In Case of Emergency: Break Glass, Pull Roy Alarm

I’m not going to say Brandon Roy coming back eight days after surgery was the greatest moment in history—sports or otherwise—but to put it in hyperbole-free perspective it was like Willis Reed carrying Kirk Gibson on his back as he stormed the beach at Normandy to dunk on Hitler.

Yeah, it was that good.

What started as a day that saw yet another Blazer go down (Dante Cunningham with a stomach bug) quickly turned into the announcement that Roy would dress and be listed as active for the game.  From there the rumor mill started swirling (Would he play?  Would he start?  Didn’t his leg just fall off eight days ago?), and ultimately Roy came off the bench for what proved to be an emotional push that helped the Blazers even this series at two games apiece.  And while Roy’s return will no doubt be the subject of every article written about the Blazers in the next few days, it was the Blazer’s stifling defense that truly stole the show, holding the Suns offense to a meager 87 points.  You read that right.  87.  This was the Suns’ worst offensive effort since January 23rd, 2009.

Phoenix held tough in the first half.  Despite a Rose Garden crowd that was amped and ready to will the Blazers to victory—and a Blazer team led by an active LaMarcus Aldridge that had no intent of getting blown out for the third consecutive game—the Suns managed to keep it close.  Aldridge was looking for his shot often and early, attacking the basket and not waiting around for the double-team as he did in the previous two efforts.  The result?  A 15 point first half.  To put that in perspective, he had two points TOTAL in the first halves of games two and three combined.  But for every time the Blazers seemed to be gaining momentum, the Suns had an answer, like a few clutch Leandro Barbosa threes to keep the game in check.  The end result was a 54-50 halftime lead for the Blazers.

The second half started like the previous game ended—with Jason Richardson finding himself wide open and draining a couple of three pointers.  The collective groan from the Rose Garden—who had seen this happen before—was thankfully short-lived, as Jerryd Bayless provided a much needed scoring punch, hitting a couple of huge buckets off of penetration and even flexing his muscles a bit.  He also landed a hard flagrant foul on Jason Richardson as he stopped a dunk in transition, and though it led to a mini-spurt by the Suns, it was nice to see a Blazer team ready to be the aggressor and shove back.  They got tough exactly at the right time—when the fourth hit.

Even though the Blazers managed to miss 11 straight field goals going back to the end of the third, and failed to score their first bucket until the 7:36 mark of the fourth, Portland didn’t give up their lead.  Period.  They Suns were incapable of regaining the advantage from an ice cold Blazer team due to Portland’s stupendous defense.  The Suns scored twice in a row with the Steve Nash to Amare Stoudemire pick and roll, and rather than try and get any role players involved (Blazer Killer Richardson had zero field goal attempts in the fourth), the Suns were content to try exploit the Blazers inside with Stoudemire—which, to be fair, had been pretty successful up until that point.  But the Blazers changed up defensive assignments, with Nicolas Batum covering Nash and Aldridge covering Amare, and when the pick and roll came, the two switched.  This worked like a charm, as the length between the pair Blazers caused havoc, resulting in a few crucial turnovers by Nash, one of which (a steal from Marcus Camby) led to a fast-break flagrant foul on Batum by Channing Frye.  

The Suns couldn’t deal with the overly-aggressive Blazers down the stretch, and ultimately fell short, recording only 37 points after the half.  All credit is due to the Blazers defense, and the glacially-slow pace, for that.  Avin Gentry said such, pointing to turnovers and the slowed-down pace in the fourth as how the game got away from them:

Aldridge deserves the game ball for this one, recording a double-double with 31 points and 11 rebounds.  Although he looked more active, attacking the basket and demanding the ball in the post, Roy deserves decoy credit (that’s like a game ball, but made out of foam).  In the previous two games, the Suns were able to double team Miller and Aldridge effectively because the ghost of Rudy Fernandez was not a presence on the floor.  With Roy in the lineup, he kept the defense honest, and the result was more open looks for Aldridge, and more driving lanes for Miller and Bayless.  

Roy’s stat line at the end of the night was modest, but his impact was crucial.  This was a needed win for the Blazers, and one that they have got be feeling pretty good about right now.

