Amid all my boredom, due to being at home at christmas, I thought I'd like to take a little look at Greg Oden. In his latest game he went 5/7 on the field, 6/6 on free throw line and it was his 9th double double with 16 points and 10 rebounds. I decided, in an effort to take up as much time as possible, to evaluate his every move on the court and take notes. It took a few hours, and I quite enjoyed it so i decided I would chop it down a little (it's origianlly eight pages worth of notes) and put some of the first quarter in as this whas his best quarter. I am by no means an expert, I play basketball for my city team but at 17 years old I do not have a lot of experience. They are just my thoughts and observations.

 It's my first fan post so be tender. And it's going to be a little long, so brace yourselves.

 Start of the 1st Quarter

 Greg and Bosh face off for the tip, Greg Oden in all his gleaming brilliance wins it. Good start.

 11:50
Something I have noticed about the Blazers is that there are a lot of bad and lazy picks set, Oden exemplifies it by setting a pick that completely misses the player and a second that is very lazy, using his arms and leaning into the defender. Third times a charm in this case and he sets a good hard pick on Calderon accompanied by a strong roll to the basket. No pass though, too clogged on the inside.

 11:16
Oden sags a lot at the start of the game, leaving O'neal a lot of space, which is dangerous with his jump shooting ability.
 Here he sags off JO a little bit too much as Calderon approaches on the perimeter, JO gets it and is left wth enough space for a jump shot for about two seconds. Greg closes it out as O'neal hesitates and while Gregs hands are active on him O'neal nails the fall away jumper.

  Greg, deciding to get his own back, sets up deep enough to receive the ball, he backs down watching double teams and then predictably spins left going up for the jump hook. Blocked by JO, Oden doesn't give up, grabs back the ball and goes up for the two handed dunk. A little fist bump action on the way back.

 10:50
 LA gets caught up in a screen on Bosh and Oden ends up going out to cover, the switch call comes a little late and both players end up on the block. Oden knows a jumpshot is coming if he is left open and comes right out. as he closes out Bosh drives but Oden just stands tall and keeps his hand up totlly disrupting the lay up attempt.

 10:20
 The turnover on the break by LA leaves Calderon breaking, going round Roy to charge down the baseline, Roy just about manages to keep up challenging the lay up but it seems to be the big looming presence of Oden putting off the shot. He kept just far away enough to not draw the foul call while reaching aove to get the block. Calderon misses but due to the lack of Blazers getting back Bosh comes through to try and grab the rebound, Aldridge manages to get to it.
 The Blazers continue to feed Oden, a good sign of some confidence, he sets up deep easily getting down low against JO, receives the ball, bangs right, turns left and gets the jump hook to go.

 9:55
  JO screens on Roys man, and in typical Blazer fashion he ndercuts the screen. Greg being in the way has to move quickly and gets knocked off balance by Mr Roy. JO has some new found space and receives the ball, with the space JO s free to take a jump shot but as Oden recovers from the knock he leaves too much space on the left, there's daylight, he also entices him by leaving his left foot back funneling him towards the basket. Oden can't keep up, flat footed from expecting the jump shot and JO blasts by for the reverse dunk. A mental lapse, but brought on from Roy knocking him away on the undercut.

 9:39
 Oden jogs up and sets up on the elbow, Blake passes him the ball and cuts while oden watches the play unravel, not patient enough Oden passes it out to Aldridge on the opposite block, a little bit further out from where LA is positioned to make sure the ball is not stolen by Bosh. As Blake pops out from the weak screen by Oden it is swung to him, with the ball now on Oden's side he sets up low again. He gets the ball, takes one dribble and sees the double coming swinging it out to LaMarcus (a little high on the pass). He then watches the play while drifitng towards the basket for the rebound. He gets the offensive rebound and fights to put it in. Good hands to grab the ball and put it back.

 9:08
Bosh gets the ball on the elbow with gregs man (JO) on the opposite block. Bosh is in an iso on LaMarcus and Oden is glued to JO. Oden is not helping to defend on the drive at all here as he has his hand on JO the whole time, Batum is on the wing so it's possible he sees him as able to disrupt the drive. Bosh ends up taking a jumpshot, making it. Oden does not box out on JO, but he is feeling his postition with his hand and probably notices JO drifting away from the basket.

 8:54
 After Steve Blake loses the ball out of bounds they all set up for the inbounds play, Greg sets a good strong screen on Roys man allowing him to get free. oy passes down to LaMarcus in the block for him to go one on one. Oden drifts towards the baseline while LA bangs to the middle and then makes a good short cut to the basket getting open enough to get the ball and get a shot off. LaMarcus decides to roll to the middle anyway and gets the hook to go. During the shot attempt JO has to use both of his arms to push Oden away from the basket to prevent an offensive rebound because he is now in a good pstion thanks to the cut.

 8:40
Gets back immediately picking up Bosh because LaMarcus hasn't made it back yet. Bosh receives the ball on the block and Oden stays square and physical while bosh tries to back him down. It clearly isn't going to work so Bosh spins away and shoots the fade-away jumpshot with good contention from Greg. A huge miss and although greg does not actively go to box out his huge body seperates Bosh and the rebound.

