It’s just easier to say Aldridge is soft and call it a day. To this I say, “(Long-Horned) Bull“.

Aldridge, as with every other individual on the team, deserves his fair share of the blame. He’s not consistently making quick decisions when dealing with double teams and he’s letting the defense get comfortable when the ball goes into the post. But when Aldridge picked up two fouls with 7:55 in the first quarter, it was a four-point game. Eight minutes of Juwan Howard defense — for all the effort Howard puts in, this is a terrible defensive matchup for him — later, and Aldridge is returning at the start of the second quarter with the Blazers down 18.

Just as we shouldn’t expect Rudy Fernandez to suddenly become an impact playmaker — even with Steve Nash marking him — when he hasn’t done so all season, we can’t expect Aldridge to be the type of explosive scorer that single-handedly brings a team back from the brink. What you can do is use his post offense as a foundation for that run, which otherwise requires a boost from he perimeter players.

So let’s take a look at Aldridge’s post offense, quarter by quarter, to see how he did. This is not a complete rundown of Aldridge’s post looks, just those that he attempted to score out of. As mentioned earlier, his passing out of the double teams needs to be more fluid.

First Quarter: Aldridge shoots 0-for-3 with a turnover and two fouls. A play that is not shown is a nice assist to a back-door cutting Nic Batum for the dunk.

The first thing you notice is the quick jumper in the first clip, but for some reason Rudy was bringing the Steve Nash double over. But being how far Aldridge was from the hoop, Nash likely would have taken a swipe at the ball and kept on moving with Rudy.

The next two possessions probably please most of you, as Aldridge makes strong moves to the basket, getting a shot — easily rebounded — look in the paint on the first one and drawing the foul on the second. Both times, the double comes at Aldridge from the top side, but he handles it well in getting into his move. I’m not seeing anything “soft” here.

Second Quarter: With the Blazers down by 18 at the start of the quarter, Aldridge doesn’t make a move out of the post until the six-minute mark. Aldridge shoots 2-for-5 overall, getting to the line for six shots, with a turnover.

The first possession is the worst, as Aldridge uses his dribble and takes a bad, but makeable, fadeaway. Had Martell Webster made a quicker cut, though, Aldridge looked like he was ready to pass off rather than taking the forced shot. Then he takes a quick jumper on the second look, faking the spin away from the help defense that’s ready on the baseline, but this time follows up the miss with the offensive putback. As long as Aldridge is shooting within 15 feet, and thus producing softer bounces, the opportunity was there for he or another teammate to grab the miss.

Remember, Aldridge is working with two fouls and has already committed a charge trying to get into the lane, which can affect aggressiveness, especially if you haven’t recognized where the help is coming from.

The next two shots are what you want to see, as Aldridge shows quick awareness of the defense. First, Aldridge establishes deep position, makes the catch and immediately goes up for the hook shot, drawing the foul as the help sinks into the paint. Then, his finest possession of the night, Aldridge keeps his dribble, sees the help available from Nash on the top side, so he spins baseline for a lefty hook.

Third Quarter: Aldridge shoots 3-of-5 in the quarter, getting two free-throws with no turnovers and a technical foul for barking with Amar’e Stoudemire. The game is clearly out of hand.

On his first back-to-the-basket look of the quarter — he previously spun off a fronting defender for an alley oop to lead things off — Aldridge again spins away from the top-side help for the baseline jumper. Second look: Aldridge quickly faces up and makes a strong move to the hoop, missing but leaving an offensive rebounding lane for Webster as the defense was drawn to the left block.

Then he goes back to the jumper. Not the ideal shots, especially down a hundred, but you can see that there is defense waiting for him on both sides if he chose to try and get around his man. The problem isn’t the shot he took, but that he was positioned far enough away from the hoop to give the defense plenty of recovery space.

If anything, that’s what you come away with: that Aldridge needs to get better position. When Aldridge got closer looks, it collapses the defense and creates opportunities for his teammates. When he doesn’t get good position, it allows the defense to just stand around and look at him without having to react. And when the defense is forced to inch closer, Aldridge often made the right reads to go away from the defense and create his kind of shots with only one man defending.

After watching this video, does it make sense to put all the blame on Aldridge or to start evaluating his trade value? Doesn’t seem like it to me. The problem is, without Roy, the expectations for Aldridge to score are greater, and it’s tough for him to all of the sudden become something he’s not when he has to be close to perfect with his defensive reads. He’s been steady. Perhaps steady would have prevented that monster run by Phoenix in the first quarter, but it wouldn’t have changed the outcome even had Aldridge played all 48 minutes.

As it’s been all season long when Roy is out, the Blazers need someone other than Andre Miller to capitalize on how Aldridge affects the defense. In the last two games, they haven’t gotten close to enough. Instead, while Aldridge works in the post — remember, this is a huge learning experience for him, too — half his teammates are taking five steps from the dinner table of offense and….thud.

