Early in the final quarter of the final game of the NBA season, Jrue Holiday took a shot that was unremarkable in 2021 but would have driven a coach apoplectic a decade earlier: Holiday raced up the court in transition and flung up a triple without appearing to think of passing. But his audacity gave […]
The Portland Trail Blazers finished the regular season ranked sixth place in the Western Conference, escaping the play-in tournament for their eighth-straight playoff appearance. Much of the team’s success remains centered on its high-powered offense: The Blazers’ offensive efficiency of 117.1, per NBA.com, trailed only the Nets’ 117.3, marking their third-straight season in the top […]
There is perhaps no more valuable commodity in the NBA at the moment than space. The best offenses go all out to manufacture it, flooding the floor with as many shooters and playmakers as possible in an effort to stretch point-prevention units to their limits. Top defenses, meanwhile, do everything in their power to erase […]
The NBA playoffs finally started in earnest on Monday, though most of the league has been in a Disney World bubble since July for the season restart (which included eight games for every team, plus a play-in contest for the Portland Trail Blazers and Memphis Grizzlies). And what did we learn from that sample of […]
Despite entering the NBA bubble 3.5 games back of the Memphis Grizzlies, the current overwhelming favorite to capture the eighth and final playoff spot in the Western Conference is the Portland Trail Blazers. The FiveThirtyEight RAPTOR-based forecast gives the Blazers a 76 percent chance of making the postseason, up from just 12 percent prior to […]