Blazers vs Lakers on Christmas Day..
our home opener will be versus the Jazz.
and we will close the Season with Golden State needing a win to clinch home court in the first round…

GO TIMBERS!!!!

Half season ticket holder – do I get the opening home game or not, it’s killing me!!

I hope so. How many nationally televised games out of the roughly a little under 250 will the Blazers get (TNT, ABC, ESPN, NBA TV)? My over/under is on 19, as we are a pretty exciting story.

Great, I try to google some news about the schedule, and what’s the top hit? This article. Now that helps.

The Celtics will open the defense of their 17th NBA championship with a game Oct. 28 against LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers at TD Banknorth Garden. An NBA source also said the Celtics will visit the Los Angeles Lakers on Christmas Day in a nationally televised matchup.

The San Antonio Spurs, who eliminated the Suns in three of the past four postseasons, will visit Phoenix on Dec. 25 to revive a tradition of an NBA Christmas in the desert.

San Antonio also will host the Suns’ regular-season opener Oct. 29 (ESPN). The Suns’ home opener follows Oct. 30 against New Orleans, starting the season with a road-home back-to-back set for the third year in a row.

...quit being a buzz kill. So you think it’s an overrated announcement. Who cares, we’re excited about our Blazers….let us be! Stop going #1 on our parade!

I’ve been highly anticipating the release of the schedule so I can plan two trips to Portland to see the team play at home. Hopefully there will be back-to-back Friday & Saturday games or Saturday and Sunday games so I can make the most of a weekend.

ESPN Marc Stein

Here

OUCH!

Link – http://www.nba.com/blazers/schedule/

We’re playing Minnesota in New Orleans?

I remember the days when we’d be lucky to get 2 or 3.

there are a total of 7 home games

http://www.blazersedge.com/2008/8/6/587755/awaiting-the-schedule

I counted 68 away games and only 14 home games.

Sept. 1?

We play the toughest stretch of the season when our new guys will still be figuring things out.

15 of our first 22 games are on the road, against mostly good teams. If we are at .500 at that point (after the Jan 7th game against Toronto), look out league. Even if we are at, say, 9 and 13 that would be pretty good.

What a schedule…this is going to be a crazy beginning to a long season.

............................ an 0-5 start is not beyond the realm of possibility. The Baby Blazers Mark II are gonna have to come out strong and together, or it could get really ugly fast.

Once they make it through the first week of January, life improves somewhat…

If they have a winning record at point, this team could be something special.

t

that’s the key date. That’s when the brutal 22 game stretch will be over and we’ll actually get some home games.

I’m officially declaring December 7th as the key marking post in this season.

get a mixture of lame and too strong to prevent a behind whooping. Prediction: 1-4 after the first five games.

Oct. 29 Milwaukee, 8 p.m. (a truly historic game worthy to go into the annals of Oklahoma history)
Nov. 1 at Houston, 8:30 p.m.
Nov. 2 Minnesota, 7 p.m.
Nov. 5 Boston, 8 p.m.
Nov. 7 at Utah, 9 p.m.
...

http://newsok.com/article/3279732

The times are ET, but it’s good for an initial overview

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/teams/printSchedule?team=por&season=2009

When you look at the home/away we could have a really exciting month and go on a solid run in the month of March. Only 6 of the 16 games are away games, 5 of which are in one east coast swing where the only really good team is Cleveland. A lot of the home games are against good competition but it will be a great month to beat some quality teams and get ready for the playoffs at home. Also, living in Arizona I am happy about the 4 games that will be on TNT/ESPN so I can watch without having to fly up to portland.

Also the two games @ Phoenix in November on Saturdays (the 1st and 22nd) will have at least one very loud Blazers fan in attendance.

..where typos happen!

Seattle? or OKC? make up your mind!

Apparently on Feb. 6th we’re playing @ Seattle. WHOOPSIES!

I’m sticking with my pre-schedule release projection of 47-48 wins.

teams with a creamy middle for Oden to warm up on. Instead L*kers and SA then a string of nastiness. Well, we’ll see how resilient this team is.

... of 5(!) Christmas day games.

schedule. 7 of our first 9 against playoff teams? Puh-leeeeze.

16 of our first 24 on the road? Give me a break.

Shaq, Yao, Duncan, Howard, Bynum? Psshhh.

Come on NBA, our young guys need a CHALLENGE.

due to the OKC games…

thanks to the printable schedule I got some dirty looks from a coworker at the printer.

