A week into the season is a juicy time for overreactions. There’s a big enough sample size to come to some sort of quick-draw conclusions, but clearly not enough to reach an overarching verdict for the year. As far as the Portland Trail Blazers are concerned, there are plenty of, well concerns; but there are also reasons for optimism.
Some of the Blazers’ most hyped young players have struggled out of the gate, while some have exploded out of it. Some veterans have shown they know how to play winning basketball, while others have regressed from what they showed a season ago.
Blazers Twitter (X) has held a heated discussion about a certain coach, as well.
So what hyperboles can be made in the first week of November?
3 overreactions to the first 5 games of the Trail Blazers season
First: What do these overreactions mean?
They’re small sample sizes, but are they harbingers of things to come? Or are they just small blips in an 82-game marathon?
Here – at least for now – are the three most significant ones coming out of Portland.
Overreaction No. 1: Scoot Henderson will have an underwhelming rookie season
A lot of hype, questions and expectations surrounded Scoot Henderson’s NBA debut. He was the No. 3 pick in the 2023 draft, and fair or not, is viewed not only as the straw that broke the camel’s back in the Damian Lillard-Portland relationship, but as his replacement.
Regardless of how well he handled the interviews, how good he looked in summer league and all the praise he received during training camp, that’s a lot for a 19-year-old to deal with.
In his debut, Scoot scored 11 points on 5 of 11 shooting in 36 minutes. He missed all three of his 3-point tries. He had 4 assists, but he also had 4 turnovers. Not a great game, not a terrible one.
Henderson followed that with games of just 7 and 4 points, respectively. He scored 11 again in a win at Toronto, but also fouled out. Just when he seemed to be catching a stride – he had 11 points and 7 assists in only 20 minutes of action against the Detroit Pistons on Nov. 1 – he rolled his ankle and missed the remainder of The Shaedon Sharpe Game.
As the Victor Wembanyama highlights continue to roll in and No. 2 overall pick Brandon Miller keeps scoring efficiently, Scoot will be pushed to the background. In hindsight, expectations were just too high.
Still, he has yet to play five full NBA games. So is the start of his career underwhelming? Sure. Will his rookie year be underwhelming? Doubtful.
Henderson still has the same strength, speed, explosiveness and basketball IQ that drove the expectations so high in the first place. Once he recovers from his ankle injury and settles in, there’s no reason to think Scoot won’t have a promising rookie campaign.
Jerami Grant will have a major shooting regression
In terms of pure scoring, Jerami Grant’s best season came 2020-21 when he was the No. 1 option on a Pistons team that finished 20-52. In terms of meaningful scoring, and efficient scoring, Grant’s best season was last year with the Trail Blazers.
The former Syracuse star averaged 20.5 points per game, the second-highest of his career, but it was the way he scored that stood out.
Grant is a career 35.7 percent shooter from three. Last year, he shot 40.1 percent, the first time he’s ever eclipsed the 40 percent mark. He shot 47.5 percent from the floor on 14.5 attempts while averaging the most minutes of his career. Jerami settled into the perfect role for him: He was the No. 3 option on offense with the potential to score like a No. 2 on any given night.
Through the first week of the 2023-24 season, Grant is averaging 18.2 ppg, but his efficiency is atrocious. He’s shooting 38 percent from the floor and a miserable 24 percent from three on 5.0 attempts a night.
Is it safe to assume last year was an aberration for the 10-year pro? Maybe. But it’s an overreaction to conclude after five games that there’s a major regression coming, and Grant is going to be a subpar shooter for the entire season.
Chauncey Billups needs to be fired
Even with more than two years as the Portland Trail Blazers head coach under his belt, it’s still not fair to judge Chauncey Billups’ tenure.
The reasons for his struggles the past few seasons are well documented. He dealt with a ton of injuries and saw most of his best players traded as the franchise openly tried to lose. This year is the first season Billups will be able to put his own stamp on his own team.
Although they lost their first three games – and they didn’t look very pretty doing it – the Blazers’ young players have shown some progression already. Maybe Chauncey isn’t the best coach in the league when it comes to X’s and O’s, but he’s pushing the right buttons on his young Jimmies and Joes.
Simply based on the eye test, Portland is playing hard. Statistically, the Trail Blazers are 12th in the NBA in defensive rating and are middle-of-the-pack in steals and blocks. They’re 10th in paint scoring, more than 16 percent of their points come off turnovers and they score 12 percent of their points on the fast break.
Those aren’t eye-popping numbers, but they are numbers that point to a team playing with effort. This is still a young, inexperienced squad that doesn’t have the talent to compete with a lot of NBA teams.
Billups at least deserves to coach this young group for one season.