At a certain point, you run out of excuses, people to blame, and fingers to point. The Portland Trail Blazers are seriously struggling, but why?
Before we dig in here, I’d just like to make a quick disclaimer. Every team occasionally loses games to teams they shouldn’t. The Phoenix Suns are also a much better basketball team than most would want to give them credit for. That being said, how many times can this keep happening before we admit this Portland Trail Blazers squad is seriously flawed.
We aren’t even at the halfway point of the season, and Portland has already collected losses to the Warriors, Cavaliers, Pelicans (twice), Kings and Suns. The fact I’m concerned heading into Wednesday’s game against the Knicks in Madison Square Garden is indicative of just how inconsistent this team has been all year.
But maybe that’s unfair. In fact, the Blazers have been consistently bad all year. Don’t take my word for it, the results speak for themselves. Look at their record against quality teams this year.
- Against teams at or above .500: (3-13)
- Against teams below .500: (11-7)
Oh, and it’s important to note those three wins against quality teams came against the Oklahoma City Thunder (twice) and the Dallas Mavericks. The latter is almost certainly overperforming and barely hovering above .500, while the former had not yet established their current chemistry in a win that came on the third game of the year.
Across those thirteen losses to quality teams, the Blazers average margin of defeat has been by 11 points. Most of these games haven’t been particularly close. The Trail Blazers just haven’t played like a team that can compete for a title so far.
It’s easy to blame these struggles on injuries, after all Portland is missing three starting caliber players. But a severe lack of depth and poor performances from the rest of the rotational players were always going to hamper this team. It’s unrealistic to expect Jusuf Nurkic to wave his wand and magically fix all of their issues upon his return.
With each game that passes, Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum continue to suffer under the massive toll that accompanies leading the league in mutes played. Carmelo Anthony is passing less and appears to be regressing into the player that was once exiled from the NBA entirely. Hassan Whiteside has looked to be one of Rip City’s few bright notes, and the fanbase is desperately trying to trade him!
For the first time in a very long time, it seems the trade deadline and the NBA Draft will be the defining moments for the Portland Trail Blazers in 2020 — not the playoffs. After making a Western Conference Finals appearance just last season, this can be chalked up to a failure of herculean proportions.
The Blazers have a litany of problems, there’s no denying that. Instead of digging for more excuses, it’s time to start addressing the issues now before these losses destroy the team’s morale. This team, and this city, deserve far better than what we’re seeing out there.