 8:17
I was pleased to see Greg sprinting back to catch Bosh on the play where LaMarcus gets the steal and break away dunk.

 8:00
 Oden gets good positoning on a screen and allows Batum to under cut however he is then in a bad position for the JO - Calderon screen. It seems like he is anticipating the switch on the left side and is a good meter or two away from the screen itself allowing a lot fo room for Claderon to operate. there is just too much space as oden sags off and Calderon lets loose the jump shot. Oden doesn't make an attempt to go and crash the boards and due to Moon being lost by his defender he breaks through for the tip in.

7:36
 Oden sets up deep during the play and receives the ball from Batum. He looks for the pass but sees nothing appealing, backs down for a dribble and doesn't get where he wants. he is still looking for a pass at the same time and kicks the ball out to LaMarcus, again a little too high. LaMarcus passes to Blake and Blake calls for a screen from LA, but Oden mistakenly comes too.He realises his mistae and goes back to where he came from while nothing comes from the screen. Roy launches a three while Greg battles underneath for the rebound, which goes long.

7:13

He gets late back with O'neal and plays good defense on the post. Kapono uses O'neal as a give and go losing Roy in the process, Oden jumps over to contest the shot (successfully) leaving JO to go and get the rebound, nearly achieving it over Blake but Oden with active hands knocks it out of his hands and out of bounds. Toronto ball, the cut away scene of LaMarcus dunking cut off the inbounds play so all i saw was O'neal free and Oden not near enough.Oden doesn't go to get the rebound from the fumbling masses, he drifts away from the basket. He should be going to get that as there is no chance of him getting anything on the fast break.

 6:46
Two screens for Roy followed by a good fake screen and open roll which should have been capatalised. He goes to the baseline while Roy drives. He receives the ball on a kick and goes straight up. Gets blocked from behind, but gets the ball bakc and goes up again. Blocked yet again but this time the whistle sounds. A shot of Nates sexy purple shirt and elaborate tie combo. Two made free throws.

 6:27
 As the free throw shooter he gets back quickly. Roy gets completely caught on a screen (bit of a push involved) but Oden stays on JO rather than helping. O#neal ends up with the ball, with a little too much space between him and Oden. O'neal makes the fall away jumper thanks to some space although he was faced with Odens giant man hands.

 6:03
 Oden gets fronted in the post and gets a screen to go away from the ball. he cuts back with really good positioning but never left the post on the opposite side. Too long in the post and a three second call. Looking a little annoyed with that one.

 5:53
 Oden on Bosh now, the drive, the spin allows him to get past followed by the typical block attempt and foul from Oden. He is subbed out for Pryzbilla and doesn't appear again in the quarter.

 A few things from the rest of the game

 Oden does get caught on sagging too much and mental lapses a few times later on in the game, he will adjust that with more playing time and it could be addressed easily in the next year.

 The switching on screens kills us, I didn't mind it at first, but when I put my scouting head on and paid attention it really hurt us on Oden defending Calderon off the screen and Blake on Bosh producing a few easy points. It needs to stop between Guard and Centers and we need to fight over screens, rather than under while the other defender halts the progress of the dribbler.

 This team misses a lot of picks, a lot. They are often lazy and the person using the pick fails to rub shoulders with the pick setter. At the moment the defender just runs through next to the offensive player rather than being cut off and having to run behind.

 The rolls by Oden are also under utilised. I'm not sure whether it's because they are not used to using them, but there were a good 10 times in this game when Oden was rolling strong to the basket and had a good oppurtunity at scoring but was never even acknowledged. That will come with time certainly, only 30 games into their first season together and already we are seeing good development.

 Oden, like a lot of players, could get a lot more rebounds if he gave a little more effort on the plays where he switches off and watches.

 Oden makes some very good cuts when coming from the baseline that put him in a good postion for dunks, and fighting under the basket for position really wears out the oppoising big men. I also noticed both Bosh and O'neal having to wrestle with him down low. Time to crash the boards when that happens, they're not going to be able to contend with everyone when it takes two players to stop Oden.

 Although Odens hands are not as safe and quick as they could be he still does a good job of getting a hand in a pack to disrupt the ball and managed to create a few offensive rebounds through it today. Including Outlaws rebound and two handed put back.

 Oden is seldom used in the later quarters as Roy and Aldridge start to take the majority of the shots, he needs to learn to be useful on the offensive end in other ways because in this match he spent a lot of time watching on the base line. He also must not let his lack of activity on the offensive end affect his intensity on the defensive end.

 I realise this is long now so I'll end by saying that it was good to see Oden out there smiling and enjoying himself and in spite of everything I pointed out that was wrong he did a lot right in this game. If he played like this day in day out we will end up with a nice and hefty win colum.

 That was only two pages out of eight worth of notes. This could have been a ten thousand word essay, I have way too much time on my hands.