Blazers Show The Importance Of The Bench

All teams know that the compact, 66-game season is going to be a lot of wear on their players. The bench is going to play a huge part this year, and a team’s depth may make the difference between playoff success and an early end. In their two wins to start the season, the Portland Trail Blazers have already shown how important their bench will be this year. Their team leader, LaMarcus Aldridge had to play almost 42 minutes in their opening win against the Philadelphia 76ers. He said afterwards that his legs were absolutely dead. It’s clear that Aldridge isn’t going to be able to do that every night, especially on back-to-backs. The Blazers are already weakened down low with Greg Oden out for now, and they’re trying to get as many minutes as they can out of two of the oldest players in the NBA, Kurt Thomas and Marcus Camby. Obviously, they’ll need someone to step up. During Tuesday night’s game against the Sacramento Kings, head coach Nate McMillan seemed reluctant to take Aldridge o...