In my first articles, I gave explanations and breakdowns on the five starting players for the Portland Trail Blazers. They were first because they’re the best and most important players on the team; this is why, to be bluntly obvious, they’re starters.
No one on the bench, on the other hand, doesn’t figure to play more than 18 minutes a game – at least, I hope so. Last year’s sixth man, Mo Williams, was not resigned by the team, likely because they believed his presence would stunt the growth of either CJ McCollum or Will Barton (The People’s Champ!), but also because he wanted more money. The Blazers couldn’t give him that money because of salary cap constraints and General Manager Neil Olshey’s general wish to maintain that most precious of commodities – cap flexibility.
In the interest of saving myself loads of research on dudes I either already know well or who won’t make any impact for Portland this season, I decided to highlight several players the Blazers will be counting on to help relieve the enormous minutes load on their All-Stars, LaMarcus Aldridge and Damian Lillard. They fall into these two broad categories: veterans wanting to play for a good team, and youngsters that need to prove they belong in the NBA.
Steve Blake: Longtime followers of the Trail Blazers should remember this guy. A veteran guard on his third stint with Portland, Blake has lasted 12 years in the league despite no noticeable physical skills or any remarkable ball handling ability. His toughness, however, cannot ever be called into question; The Oregonian once had the guts to run a close-up photo of Blake on the front of its sports page, blood running down his face and dripping off his nose. I forget when or how he got in that state, but I do remember that he got stitched up after the game, then came back for the next one like nothing happened.
That toughness, combined with extremely accurate 3-point shooting, puts Blake firmly in what I call the Steve Kerr/Derek Fisher Role – a guy who excels by playing off a ball-dominant shooting guard, giving him space to operate by standing out at the 3-point line ready to be a lifeline if the ball handler needed one.
Kerr found his greatest success playing off Michael Jordan in Chicago during the late ‘90s, while Fisher was the running buddy of Kobe Bryant in the backcourt of the Los Angeles Lakers for most of the ‘00s. The similarities between how Kerr played with Jordan, or how Fisher co-existed with Bryant, and Steve Blake playing with Brandon Roy in Portland are uncanny.
Blake didn’t have the team success Kerr or Fisher experienced, but he did have his best seasons playing with Roy and Bryant. In his last three Portland seasons, Blake shot at least 40% from three – an elite mark. He also exceeded or came close to that mark in three of the four Laker seasons he played before being traded to the Golden State Warriors last season.
I’m thinking Portland coach Terry Stotts will use Blake in that role alongside Damian Lillard most of the time, since Blake’s limitations as a primary ball handler are pretty widely known. The problem here is that the defense would be incredibly bad – the combination of Lillard’s inexperience and Blake’s advancing age (he’ll turn 35 during the season) means the Blazers better light up the opposing defense. They will be getting lit up in turn if Stotts isn’t careful about who he puts out there with Blake and Lillard.
To sum up, as long as Stotts uses Steve Blake like Steve Kerr, he should do just fine. But if Stotts, a former assistant with the Dallas Mavericks, uses Blake like Jason Terry – the score-in-heaps sixth man who’d played in Dallas the vast majority of his career – Blake will flounder, and the team’s $2 million biannual exception will have been wasted.
CJ McCollum: This guy, on the other hand, could have Jason Terry written all over him. A four-year player from Lehigh, McCollum was taken with the 10th pick in the 2013 draft with the intent of turning him into a score-first, second, and third combo guard capable of lightening Lillard’s historically gigantic minutes load. (Lillard led the league in minutes played as a rookie – first rookie to do that since Wilt Chamberlain. You might have heard of that guy.)
Sadly, that plan didn’t materialize in McCollum’s rookie year. After breaking his foot in training camp, he watched the Blazers transform from an also-ran into a juggernaut in two months. By the time he was ready for action, Mo Williams had taken all available backup minutes, and Stotts had no incentive to bring McCollum along slowly since the team was winning.
Without Williams around, and with Blake being an obvious stop-gap, the stage is set for McCollum to show what’s he learned after a year of watching, waiting, and inconsistent play. Neither the Blazers nor the fans should expect him to make up for Williams’ loss right away, but if he can provide 15 minutes or so of solid ball handling, three-point shooting, and not getting killed on defense, that would make Stotts happy for this year.
By the way, if you’re wondering whether McCollum could follow a Lillard-like path to stardom, the short answer is no. Portland’s had great success with four-year college players like Lillard and Roy, but if they can eventually turn McCollum into just a Jason Terry-like player, they’ll be more than happy with that.
Chris Kaman: Two months on the team, and I already like this guy. Air Sasquatch is the kind of oddball that a city like Portland should embrace, and if he performs well on the court, he’ll have a place here for the rest of his career.
His fit on the court is as odd as his personality, however. Kaman never was the greatest rebounding big, nor a good defender. Being on the downside of his career, and injury-prone to boot, Kaman’s only real value is scoring – unusual for a backup center. That means playing him with LaMarcus Aldridge could be quite tricky, especially with Aldridge playing large amounts of minutes and dominating the ball.
Stotts could use this opportunity to rest Aldridge more by playing Kaman with either Robin Lopez or Thomas Robinson, but the spacing the Blazers rely on to score would be crimped because none of those men I mentioned is nearly a good a shooter as Aldridge is. Meyers Leonard is another option, but after his antics last year, I doubt Stotts is inclined to play him over Kaman, Robinson, or even Joel Freeland, Lopez’s primary backup last season.
