The Portland Trail Blazers won 42 games last season, grabbed the No. 7 seed in a loaded Western Conference and did it while dealing with plenty of chaos along the way. Tiago Splitter stepped in as interim coach just one game into the year, the club snapped a four-year playoff drought and a young core made its first collective postseason appearance. All of that came while Portland dealt with injuries all over the backcourt.
That’s why the front office’s decision not to keep Splitter in the job still stands out. He’s now coaching the Chicago Bulls, while the Blazers turned to Micah Nori, a first-year head coach with a mix of NBA experience and creativity that should give this team a different edge.
When Nori met the media in June, he already had a clear idea of where Portland needed to sharpen up. With training camp set to open on September 29, the most interesting part of that blueprint is the area that often gets lost in the bigger season-long story: crunch time.
For all the good Portland did last season, the closing minutes were a problem. Nori said the Blazers were around .500 in games decided in the final five minutes, and he was blunt about what that means going forward.
"Also at the end of games. This team last year was 21-22 in two-possession games with five minutes to go," Nori said.
"At the end of games, we can't guarantee makes and misses and stops, but I'll tell you this: they're going to have to make shots and we're going to force them to make tough shots. We're not going to hope that they miss."
That message starts on defense, but Portland also has a major help on the way in Damian Lillard, one of the most reliable clutch scorers the league has ever seen. That kind of presence changes the late-game math immediately.
Splitter deserves credit for navigating a messy season and getting the most out of a roster that rarely had all of its ball-handlers available. But the Blazers’ late-game issues were real, especially on ATOs. Creativity should be less of a problem with Nori, and that matters because Portland spent too many possessions last season looking disorganized when games tightened up.
The issue showed up in those end-of-game inbound plays, where the ball often got shoved into the corner and possession broke down from there. Sometimes the pass went to a trapped player.
Sometimes it never should have gone there in the first place. Those were the kind of mistakes that had little to do with talent and everything to do with execution.
Portland survived those stretches and made it through the play-in tournament, but the margin is going to be slimmer next season. The Western Conference is even deeper, and the Blazers can’t afford to treat late-game execution like an afterthought.
Morant and Lillard are the obvious headline additions for this roster, but Nori’s arrival may end up mattering just as much in the moments that decide games. That’s where Portland can make the biggest leap.
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The Blazers latest offseason swing has given the roster a far different look, and the appeal is obvious. Portland landed Ja Morant in a trade without having to part with any key pieces, then added frontcourt help in Micah Potter and Branden Carlson to give the bench a little more size and insurance. On paper, it is the kind of aggressive retool that can energize a team trying to climb back into relevance, especially with Damian Lillard still at the center of everything.
Still, the roster picture is not fully clean. Morant brings the sort of talent that changes expectations, but there are lingering questions about his health and how he fits defensively next to Lillard, and the Blazers cannot ignore either issue if they want the move to work. Off the floor, the franchise also remains under scrutiny as protests continue over taxpayer money going toward Moda Center renovations, with critics arguing those dollars should be redirected to local schools instead. [Read more 🡒]
Blazers Camp Is About To Settle Portlands Biggest Roster Battles
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For a team still trying to answer some of its biggest personnel questions, this is the stretch where small decisions can carry real weight. The Blazers get just a short runway before the first preseason games arrive on Oct. 7 and Oct. 12, so every practice rep matters as the club starts separating the players who fit from the ones who may not be long for the final group. [Read more 🡒]
Blazers Suddenly Face A Ja Morant Question Fans Cant Ignore
The Blazers backcourt picture changed fast enough to make the rest of the league do a double take, and Joe Cronins confidence in Ja Morant is now part of the conversation in Portland. Morant arrives after missing much of last season because of injury, but the front office clearly believes the talent is still there, even as the roster already has Damian Lillard, Jrue Holiday, Scoot Henderson and Shaedon Sharpe all looking for touches and minutes.
Morant has talked about being focused on winning no matter what his role ends up being, which is the right message for a team trying to sort out a crowded guard room. The bigger question for Portland is how all of those pieces fit together once the games start mattering, because talent is not the issue here so much as who ends up where in the hierarchy. [Read more 🡒]