I’m so GD sick of this overrated Portland team. Constantly bailed out by a broken officiating system that only exists to create stars out of player’s that aren’t really that. Half of Lillard‘s FT attempts were flat out gifts. Nothing more.
You can watch CJ McCollum catch a pass of a screen and take two steps without ever putting the ball down with the ref not even batting an eye yet Harrison Barnes gets called for traveling for lifting his pivot foot while simultaneously putting
the ball on the floor.
The NBA has always had a problem with star treatment since I first started following the game closely in the early 80’s. But their officiating system is so broken that it’s not even fair to refer to it as WWE anymore.
When Portland invariably plays Golden State or LA or Brooklyn or some team that has more name recognition than they do they don’t get those bail out calls. Their mostly awful shot selection results in Lillard or McCollum (or both) going 5-23 and Nurkic gets whistled for a large portion of the push offs he initiates under the basket (yes, I saw the egregious one against Barnes late Q4 tonight).
Happens every season.
But, yeah, they’re both great players — when allowed to take whatever amount of steps they need in order to create space or get to the spot on the floor they want to.
Sorry NBA. I have 20/20 eyesight.