NOTES: 

-Rudy Fernandez Death Watch ‘10:  Rudy was pulled from the starting lineup this game (with the nod going to Jerryd Bayless instead), and didn’t log a single second half minute.  Of all the players to see the court, from both teams, Rudy saw the least minutes.  Yes, Amundson’s ponytail got more playing time than Rudy.

-The Suns only logged four fastbreak points to Portland’s sixteen.

-Quote of the night: “Thank God, he’s back.” (Aldridge discussing Roy’s return.)

-The Blazers had six more rebounds (5 of which were offensive), 6 more made free throws, and four less turnovers.  That right there was the ballgame. 

Game Four: Blazers vs. Suns

Jason Richardson goes looking for Rudy Fernandez’s game. Nothing was found.

For the Blazer faithful this season has been like one long Kübler-Ross exercise in suffering. We have attended to our five stages of grief in the proper order. First it was denial. Sure, Greg Oden and Joel Pryzbilla have one working knee between the two of them, but the team still has Brandon Roy. They’ll be fine. Then came anger. This was directed at anyone from the token Laker fan complaining about Kobe’s wa-wa-wounded pinky finger, all the way up to yelling out God’s name in vain when you found out that Pryzbilla couldn’t even shower safely. Next was bargaining, a stage made easy by the Clippers’ willingness to bless Portland with Marcus Camby. Then there was depression, the sad reality that this was essentially a wasted season; where the Blazers’ mapped out march towards a championship was stalled out due to a merciless wave of injuries. And finally our current stage: acceptance.

The Suns are the better basketball team. Are they better if Portland was healthy? Would I want to trade rosters? No to both, but right this very second, the Suns are superior. That doesn’t mean Phoenix wins in five, or the Blazers give up (any more than they did Thursday night), but it does need to be said. The Blazers are vulnerable enough to be dominated in back-to-back games not by Amare Stoudemire and Steve Nash, but by Jason Richardson and the Suns’ uptempo pace. When your best offensive option is a pass-first guard like Andre Miller, perhaps it’s time to accept your role. 

This is not reason to hang our collective heads. The Blazers still have plenty of life in them, are clearly capable of winning inside the US Airways Center, and have proven countless times this season that they play their best basketball when the chips are down. If there is any temporary reprieve from the grief of this season, it can come with a Blazers’ victory today. 

Tip-off: 1:30 pm
TV: TNT
Las Vegas Line: Suns -2.5
TrueHoop Network Blog: Valley of the Suns

Friday Practice Notes: Groundhog's Day

Just like Thursday’s game, Friday’s practice was almost a carbon copy of the one that came before. It was eery—talk about needing better energy, no real proclamations or turns in strategy, and Nicolas Batum is again a game-time decision.

If anything, the Blazers seemed somewhat loose. Before they were descended upon by the media, who sought some answers for the previous night’s stupefying performance, their were a number of smiles in the room.

Nate McMillan again said turning the series around is about effort and tenacity much more than adjustments and schemes.

LaMarcus Aldridge, who has been unable to become the Blazers’ primary option with Brandon Roy out, offered nothing new. He did not appear angry, ready to make any promises, or to take any blame. Ben Golliver over at Blazersedge caught Aldridge’s response to a question about Rose Garden fans boo’ing.

Pick and Scroll

Your daily (Mon-Fri) roundup of links from around the blogosphere, typically Trail Blazers related.

• Mike Barrett wants to know, have the Portland Trail Blazers finally reached their limit?

• Jason Quick of the Oregonian reports that Andre Miller says Portland needs to get nasty: 

“We are probably going to have to nasty it up a little bit, like we did in the second half,” Miller said when asked what adjustments the Blazers need to make. “We committed some hard fouls, tried to get up under their skin, but (Phoenix) calmed themselves down and didn’t get caught up in all that. We have to figure out a way to kind of gritty it up a little bit and force them out of their comfort zone like they are doing to us.”

 • Dave Deckard of BlazersEdge agrees with Miller, the Blazers need to get physical. Meanwhile, Ben Golliver says Aldridge looks overwhelmed.

