The Trail Blazers were one of the few feel-good stories in the West in a regular season mired with disappointment and injuries. Damian Lillard emerged as a legitimate first option and the NBA's most improved player C.J. McCollum made a huge leap to become one of the best secondary scorers in the league. These playoffs were supposed to be a coming-out party in front of a national audience.
How the Clippers are shutting down the NBA’s second-best backcourt
The Clippers are taking the ball out of Damian Lillard’s and C.J. McCollum’s hands and daring Portland’s role players to beat them. So far, the strategy is paying off.
Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports
After two games, it's clear that the Clippers won't let that happen. They have the perfect game plan to stop the Blazers' two gunners and cool down Portland's explosive offense.
Lillard and McCollum get nothing easy
Doc Rivers knows that Lillard and McCollum are the only two Blazers who can create for themselves consistently. They were the only two rotation players in the roster who weren't assisted on over 50 percent of their made field goals this season. Everyone else on the roster is a finisher. Portland managed to have one of the best offenses in the league with such a limited supporting cast because the two guards accounted for 46 of the team's 105 points per game.
With that in mind, the Clippers have devoted all of their defensive focus on preventing them from getting open shots. They are having their big men step outside to the perimeter to prevent those pull-ups that make Lillard and McCollum so unique and dangerous.
Knowing that calling for a screen is asking for a trap, the Blazers’ scorers sometimes decide to isolate against their defenders and try to drive to the rim. The Clippers are happy to let them do that because they aren’t worried about the other Blazers beating them from the perimeter. Since the Blazers have no stretch big men, the Clippers can pack the paint and force them to take tough shots.
Lillard is averaging 19 points on 33 percent shooting, while McCollum has struggled even more, scoring just over 12 points per game on 31 percent shooting.
The Clippers want them to take bad shots or give the ball up, and they're committed to that even if it means leaving others open. That's a dangerous strategy against opponents who have the shooters and playmakers to attack. Unfortunately for Portland, they have their junior Splash Brothers, but not the supporting cast the Warriors have.
The Clippers are daring Aminu and Harkless to beat them
Los Angeles is gambling that Maurice Harkless and Al-Farouq Aminu won't hurt them. They are leaving them open to chase Lillard and McCollum off the three-point line and block their path to the rim. Unfortunately, the two forwards are neither prolific nor effective enough shooters to make them pay. They have gone a combined 5-for-22 (22 percent) from outside, even though many of those looks have been wide open.
Both players are athletic, so they should be able to put the ball on the floor and attack closeouts if they are not comfortable pulling the trigger. Unfortunately for them, the Clippers are packing the paint, so they always have someone ready to contest their shots when they pump fake and drive.
The Blazers beat traps fairly well in the regular season, but rarely faced this type of aggressive and positionally-sound defense during the regular season. In January and February, they can get away with playing two mediocre shooters and ball handlers at the forward slots. April, however, is a different story. Los Angeles is taking them out of their comfort zone and neither Harkless or Aminu have showed that they have the skills to adjust.
This series shows why big forwards with perimeter skills are so valuable
This type of hyper aggressive, trapping defense is nothing new. The Warriors routinely beat it with Draymond Green, who can both shoot and handle. The Spurs solved the Heat's trapping defense in 2013 in no small part thanks to the play of Boris Diaw.
However, the Trail Blazers have no one like those two players on their roster. Mason Plumlee is an underrated passer who can facilitate from the elbows and on the short rolls that Green loves, but he's not a scoring threat outside of the restricted area. Aminu is a combo forward, but his shooting is inconsistent and his ball handling is subpar. Ed Davis is quick, but has little range on his jumper. Noah Vonleh could eventually become a play-making power forward, but he's too raw right now.
As strange as it sounds, this team really misses Meyers Leonard, who is out for the season with a shoulder injury. Despite his many limitations, he could at least punish the Clippers for sending two or three men to contain the ball handlers with his three-point shooting. No one else has that skill, so the Clippers will continue to send one big man to trap Lillard and McCollum while the other packs the paint to deter and contest close shots.
Can the Trail Blazers adjust?
They have already and it hasn’t been enough. They are having a wing screen the Clippers’ big men before pick-and-rolls so that they are a step late to help. Sometimes, this strategy gives the ball handler just enough room to get an open shot. However, the Clippers already know it’s coming and aren’t getting caught off guard as much.
Terry Stotts also ran more of the offense through Plumlee in the high post Game 2, and the results were good. He had seven assists to zero turnovers, showing he can really find cutters. This in theory should force DeAndre Jordan to leave the restricted area when Plumlee's at the elbows. But it's hard to see Plumlee taking on even more of a playmaking role, especially since he's not a perimeter scoring threat.
The one thing the Blazers haven't tried, but should is going even smaller when the Clippers do. It's understandable for Portland to want to leverage its big man depth, but it plays right into the Clippers' hands when they stay big when Jeff Green is on the floor. That's the time to go with four shooters, with Allen Crabbe potentially getting more minutes.
Still, nothing will matter unless Aminu and Harkless find their shot or hurt the Clippers off the dribble. Doc Rivers has found a big weakness in the Blazers’ roster and is going to exploit it, possibly all the way to a sweep.
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