The NBA always lives up to its motto. It truly is where amazing happens. More often than not, something we just couldn’t predict catches our attention and, while most of the time is just a coincidence, it’s still quite impressive.
That happened when the Portland Trail Blazers faced the Los Angeles Lakers in the first round of the NBA playoffs. As Redditor d33jay64 pointed out, the Blazers featured the lowest possible sum of jersey numbers in a 5-man lineup in NBA history when they sent Damian Lillard, CJ McCollum, Anfernee Simmons, Gary Trent Jr, and Carmelo Anthony to the court.
“During game 3 against the Lakers, the Blazers played a lineup of Melo, Lillard, Simons, Trent Jr., and CJ. Their jersey numbers (00, 0, 1, 2, 3) combine for the lowest possible sum of jersey numbers in a 5-man lineup,” the post read.
Moreover, he also pointed out that this lineup had an offensive rating of 300 in the limited minutes they shared the court, which shouldn’t be a surprise considering they featured 5 incredible shooters and scorers at the same time. The problem, however, would be getting stops.
Scoring points was never an issue for the Portland Trail Blazers under Terry Stott’s command. Their defense, on the other hand, let a lot to be desired, to say the least.
Moreover, we might as well see that lineup again pretty soon, as all players (but Carmelo) are still under contract for RIP City and have proven to mesh around perfectly with Stotts’ system.
The Blazers will also have a fully healed Zach Collins and Jusuf Nurkic plus the return of Trevor Ariza and Nassir Little so their defense should improve a lot if they manage to stay healthy. For now, there’s not much their historically low lineup can do but to rest plan ahead to the upcoming campaign.