• Coup from Rip City Project says at least this series can be a growing experience. I’d rather it be a winning and growing experience.

• ESPN’s John Hollinger says that with all the injuries, Portland is bringing a knife to a gun fight. A plastic knife. A dull plastic knife. A pink dull plastic knife. A pink dull plastic butter knife.

• Wendell Maxey explains that Phoenix knew they had to hit first.

• Kevin Pelton says at least the Blazers can be happy with how Webster defended Nash with Batum out.

• Matt Moore of TrueHoop Network sister site Hardwood Paroxysm breaks down the difficulty of dealing with the Suns in transition.

• Okay, that’s about all the “Woe is us” I can take for the moment. Here’s a picture of a cuddly bear: 

Ugly Has A Sister: Blazers Whiff Away Home Court

As halftime rolled to a close, Portland fans took their sweet time getting back to their seats. Some didn’t bother returning at all.

For all practical purposes, the game ended with the first quarter. Phoenix came roaring out of the gates while Portland simultaneously stalled. The Suns were up, 34-16. Lights out.

At the half, things had only gotten worse. The Blazers were down 29 and for the first time in months, Rose Garden fans were boo’ing the home team. What’s more, the Blazers deserved it.

Like Tuesday’s blowout loss before it, the Blazers resembled a team without energy, and worse, without hope. Thursday’s 108-89 drubbing, however, recalled something even worse: last year’s playoff opener against Houston.

And just like the Rockets did one year ago, Phoenix did the Blazers Thursday—they ate their souls. Phoenix pushed a heel down into Portland’s throat, watched the body’s life drain away, then twisted and dug in one more, just to be sure.

The home court advantage—both in number of games remaining and the psychological edge it provides—has been stolen by Phoenix.

Every adjustment that the Suns made in game two carried over unchallenged to game three. Grant Hill again contained Andre Miller, the carburetor of Portland’s offensive engine. Quick double-teams stifled LaMarcus Aldridge into another hapless night the post. Rudy Fernandez couldn’t do anything right (until the game was well out of reach).

Coach McMillan agreed that game three felt much like the one before, and in keeping with the consistency, said again the difference was energy, grit, and a quick start.

For the Suns, their barometer, Jason Richardson again scored 20 points in the first half on his way to a playoff career-high 42. Phoenix are now 28-4 this season when Richardson scores 20 or more.

Suns coach Alvin Gentry says Richardson is a key part of their game plan—that the way the Blazers choose to defend the pick and roll, Amare Stoudemire in particular, leaves Richardson open.

And lord, was he. Whatever the defensive tradeoff, there was a point after which the Blazers had no excuse to lose Richardson—say after he had 30. But again and again, Richardson found himself with no defender withing 10 ft. He called it the best game of his career.

The Blazers had nothing new to show. In fact, they had less. Nagged by a shoulder strain, Nic Batum sat out the second half.

And while the series isn’t over yet—a game four win could pull the zombie-Blazers from the proverbial grave—the crack of daylight Portland has left to wiggle through has become the size of a pin prick.

After scoring 17 points on five of 17 shooting, LaMarcus Aldridge, who has been asked over and over what he’s going to do to turn the series around, had no definitive answer. After being pushed and elbowed by Amare Stoudemire, Aldridge pushed back a bit towards the end of the third quarter. The exchange earned both technicals fouls. It was, however, too late in the game for Aldridge to decide to finally get touch. Afterwards, he was as mopey and stunned as I’ve seen him all season.

The Suns, meanwhile, are riding high. After losing home court in game one they’ve regained it convincingly. They were playful afterwards, although they don’t expect Portland to come in and give up game four without a fight.

—-

One question remains: have the Suns, long known for their offensive prowess, finally found a tenacious defense to match? Or are the Blazers, without Brandon Roy, making Phoenix appear better than they really are?

I’ve said it before—the time for excuses with this Blazers team has long passed. And I don’t think Brandon Roy would be the difference maker in the series thus far. In other words, Phoenix are playing passable ‘D’ for the first time in the Steve Nash era.