Although I think Kaman might be excited to play on a team that’s going somewhere for a change (his only playoff appearance was with the immortal 2006 Los Angeles Clippers, a second-round team known as the Best Clipper Team Of All Time Before Chris Paul Arrived), whether he or Robinson will be the first big off the bench, or play the most, could be an issue worth watching. While Olshey didn’t pay Kaman $5 million to take naps on the bench like he did with the Lakers last year, if he’s not giving Stotts much on the floor, Air Sasquatch could be grounded.
Will Barton: Last season, the Blazers used Williams, Lillard and Wesley Matthews in three-guard lineups whenever Nicolas Batum needed a rest. They did this because the only wing-sized player they had on the bench was Barton, and he had a hard time earning Stotts’ trust last year.
After playing in 73 games in 2012-13, Barton saw his playing time cut severely when McCollum was drafted and Williams was signed. His suspect shooting (just above 30% from three, a horrible percentage) has kept him out of the lineup. Which is a shame, because Barton’s athleticism, energy, and sheer unpredictability form the basis for an excellent change-of-pace bench player.
Barton’s penchant for the spectacular makes him a fan favorite, and his performance at the Fan Fest held about a week ago reaffirms that status. If the Dunk Contest wasn’t starved for star power, Barton would be guaranteed a spot every year.
If he can finish at the rim more consistently, as well as absorb a crash course in the Wesley Matthews School of Annoying Defense, Will the Thrill could become an everyday presence in the Blazers’ rotation – and after the San Antonio Spurs beat up on the worn-down starters in last year’s playoffs, Portland may need all the Thrill they can get if they want to go farther than last year.
Thomas Robinson: Robinson is basically Barton in a power forward’s body: energy, a nose for the ball, and a knack for nasty, violent hammers that leave every fan in the building making one of those faces you usually associate with smelling something rotten or a gross fart. Unlike Barton, Robinson usually was the first guy off the bench, entering the game with Williams to give Lopez and Matthews early breathers.
Robinson chases offensive rebounds to the point of it being a detriment; he often gets knocked out of position while a fast break starts behind him. If an opposing big runs well, that big would beat Robinson down the floor and get an easy dunk as a reward.
Robinson’s also undersized for a 4, but with experience and temperance of his wilder instincts, he can overcome that. He shows a decent shooting touch from 15 feet, but fell in love with that shot way too much. If he’s practiced enough to where he can make about 40-44% of those midrange shots, he can be enough of a threat to provide a touch more spacing on the floor – something Terry Stotts is religious and passionate about achieving.
Both Robinson and Meyers Leonard are on the last year of their rookie deals; the Blazers have until Halloween to extend their deals, which is very unlikely with Aldridge and Matthews also in contract years, as well as the issue of Lillard’s inevitable max extension. In fact, if Lillard makes another All-NBA Team after this season (he made the Third Team last year), he would be eligible for the “Derrick Rose Rule”, or supermax.
Lillard and his representatives would assuredly demand that supermax deal if he qualifies, meaning even less money to go around for Robinson and Leonard. Zach Lowe of Grantland delved into this very issue a little while back, breaking down both young big men’s court abilities at a level I can’t hope to achieve.
To spoil the Blazer-related parts of Lowe’s piece, he says the Blazers should re-sign Leonard and let Robinson walk. I have great respect for Lowe, but he’s dead wrong, and here’s why …
Meyers Leonard: To being with, Leonard couldn’t get on the court last year. His teammates will swear to the sky that he’s really a good player and kid, that he routinely amazes in practice, that the skills he’s developing will someday translate into a very good center.
The problems with Leonard are that he’s as raw as grocery store sushi, his defensive abilities (something all young big men struggle with, as Lowe points out) are horrifying, and he allowed an undersized 4/5 tweener named Joel Freeland, a guy drafted six years before he played a single NBA minute, to beat him out for backup duties behind Lopez.
What placed him beyond my forgiveness, and Stotts’ (but which Lowe ignored), were the rare times Leonard did hit the court. In garbage time during a blowout win for Portland, Leonard was fighting for a loose ball against Daniel Orton of the Orlando Magic. That kind of hustle was what the coaches wanted to see from him.
What came next, however definitely was not: Leonard drags Orton to the ground, they tussle for the ball, then Leonard scissor-kicks Orton in the head while both men are on the ground. After referee review, Leonard was charged with a flagrant-2 foul, ejected 90 seconds before a blowout game ended, and was suspended for the next game.
It was the kind of “WTF!?!?” moment that gave Stotts all the justification he needed to nail Leonard’s rear end to the pine. I get that he’s barely more than a boy, and that a 7-1 dude that can jump high and shoot a basketball is more valuable IN A VACUUM than someone like Thomas Robinson, but the Trail Blazers are in a position as a team where they can’t wait on someone like Meyers Leonard to reach a point where he could actually help them. It won’t happen unless Portland gives him court time, and if he’s determined to turn NBA games into WWE matches instead of trying to make a difference, why should the Blazers pay Leonard when they can give that same money to a player who actually CAN make a difference?
Zach Lowe’s a very smart guy, and I rarely disagree with him, but I felt incensed enough to write about 500 words saying why he’s wrong about Robinson and Leonard. I hope Neil Olshey disagrees with him too.
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