Tonight, I got to go see ^[1] the Blazer game. I was left with a variety of thoughts.

For my recap of thoughts during the game (and some half-decent pics from the game), you can read here ^[2].

We’re discouraged from pulling things from our own blogs to put here, but I thought that we may be able to have an interesting Blazers discussion regarding some of my final thoughts, so I’ll post them here and you can chime if if you’re interested…

Final thoughts

Z-Bo was amazing. Yet we lost to a team that we should have beat. I can’t help wondering if this a coincidence. Since Zach’s been back, we’ve gone 0-3 after going 3-0 with him gone. And we’re losing games we should really have a shot at, especially with a player of Zach’s caliber on the floor. What gives?

I think Z-Bo stymies the offense of the other players on the team. Which would be fine if Z-Bo were, say, Kobe, and if we were the Lakers. They’re designed to complement Kobe. And Kobe’s dominant on both ends of the floor.

The Blazers are designed to get scoring from more than one person. When you have a game where the ball gets pushed into one guy, and the guy shows a propensity for taking shots when he could pass (really, Zach should’ve had a triple-double tonight, except he’s not very good at passing to an open man when the defense collapses on him), then the team can’t get the production it should. LaMarcus is a legitmate 15 point guy right now, but he was held to 6 tonight. Roy is a 20 point guy right now, but was held to 13. I think a lot of this has to deal with the fact that they aren’t being fed shots they should.

I’ve picked on Zach a lot, so I know this may come off as me being a hater. But I can’t help wondering if the result wouldn’t have been different with him sitting out, even though he scored a career-high 43 tonight. I think if other guys had a chance to get into a rhythm, it would’ve paid dividends all over (like on the free-throw line, where we shot an abysmal 69%, or from 3-point land, where we were 0-11 overall).

After the game, I heard a couple of things that I thought were interesting. First, Coach McMillan was on the Fifth Quarter on KXL and noted that the disparity in free throws had a lot to do with weak defense by our squad. Alot of reaching and grabbing and not enough moving of the feet and chasing the ball. But he also seemed to imply that the officiating was a bit ludicrous, and I tend to agree.

From Charles Barkley on NBA Tonight: “The Grizzlies are like the Washington Generals.” My thoughts exactly. We had no business losing this game.

Today Roy was on Colin Cowherd’s ESPN radio show. He noted that he thinks that next year we should make the play-offs. With the current squad, I’m not so sure.

My off-season wish list:

–> Move Z-Bo. He’s a great player, and his value is going to be at its peak after this season. But we have LaMarcus, who is the future for us at PF, and we need to pull a legitimate big-time small forward. After tonight’s game, Kevin Pritchard paid lip-service to bringing both Ime Udoka and Travis Outlaw, our current SF platoon, back in the off-season. I can see bringing both back. But as back-ups, not as starters. We NEED to upgrade. And for anyone hoping that Darius Miles will come back, I feel pretty confident that he’ll never lace ‘em up again as a Blazer.

–> Draft a center. Joel and Jamaal are fine for now, but we need to develop the player of tomorrow. LaMarcus is not a center, and we need to move him to the PF, where he belongs. And the truth is that, without a legitimate star at center, we aren’t going to go anywhere, even if we make the play-offs. Go back 15 years and look at who won the championship. Unless the teams had Michael Jordan (who still always had a real-life center on his squads, even if they weren’t star centers), they had Shaq, or Duncan, or Olajuwon, or Ben Wallace. Portland’s best recent seasons included Sabonis, who was a big fat turd but who took up a lot of space, made scoring more difficult, and had some offensive talent. Right now we have little offense and spotty defense at center. We won’t be able to trade for a good center, since everyone’s aging at this point. We need to draft a real big man and train him up. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that all of the NBA draft boards I’ve seen have the Blazers drafting a center with their first pick. I think that’s where we need to go.

–> Move Jarrett Jack (this hurts to say…I love the guy). He deserves to start somewhere, I think. But he’s not our guy, and he doesn’t fill our needs. We need to turn the keys over to Sergio, build his confidence, and bring in a role-player (a shooter) to back him up.

–>Do something with Darius. I don’t like the idea of him lurking out there, almost certain not to come back but always a possibility. Darius has always intrigued every team that’s had the displeasure of dealing with him with his potential. I don’t see that changing. The “what if he can come back” thoughts won’t stop swirling in the minds of the powers-that-be at One Center Court, and that alone is reason enough to dump him. I don’t want any planning going on for the future that involves the possibility of Darius coming back. I don’t see the benefit. That said, I know it’s hard to just waive him and carry the money on our books. But it’s only two more years, and I honestly think we’re that far away from the play-offs anyway.

I have great hopes for this team. But if anyone thinks that we’re not in a two-to-three-year rebuilding phase prior to really making any noise in the play-offs, they’re deluded. That said, I’ll probably fall into the trap of what-could-be early next season, and again be disgruntled toward the end when the team doesn’t meet my unfair expectations.

YOUR THOUGHTS?