Pick and Scroll

Your daily (Mon-Fri) roundup of links from around the blogosphere, typically Trail Blazers related.

• Marcus Camby’s agent, Rick Kaplan, and Kevin Pritchard discuss the Camby signing. The most important thing to glean from this is that apparently Kevin Pritchard is not a lame duck.

• Geoffrey C. Arnold of The Oregonian wants to see LaMarcus Aldridge step up in this series. I agree, but I’ll tell you that it’s awfully hard to play against a committed double team, which is what Aldridge will be facing as long as players like Rudy Fernandez can’t take advantage of the imbalanced defense. Right now, Portland is in the same condition they were in last year against Houston, there are two scoring threats (Miller and Aldridge instead of Roy and Aldridge) that the defense is determined to deny and nobody is stepping up to make the defense pay. 

• The Oregonian’s Jason Quick has an interesting interview with “Mr. Half-Court-Fling” himself, Rudy Fernandez. Take a look at that interview and tell me, is Rudy using his “role” as a pejorative?  It seems to me that there is a touch of scorn and frustration inherent when Rudy refers to his (limited) role. Of course, I could just be reading way too much into it.

• Speaking of Rudy Fernandez, Coup from Rip City Project says he’s not just invisible, he’s an illusion.

• Nate McMillan got third place in the Coach of the Year voting. Well, those other two guys must have won more games… No? Well, maybe they had more injuries to deal with? No? Well maybe everyone just made poor predictions at the beginning of the year and now rather than admit they were wrong, they attribute credit to the coach and give him an award for their lack of foresight? Ah, so that’s why Jerry Sloan has never won a Coach of the Year award.

• Well, Blazers, if you can make it past these Phoenix Suns the cavalry is on its way.

• You can take Channing Frye out of Portland, but apparently he won’t shut up about it. Oh Channing, if only you’d been able to shoot over 40% from beyond the arc in your time with us.

• Wendell Maxey reports that Roy is a “twelve flasher” as we used to call them (definition).

• Chris Ballard over at Sports Illustrated says as Andre Miller goes, so go the Blazers. Take a minute to read this article, it’s got several interesting tidbits, including Andre Miller’s nickname “Young Richard.”

• Sarah Moon over at A Stern Warning has been working on a Blazers Letterpress project.

• Via The Onion, Amare Stoudemire is still trying to figure out where he was traded to. 

• ESPN’s John Hollinger takes a look at the top 10 playoff stories. Camby’s signing makes the cut for an interesting reason:

Want to know why Portland could extend Marcus Camby? As I mentioned a couple days ago, the revised salary-cap guidance released by the league at this past weekend’s Board of Governors meeting meant the Blazers could add Camby to next year’s payroll while staying under the luxury tax.

Want to know why the Blazers felt they had to extend Camby’s deal? Same reason. With the new cap guidance and increased flexibility it provided, Portland felt teams like New York, Oklahoma City, Miami and the Clippers all were poised to make a run at Camby. 

Game Three: Blazers vs. Suns

Illustrator: Dave Bow

Say hello to “The Pinhweel.” 

If a ridiculous hand sign can work for Diamond Dallas Page, the Crips, Ronnie James Dio, the Texas Longhorns, and Jay-Z, it might as well work for the Portland Trail Blazers. Given that the Blazers surrounding cast is already a mixed bag of larger-than-life personalities (The Hippie, Free Throw Guy, DarthBlazer, Travis Diener), might as well give the Portland faithful it’s very own hand gesture. “The Pinhweel” can be thrust into the heavens as a proud act of fandom, flashed across the number six Trimet bus to a fellow Blazer fan (like a secret handshake), and perhaps it will replace Rudy Fernandez’s three digit celebration after he drains a three-pointer (that is, if he ever hits one again). Think of it as a less annoying, and far less insulting to Native Americans, Tomahawk Chop. 

It’s “The Pinwheel,” and do with it what you will.

