<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Ezeli will also add some extra rim protection and muscle in the paint. Given that Ezeli is\u00a0a center who could easily start on many NBA teams, Portland is\u00a0blessed in the big man department. This is exactly why Ezeli\u00a0was brought into the team, with Stotts himself saying in a preseason interview that Ezeli is there to bring\u00a0extra rebounding and rim protection. Interestingly enough, Stotts also claimed that he was brought in to introduce a smaller Portland lineup:\u00a0“In today\u2019s NBA, particularly with the plan of playing Farouq at the 4, [Ezeli] is going to give us the ability to play a smaller lineup and still have a defensive component to it.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n

In 16.7 minutes per game over 46 contests\u00a0for the Golden State Warriors<\/strong> last season, Ezeli\u00a0averaged\u00a07.0 points, 5.6 rebounds, and 1.09 blocks per game. Stotts believed that Ezeli\u00a0was one of the best defenders on one of the league\u2019s top defensive teams. With new-found dynamism, an upward trending defensive effort, and more stability come next season, the Trail Blazers find themselves in a good position. But, for all of their offensive power, they still seem to be an average defensive team. This does not look like a\u00a0championship team, but it is still\u00a0one that\u00a0could, potentially, make a deep playoff run.<\/p>\n

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Main photo:<\/p>\n

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Embed from Getty Images<\/a><\/div>\n