Freeland Impressing Blazers Teammates

By Sam Neter on October 23, 2013

It would appear as though Joel Freeland’s decision to skip Great Britain National Team duty this summer is paying off, as just weeks into training camp and pre-season he is being labelled as the team’s ‘MVP’.

Over the past week and a half, both Nicolas Batum and LaMarcus Aldridge have heaped praise on the 6’10” forward, despite his statistical contributions being far from mind-blowing.

“He’s my MVP right now,” Batum said when talking to Joe Freeman of The Oregonian. “He’s one of the best players right now of the camp. Joel is playing good, especially on defense.”

Freeland said during media day that his focus during the off-season was working on his defence, and by all accounts, it is translating on to the court.

After a victory over the Utah Jazz, where Freeland scored 2 points on 1/5 shooting, but pulled in 5 rebounds along with two blocks, Aldridge wanted to talk about nothing but the GB star’s performance.

“I’m excited about what Joel Freeland did tonight,” he said to The Oregonian. “All of those blocks and all of those contested (shots) at the rim — that’s big time for me. I feel like if he can continue to do that all year, he’s going to make our team better.

“I keep telling him about it. It’s really, really good for us. I think he had at least four or five of those, where he went up and either blocked it or made the guy miss, and that’s big, because last year we were really bad at that.”

It remains too early to say how heavily Freeland will feature in the rotation, but Portland head coach Terry Story added he has taken huge steps forward since his underwhelming rookie year.

“It is too early for that,” Stotts said when asked if Freeland will become a regular. “But I think he’s performed well. And he’s versatile enough that he can play four or five. He can play with Robin (Lopez), he can play with LaMarcus (Aldridge). And he’s much more comfortable with the NBA game and what’s expected of him. Last year was a big adjustment for him.”

Read more at the Oregonian here and here.

Image Credit: NBAE/Getty images

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