Now on to the game: How much homecourt advantage do the Blazers really have? Certainly not as much as last season, where Portland’s 34-7 record inside the house that Paul Allden’s money built was fourth best in the league (although no one bothered telling the Houston Rockets that). This season the Blazers reside on the other end of the spectrum, possessing the worst homecourt record (24-17) of any Western Conference playoff team. While there is something to be said for the deafening volume of this sanctuary of inflatable boom stick yielding Blazer faithful, the pair of upcoming Rose Garden games will not come easy for the Blazers.

Following the results of game one, Alvin Gentry adjusted in a big way. Now it’s your turn, Nate McMillan. If there ever was a time for McMillan to show the Coach of the Year voters (Third place!?!) that he deserved better, it’s tonight. Adjustments need to be made on every inch of the hardwood, from Andre Miller being blanketed by Grant Hill for all 94 feet of the court, to Portland’s inability to clog the lane in game two. Since both the Suns and Blazers rely on tempo (the Suns like it fast and furious, while the Blazers prefer the leisurely sunday driver approach), the opening minutes of the game are everything. Nothing good can from Nash hitting the double digit mark in assists before the half.

For now, everything hinges on this game. If Portland wins, game two was just a fluke, an off-night loss that they didn’t really need in the first place. The Blazers would have the homecourt advantage and momentum on their side. But if the Suns win, panic. All homecourt advantage vanishes for Portland, and the team knows that it will have to win in Phoenix one final time. No one wants that. 

Wednesday's Practice Notes

Nate McMillan hasn’t slept in almost a week.

The restless nights began a few days before the series with Phoenix opened last Sunday. It’s almost routine now. “Nobody sleeps at this time of year,” McMillan said, motioning towards his players and assitant coaches.

McMillan and the team returned from Phoenix early Wednesday morning. He got home around 2:00AM. And though the schedule is exhausting, McMillan says there’s too much on his mind to get real, restorative sleep. “You just doze,” he said.

So at 6:00AM the McMillan got back out of bed. By 8:00AM he was back at the Blazers practice facility watching tape. And around 2:00PM, after practice and done answering questions before the horde of media, McMillan headed back into his office—presumably to watch more tape and plan for Thursday’s game.

“It’ll be over soon enough,” I said before catching myself. “Well, hopefully not.” He just smiled. Tired, yes. But happy just the same.

McMillan’s main message to his team and to the media was energy. It isn’t about adjustments, he said. It’s about tenacity and will.

—-

Nicolas Batum, part of the injury train including an ankle-iced Marcus Camby and a knee-wrapped Brandon Roy, followed back into the team huddle after practice. An MRI showed Batum has a strained shoulder, not the recurrence of a torn labrum as originally feared.

The shoulder, Batum says, remains painful, but he expects to play. Team doctors will weigh in Thursday morning. At this time, Batum is technically a game-time decision.

From this vantage point, I see Batum as determined to play, regardless of pain. He sits only if doctors make him.

—-

Brandon Roy watched the first game at home. He wanted to be alone.

“Game one was the hardest,” Roy said. He just wanted to be there so bad. Instead Roy was stuck on the couch, his post-surgery knee elevated.

It was a serious enough feeling where Roy wanted to be focused—and free from other’s comments and suggestions.

Game two was a bit better (even if the result was worse). Roy watched with his family in Seattle as the Blazers fell in Phoenix.

Wednesday Roy was back in the practice facility, but didn’t go through regular drills with the team. After working in the weight room, Roy met with reporters, sharing that wherever media talk of a one or two week return came from was somewhat unfounded. Roy says he got a call from the doctor asking if he himself shared such info with the media. He had not.

Roy is ahead of schedule, but is not meaning to suggest that he would return unless the Blazers get through the first round.

—-

Rudy Fernandez has been frightful in the place of Brandon Roy. In to games he is a combined two of nine from the field (%22) and has scored just 10 points.

Yet he decided to spend some practice time Wednesday working on half-court flings:

—-

Andre Miller, who had a private meeting in the coach’s office afterward, met the media in a more jovial mood than usual. He talked about getting himself more involved after the switches in the Suns’ defensive scheming and more:

—-

LaMarcus Aldridge also had a few words in how he hopes to have more of an impact. Wish he was a little more fired up?