Aw, jeepers, is this a post about Blazers again?
Yes, okay! I care about them!
Anyway…a deep playoff run was not to be. The Blazers fell out of the NBA Playoffs two nights ago, putting up an assured effort through most of Game 6 only to fall apart over the final 15 minutes.
Alright, fine. What happened?
With a little over 3 minutes left in the 3rd period, Portland had a 93% chance of winning. Then Jusuf Nurkic imploded through fouling and the Blazers went cold and the Nuggets didn’t.
Sometime in there, I felt a wave of doom. This is a feeling I’d usually ignore but on Thursday night I didn’t. The Blazers’ body language was off, the certainty of the early quarters whisked away somehow, even though they were still winning, and very much in the game. I typically feel relentless hope for the Blazers, and no game is out of reach when Damian Lillard catches fire. Yet the doom pervaded, and almost everything rolled downhill from then on.
So now the Blazer season is over, and the Nuggets carry on to face the Phoenix Suns in the Western Conference Semi-Finals.
And how did your prediction fair?
Extremely well in that the series ended in six games. Not so well in that I picked the wrong team to win.
As I estimated, Dame would need to go supernova (he did), and role players would need to step up (Covington, Powell, and Simons did; Kanter and Little were afterthoughts). I also said the Blazers needed C.J. McCollum and Jusuf Nurkic to shine for the team to have a central Big 3. Outside of a few flashes, neither played to ability.
C.J. was off, somewhat understandably after an injury-abbreviated season. The flows I hoped for never emerged. Nurk, meanwhile, is continually maddening, a player with an astonishing combination of craft, grace and power who occasionally lives up to those gifts and mostly doesn’t. The concern with Nurkic was always his headspace, and whether we’d get the ideal Balkan center or a moody, uneven mope.
Also gotta give it to the Nuggets, a tough all-round team who absorbed Damian Lillard heroics and won through team-oriented ball and shining role-players. The other day Lana and I were walking on the beach and got to talking about how Sun Tzu warned against underestimation in The Art of War. Well, I underestimated the Nuggets backcourt, especially Monte Morris and Austin Rivers.
What now? Is there any good news?
The good news is the Lakers also got booted in the first round so Rip Citizens don’t have to hear their spoiled rivals gloat.
The bad news is losses like this rattle organizations, and there’s likely major change ahead.
Already, Terry Stotts—the best head coach Portland’s had since Rick Adelman—is gone in a move announced yesterday. Next season, Damian Lillard will be 31, still in his prime, and still theoretically healthy and effective for 3-5 more seasons. It’s clear now that Dame needs improved role players to contend, though.
The ideal scenario with the least amount of change is that Zach Collins returns from injury to 2019 playoff form, McCollum enters next season hungry and dialed in from distance, and Nurkic comes back matured and ready to challenge for top center in the Western Conference. Maybe Norm Powell even sticks around somehow, and maybe that squad sticks with the defensive improvements of the late season and turns into an outside contender under a competent new head coach.
More likely, one of the Blazers’ Big 3 will be traded, which may be necessary. I’m loathe to part with the lovable C.J., though right now I’d prefer the boost of Norm Powell’s perimeter defense starting at the off guard position. Jusuf Nurkic has the tools to be great, but not the emotional makeup, and I hope the Blazers upgrade to Karl Anthony-Towns.
The worst case scenario would be cashing Damian Lillard in for a full rebuild. I doubt the franchise dispenses with such a crucial cornerstone, though. In other words, changes are fine but let’s avoid the Self-Destruct button.
With whom should our basketballian playoff loyalties now lie?
If you want a frontrunner and don’t mind cheering for an East Coast squad, go with the Brooklyn Nets because their talent level is undeniably total. The Milwaukee Bucks are also fine and have cool design and likable stars.
I’m a Western Conference guy, though, so I’m now cheering mostly for Phoenix due to our time in that city and because Deandre Ayton reminds me affectionately of Greg Oden. My feelings toward the Nuggets are still raw right now, though I love how they pass and have cool players. The Jazz are always weird but I like them too!
Boo to Dallas and the Clippers, though. We’re all better off with less victory parades featuring Luka Doncic or the City of Los Angeles right now.
Do you ever wonder if your fandom of the Blazers, or sports in general, tips over into idolatry?
Oh, yes! I wonder this often. On one hand, sports have brought me some of my most glorious moments, encouraged prayer, and deepened communal bonds with my neighbors, our nation, and the entire world. Sports are so sweet, man!
On the other, if you looked at a pie chart of how I spend my life, one very large slice would be labeled SPORTS and would include all the time I’ve spent playing sports or thinking about sports or watching sports (on TV or in real life), or tinkering with fantasy rosters, or scouting imaginary athletes to draft for imaginary franchises, or playing sports-centric video games, or running play-by-plays in my head while standing in elevators, then I’m quite certain you and I would both be appalled and genuinely disturbed. And then if you compared that slice with a similar slice denoting how much of my time I’ve spent helping and loving other people, you might cry out, loudly in despair, “Lord, have mercy on Jordan, a hopeless sinner!”
Fortunately, unlike loving Jesus, Blazers fandom—and Oregonian sports fandom in general outside of women’s soccer and Oregon State baseball—is deeply unsatisfying. Unless you were old enough to remember ‘77, the Blazers have almost always been consistently good, yet never truly ultimate. Perhaps to root for such a team is a secret blessing, a heaping helping of horseradish to clear one’s sinuses at the Seder Table of Sports.
But then I remember suffering can also be insufferable, which is why I appreciated Albert Burneko’s reminder in his playoff preview for Defector where he accurately predicted Portland would lose:
I dunno, rending garments over the sad fate of the poor, doomed Blazers is something of an annual basketblogger pastime, these days—Boo hoo, all they ever do is give their fans playoff basketball to watch eight years in a row, while featuring one of the NBA’s most dynamic stars, a guy who has truly embraced the local community and is probably the greatest player in franchise history, truly a fate worse than death—but, like, close to a decade of perennial dignity and competitiveness (and a future hall-of-famer in the starring role) seems like a pretty swell state for a basketball team.
True. To be a Blazer fan is a joy, whether there’s a 93% chance of forcing a Game 7 or we’re nursing a post-loss hangover. To a cheer a historically competent and plucky franchise in a basketball-savvy city, to know and love other Rip Citizens, to live and breath the trumpets and lingo and lore—that’s worth all the Bowies and Odens and first-round flameouts. Right?! Please tell me I’m right.
I had another feeling this week: a breath of relief. I didn’t have to worry about these nerve-wracking games anymore, the hours of gut-churn in crunch time, the endless hoping for these valiant young men to thrive and not be injured and bring us home glory...it’s also nice to exhale. To relax.
That feeling was fleeting as head coach and trade talks swirl, and it’s also true post-season disappointment pales in comparison to Dame hitting buzzer-beater beaters every other night. It’s alright to luxuriate in the lull for a while, get comfortable, rest for next season. Storms ahead or no, Rip City drives on, lickety-brindle up-the-middle.