In the 22 pick-and-roll possessions shown, the Suns scored 23 points, so a little over a point per possession. They also got quality shots on 12 of those possessions, committing two turnovers in the process. Those numbers fall right in with the Suns’ season averages, where they scored 0.95 points per possession when the ball handler (Nash, normally), used the possession — the top ranked such play in the NBA.

You’ll notice how the Blazers didn’t rely on show-recover tactics to avoid switching on the screens. In fact, at times Amar’e only needed to stand in the area of a pick and the Blazers would switch men in order to keep both players on the perimeter. The most effective defense, though, was when they didn’t switch, but used whatever defender was in the paint at the time — usually Camby — to step up and stop Stoudemire’s roll while Nash was pushed off his drive line. Packing the paint like this left a number of three-point shooters open and, even with the relatively quick recovery closeouts we saw from the guards in this video, it’s fair to assume that the Suns are going to catch fire and win a game with those threes Nash creates.

But that might be OK. Better than letting Nash weave his way into the paint on any of the 457 picks he uses, or letting Stoudemire roll to the hoop unhindered. As long as the Blazers can run off a reasonable percentage of three-point shooters, the overall effect will be limiting the Suns to a streaky, perimeter based offense rather than the unhealthy Dunk-Three-Open Nash Jumper rhythm the team can get into.

Keep an eye on the guards in all those switch situations tonight. With Miller and Bayless shadowing Amar’e into the paint, the Blazers were often at a rebounding size disadvantage — allowing 17 offensive boards. That’s part of the reason why Camby outrebounded Aldridge 17-3 — the onus is on Camby to compensate for his guards in the paint while Aldridge is busy chasing guys at the arc.

We’ll see what adjustments the Blazers and Suns make in Game 2 tonight and compare it to the Game 1 defense tomorrow. Defensively, everything starts with that pick-and-roll, and the Blazers are going to have to play it at least as good as they did in Game 1 to win the series.

Batum did the Timberwolves wrong. The Jazz were full of empathy.

There’s little you can say to make someone think that Saturday night’s win against the Minnesota Timberwolves was not Nic Batum’s best game as a Portland Trail Blazer. It may not have been his greatest seasonal impact, given the quality of opponent, but statistically it was his best line and will probably be the game we point back to at the end of the season when arguing his grip on the starting small forward position for the foreseeable future.

Random fan: “Why didn’t you guys trade for Gerald Wallace? You need a small forward.”

Blazer fan: “31 points, 7 rebounds, 7 assists, 5 threes, 3 steals, 0 turnovers. Put that in your pipe, smoke it, taste it, and like it.”

I didn’t catch the game live, though, having recorded it earlier in the night, and came away slightly underwhelmed by the performance. Some of it I attributed to Minnesota’s “We don’t need no stinkin’ defense” defense, some of it to the fact that a lot of his offense was created for him, as he mostly needed to take care of positioning and shooting. Those are very important aspects to the game, of course, but role players like Eddie House and Kyle Korver both have career-highs of 31 points with positioning and shooting, and have dished more than seven assists, just not all in the same game. Mostly, as elite at Batum’s stat line was, he never appeared to be dominating the game like other elite players do. In other words, he never looked unstoppable.

Maybe this is a good thing, that he can put up fantastic, efficient numbers in a supporting role without having to stand out in a ball dominating role like Jerryd Bayless has this season in his own explosive games. Nevertheless, Batum put himself in such rare company — check was Mookie had to say at asternwarning.com — that it’s worth a second look at Nic’s 22-point third quarter, just to see what we can see.

First, the raw data. Of Batum’s 11 field goals, 10 were assisted. The only one which didn’t come off a pass was a baseline offensive board and putback. He also made 4-of-4 free throws. Compare that to Bayless’ 31-point night on Dec. 23rd against San Antonio, when only 4-of-10 baskets were assisted and he got to the line 10 times.

Nic hit 5-of-8 threes, giving him an effective field-goal percentage from that range of 93.8 percent. Pretty sure you can win a 3-Pt Shootout with that. After the triples, Batum shot 1-of-2 from 16-23 feet, 1-of-1 from 10-15, missed his only shot within 10 feet while converting on all four at the rim.

