He clanked the shot, despite having just come into the game a few minutes prior and despite being a poor deep shooter. I mean, that just screams conspiracy, doesn't it?

The truth is out there.

* SERIOUSLY, OMRI, you're making a case for more minutes here! You'd better watch out or you're going to have to spend your winter evenings playing NBA basketball instead of the much more relaxing "waving a towel" job. Omri was a +7 over 17 minutes on Wednesday, scoring seven points on 3-of-4 shooting (1-of-2 from three) with one offensive rebound and one turnover. He had a sequence Sam Amick describes thusly:

Hitting the floor for a loose ball? Check. Pounding a breakaway dunk? Check. Mr. Casspi, according to my records, you're a lead-changing three away from completing your "Become an Instant Fan Favorite" boot camp.

* SERIOUSLY, KEVIN, in preseason? Harsh, dude! I wish I had been there to see how Portland guarded Martin so that I write an essay titled "Either the Blazers Don't Know How to Defend Kevin Martin, or Kevin Martin is Unguardable." It would get mad links!

* RAW PLUS-MINUS is problematic game-to-game, though it is the basis for a robust analysis when adjusted by someone smarter than me to account for teammates and opponents. But … hmm … just a cursory glance and well …

Casspi: +6
Nocioni: -10

Obviously, I don't know the full story behind these figures. Even people at the game don't know the full story behind these figures — you'd have to watch a game several times while taking copious line-up notes to know the full story behind single-game raw plus-minus numbers. But it bears mentioning that in no statistic is Nocioni (a grizzled vet) outperforming Casspi (a project player). It's just exhibition season, and maybe Nocioni is sleepwalking. But keep it in mind going forward.

* DONTE GREENE, a DNP-CD in the team's second preseason game, a game in which

and D.G. still didn't get out of the hangar. Hmm.

* OTHER COVERAGE: