Los Angeles Lakers: 3 reasons why LA could sweep the Trail Blazers
By Jason Reed
1. The Trail Blazers are really bad defensively
The Portland Trail Blazers are one of the most exciting teams to watch because of the lethal scorers that they have on the floor. Damian Lillard is playing with ice water in his veins and already has two of the most clutch playoff shots of this millennium.
CJ McCollum is a great second star that is prone to get a bucket or two here and there and Carmelo Anthony is a fun veteran who has proved he still belongs in the league. Jusuf Nurkic is a really solid big as well.
All of that is great. What Portland fans don’t want us talking about is how bad this team is on the defensive side of the basketball. This isn’t a team that has a few holes defensively, this is a team that is really poor defensively and it has burned them in the past.
Just look at their last two games of the Orlando bubble. Portland had to beat a dismembered Brooklyn Nets team to ensure they were the eighth seed in the West and that went down to the wire. That game was way closer than it should have been. Why? They allowed the Nets to score 133 points.
The same could be said in the play-in game against the Memphis Grizzlies. The Blazers are a far more talented team than the Grizzlies, especially with Jaren Jackson Jr. out with injury. Portland won by four, allowing the Grizzlies to score 122 points (10 more than their regular-season average) with Ja Morant scoring a career-high 35.
If a rookie in Ja Morant is feasting against the Blazers then just imagine what two superstars will do in LeBron James and Anthony Davis.