Out of Batum’s seven assists, three were on mid-range jumpers, while four were on shots at the rim. Efficiency wise, his true shooting percentage was 87.3 while scoring 1.73 points per possession used. That’s the Brandon Roy zone. Now lets look at the qualitative stuff, looking at Batum’s offensive possessions beginning with the second half and ending at the end of the third:

• 10:40 in the third — Batum begins the set on the right wing, with Roy in the corner. Batum moves toward the block, making contact with Ryan Gomes. As Andre Miller begins to drive on the opposite side, Batum backpedals into the corner slot, replacing Roy, who moves to the wing, catches Miller’s kickout, and hits Batum for a three. The nearest defender to Batum was Roy’s man, 12 feet away.
• 10:22 in the third — Batum inbounds the ball off a Flynn make and streaks down the left side of the court. Miller finds him a little inside halfcourt, and Batum takes the ball directly toward the hoop for the foul, catching Minnesota’s defense off-guard and in poor position.
• 9:14 — Roy misses a short jumper from the right side of the paint, Batum glides into the middle behind two Minnesota defenders and tips the ball to Marcus Camby for an assist. Mike Rice calls it “Super”.
• 8:42 — Roy gets a clearout from the right corner, with Batum on the left wing. Roy drives and kicks to Miller, who then drops it to Batum who misses the three with a hand in his face.
• 7:22 — Batum gets the ball from Miller on the left baseline, takes two dribbles into the defense, and passes back to Miller. Batum then retreats to the left corner, gets the ball back from Miller, and hits a three with Kevin Love closing out well from a zone defense.
• 6:42 — Batum is standing in the right corner. Roy and Aldridge run a pick and roll at the top of the key, getting Aldridge a long jumper. Batum trots down the baseline, grabs the miss and puts it back in before any Minnesota player so much as looks at him. Once again, poor awareness by the Wolves in a zone defense.
• 6:16 — Batum tries to cut baseline, but backs into the left corner, getting the ball from Camby, who moves into the lane. Batum takes one dribble forward and rises for the contested jumper before bulletting the ball to Camby for the layup and assist. Batum smirks as he backpedals down the court, like he ate a cookie and his mother doesn’t know.
• 5:43 — Batum enters the ball into LaMarcus from the left wing. He cuts baseline, Aldridge hands the ball off with Batum’s defender trailing the play, and Batum waltzes into for an open dunk.
• 3:35 — Rudy gets the ball with five to shoot at the top of the arc. Batum streaks from the right baseline, around Howard in the post, out to the left wing, receives the ball, squares his body and hits a very tough, very contested jumper just inside the line.
• 3:10 — Batum brings the ball across halfcourt and passes to Roy, who drives down the middle and misses a short floater. Howard tips the rebound, which bounces off Darko’s right hand and back to Roy on the left side. Roy takes the ball behind the hoop as four Minnesota defenders watch him and swings the ball out to Batum on the right wing for a three. The nearest defender was in the restricted circle.
• 2:40 — Batum is chillin’ in the right corner after a timeout. Roy comes baseline from the opposite side, hands it to Batum, who fakes the three, gets Ellington in the air, takes a dribble and then gets fouled on the two-point jumper. He makes both freebies, putting the Blazers up 27.
• 1:10 — Roy gives Batum the ball on the left wing after Nic curls off a pick. Batum fakes and passes back to Roy. Then Rudy comes over and screens Batum’s defender, allowing Batum to step back and to the right and receive the ball for an open three, which hits back iron before falling. Nic now has 29 points, 22 in the quarter.
• 38.9 — The Blazers run through an offensive set that goes nowhere, leaving Batum on the right wing and Rudy up top with the ball. The Wolves at this point are in a 3-2 zone. Rudy swings the ball to Batum and the defense finishes one of its better rotations of the quarter, contesting Batum’s three as he misses and falls to the ground with little contact.
• 01.0 — The Blazers play for final possession of the quarter, with Batum waiting in the left corner. Rudy replaces Batum in the corner, pushing Batum to the wing. The ball swings to Rudy, who fakes and gives it back to Batum, who misses with a defender flying right at him.

In total, Batum made seven field goals in the quarter and four threes. On three, arguably four of those baskets, the defense had either ignored or forgotten Batum, or they been picked off by a Blazer screen. Six of the seven buckets were assisted. Of the 14 possessions listed above, Batum only had to put the ball on the floor in five of them. Nic was also never out of position, and moved fluidly as the ballhandlers went though their progressions. Still, as well as Nic played off the ball — and the cuts he made, whether resulting in a hoop or not, were hard, deliberate and effective, even if an inane zone defense didn’t react — there’s no doubt that for most of the quarter, his teammates did much of the heavy lifting in terms of play creation.

The most encouraging things about the quarter, other than the off-ball movement, was Batum’s willingness to test the defense, pass the ball back out and find a better shot, whether with a quick dribble, backpedal or pump fake. Not once did he try to play outside of his own game. The two best examples of him creating for others were the offensive-rebound tip-assist to Camby, and the jump pass that, despite being a jump pass, was an excellent look into the paint that makes you think about Batum’s ability to get healthy Greg Oden the ball, as the team often failed to do in November thanks to Martell Webster and Travis Outlaw.

My reaction wasn’t very different after analyzing the quarter than after my initial watch. Batum did all the right things, he just didn’t do a ton of things, at least not of the sort his MVP-caliber stat line makes you think of. It was a great performance in a supporting role, with a couple glimpses of creative possibilities, but hardly deserving of a Best Leading Actor nomination.