The Portland Trail Blazers lost by a lot of points to the San Antonio Spurs on Wednesday night. Just your run of mill 37 point thrashing. It happens. Zach Collins made his return to the Moda Center, which was a nice moment. But overall the game was a mess.
The mess is part of plan but also part of the problem. Portland's commitment to being bad on purpose makes scouting the players on the roster a challenge. It's hard to build an environment that puts players in positions to be their best and work on their games in a productive way while also guaranteeing a loss in nine out of every ten games. Is Keon Johnson good? Has Greg Brown III improved useful NBA skills? It's hard to know and even harder to find a solution that would benefit those two youngsters and others like them on the Portland roster. Moreover, it's hard to get a sense of Chauncey Billups coaching prowess during a season with so much turmoil followed by so much intentional losing that is outside of his control.
Finally, the men's NCAA tournament starts back up for its second weekend on Thursday with four more games. Let's close the show with a discussion of who to watch in the first four games of the Sweet 16, Hint: Check out Ben Mathurin.
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