The team will almost certainly come to training camp early which means we’ll be gelled and ready to play when other teams are still getting rid of off season rust. In just the first few games, I think there is big potential to catch good teams unprepared for the season. Kobe has to get surgery on his pinky finger after the olympics, which only leaves him 2 months to heal before the season starts. Bynum’s is still coming back from injury as well. Plus after getting destroyed by the Celtics in the finals, they may not have any confidence in their first game back.

San Antonio is vulenerable because of their age and the fact that Ginobli will be tired from the olympics. Is he healthy? The last few years it seems like Shaq uses the first 1/4 of the season to play himself into shape, so Oden will hopefully have an advantage there. Utah got off to a slow start last year, maybe they’ll do a repeat performance and 2 of their guys are on the olympic team, so they could be burned out.

I think we can catch these teams unprepared at the start of the season, if the team meshes well during training camp. If I was a betting man, I’d say 3-3 through the first 6, but as a blazer fan, I say 4-2.

... but that is what the others are saying about themselves when they see that we are coming into town.

This season is going to surprise everyone, even those of us expecting a surprise.

I like that we play our “toughest” stretch right out of the gate. All teams will be working out the kinks, not just us. We might be able to catch a few folks off gaurd and steal some wins we wouldn’t get later in the year.

Plus, it’s not how you start but how you finish… getting some of these games/teams out of the way right away clears up our path late in the season for the “friendlier” games.

I’d be terrified/depressed/pissed if we had to play our opening stretch of the season at the end of the year…. 16 of 24 games on the road and 15 of those 24 being playoff teams from last year could’ve killed our chances of making the post season this year.

We’re making the playoffs. 50 wins.

the Schonz and his magic eight ball say to book it.

I was going to rec your comment but it was already green so humm doesn’t seem to be much of a point now. Thank you for saving my clients. They were catchin HELLA ‘tude since I read that sched but then I happened upon your brilliant obviousness that us homerpessimisfreakouters couldn’t think b/c we were too busy thinking we got screwed. Thanks again, you just made my DAY.

I heart you,

Sophia

I don’t see the sceduale as all the brutal.
other than we play the west and we have a big early road trip
and that we play in the west

I want us getting tested early. We’re going to have to be a fearless team if we want to beat Boston in the finals

Which is exciting because I have only been able to see 1 per year (at the rose garden) since forever. They’re coming to Oakland in November, I’ll be in Portland to see them at home once in December, and then when I move to New Jersey I’ll get to see them there once in January. Good times!

1 per year (live)—I saw them in Oakland vs GS last year … not a great game but oh well

I think if we are going to make the playoffs, the blazers have to really hit their stride in January and February and play .70 + ball. The schedule through November is almost unfair, I am thinking 6-12 or 7-11 heading into December would probably be good…

A field trip to Sac I took a close look and found to my amazement that we only play Sac 3 times this year

Going to be rough early, but I’m still looking at 48 – 52 wins which should put us as 6th or 7th seed and a team that nobody wants to see coming into their series!

You can view my calendar at:
http://ical.me.com/kroll/Blazers

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webcal://ical.me.com/kroll/Blazers.ics

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on ESPN’s NBA page, under the First Dates picture, it show’s East skeds and West skeds and lists 6 teams from each.

Guess who’s one of the teams listed from the West?

Buzz is building.

Also, I was trying to see which teams had the most nationally televised games, but there was no easy way whatsoever to compile this list except to go through and count each team individually. Any takers?

With 13, we’ve got to be up there, right?

Here’s the phases I break it down into:

October 28 through December 12:
25 games in 46 days.
9 home, 16 away.
7 back-to-backs with travel, but no travel day.

December 13 through January 10:
11 games (9 home, 2 away) in 29 days,
starting with 3 days off between homes games.

4-game eastern road trip.

5 of 6 at home.

3-game road trip to redneck country.

5 of 6 at home, with the all-star break in the middle (15-day stretch).

3-game road trip to redneck country.

6 of 7 at home.

5-game road trip, roughly up the Mississippi river.

4-game homestand.

4-game road trip to redneck country.

3 of 4 at home.

Playoffs.
__

Let the record show that I called my shot on the season opener at the L[xxx]rs.

And our 12 scheduled nationally televised games include BOTH of our home games against the Suns.
Gee . . . I wonder why the national audience is so interested in THAT team in the Rose Garden?
Could it be . . . a Terry Porter jersey retirement?!?

(Ummmmmm . . . DUH.)