Week 1 recap and Roze's 5 Things

The NBA is back!! Welcome to another year of Roze Analysis. I hope the offseason has treated everyone well, and as we gather to recap the first week of the NBA season. Next week will start each article with the NBA standings, there’ no point in putting it before everyone has had the chance to play at least more than a couple of games. However, we will start with the rookie contract extensions, and flow into the early injury news, before ending with our traditional Roze’s 5 Things. 

News Recap 

Sunday, October 19th

Toumani Camara and the Portland Trailblazers reached on a 4-year $82.5 million extension to keep the wing in Portland. 

Shaedon Sharpe and the Portland Trail Blazers reached a 4-year $90 million rookie extension. 

Monday, October 20th

Coby White will miss at least two weeks with a calf strain 

Christian Braun and the Denver Nuggets reached a 5-year $125 million rookie extension. 

Dyson Daniels and the Atlanta Hawks agreed on a 4-year $100 million rookie extension. 

Ty Jerome will miss at least 4 weeks with a calf strain. 

Aaron Nesmith and the Pacers agreed to a 2-year $40 million extension. 

Tuesday, October 21st

Maxi Kleber will miss at least two weeks with an oblique injury. 

Thursday, October 23rd 

Terry Rozier and Chauncey Billups were arrested for their part in a gambling probe by the FBI, and were allegedly participating in rigged poker games. Both have been placed on immediate leave, and the Trail Blazers named Tiago Splitter their interim head coach. 

Friday, October 24th 

Luka Garza will miss a period of time with a concussion. 

Roze’s 5 Things 

Thunder’s high floor

The Thunder are the reigning NBA champions, and they have been tested this week unlike any other team in the NBA. The Thunder were able to survive a pair of double overtime thrillers against the Houston Rockets at home and the Indiana Pacers on the road to open their 2025-2026 campaign. OKC also beat the Hawks very easily in their game on Saturday. The impressive part of the Thunder is the fact that they haven’t lost a beat at all as a team, and their best player, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, is still unguardable for most of the NBA. Gilgeous-Alexander put up scoring outings of 35, 55, and 30 points so far this season, and his now second-best player, Chet Holmgren, looks the part of a 2nd overall pick in his 4th (3rd playing) NBA season. Holmgren is averaging 24.7 points per game on 56-42-90 shooting splits. He’s also grabbing 10 rebounds a game, and OKC’s offensive rating is a cool 120 per 100 possessions with him on the floor. Many amongst the NBA believe we will have a new champion (I am included), but the Thunder forces you to play a brand of basketball that requires toughness and physicality that many in the NBA cannot match. OKC is at the peak of its powers, and Isaiah Joe and Jalen Williams haven’t suited up this season yet. The defending champions are playing the part to start the season. 

Anthony Edwards’ Evolution 

The Timbewolves went 1-1 this week, splitting matchups between the Trail Blazers and the Lakers as part of their opening week. The Lakers beat up on the Wolves in the second matchup, but the come-from-behind win against Portland, and more notably, Edwards’ 41-point outing left quite an impression on me as a fan. The progress that Edwards has made as a basketball player, and more importantly, to be the best shooting guard in the NBA, has been an outlier in complete honesty. A guard coming out of college had issues with his shooting, hustle, and handling, which have completely changed as a basketball player in his 5 seasons. He’s shooting 53-50 shooting splits with him making 54.8% of his 2s from the floor, and he’s making 56.2% of his pull-up 2s so far this season. Along with his shooting improvement (he’s making 50% of his 3s on 8 attempts a game, too), the handle to avoid the pressure from the Blazers and navigate the blitzes from the Lakers as well. Edward’s progression as a basketball player is an outlier and shouldn’t be expected from what was considered to be a weak 2020 draft class at the top. 

NBA’s Gambling Investigation 

While the NBA is back, so is its more pressing concern in the early portion of the season. Don’t worry, we haven’t forgotten about you, Clippers. However, Thursday morning delivered a bombshell report that both Terry Rozier and Chauncey Billups were arrested in separate, but also conjoined cases, between NBA player prop bets and rigged poker games involving the mafia. The situation took a turn when the FBI held a press conference announcing the arrests of 34 individuals involved in both cases. The two separate indictments listed the names and described co-conspirators who led to Chauncey Billups, current NBA head coach,  Damon Jones, former NBA player and coach, and Terry Rozier, whose name was explicitly listed in the indictment. The part that doesn’t make sense is the NBA initially cleared Rozier of wrongdoing after the sportsbook notified the NBA of abnormal betting patterns pertaining to Rozier’s prop bets THE DAY OF A GAME, and still the NBA made Rozier allegedly fake an injury for the rest of the season and essentially covered up the incident. The NBA needs ot get a hold of the prop betting by the companies because it feels like we are at the tip of the iceberg for this investigation, and three former or current NBA players' lives have now been ruined because of it. This also points to the NBA creating better ways to have teams update the injury report. Is it in the indictment that Damon Jones and Chauncey Billups used the injury report to tell friends that players would be held out of games, and the sportsbooks did not know, a textbook example of insider trading and something the NBA should figure out. 

Is pressing back in the NBA?

It is possible that pressing is making a comeback in the NBA, and it is kind of fun. After the Pacers magically ran last year in the NBA finals, many teams have now adopted this pressing style that the Pacers did last season. The Celtics, Trail Blazers, Spurs, Thunder, and Raptors are teams that showed very heavy pressing attacks on defense for extensive times in the opening week in the NBA, and we may see this trend pick up across the league if successful. 

Victor’s warning to the NBA

If you didn’t watch any of the opening week from the NBA, the one player you needed to watch was Victor Wembanyama and the warning he sent to the rest of the NBA to say I have arrived, folks. Wembanyama’s performance against the Mavericks included 40 points, 15 rebounds, and 3 blocks, along with no turnovers and shooting 75% from the field. More importantly, Wembanyama is only averaging 3 3-point attempts a game and shooting close to 8 free throws a game as well. The biggest improvements for Wembanyama are his shooting closer to the basket, as he’s 19/21 finishing at the rim so far this season, and has had a couple of moves involving shot fakes and pivots, paired with the added strength he put on in the offseason. When Wembanyama is on the floor, the Spurs have a defensive rating of 100.1 and a net rating of +12.2, both are better than the Thunder from a season ago.