Calzone's Blazers Season Preview

Maybe you’re sizing your own replica Blazers championship ring.

Maybe you’re confident about this roster. This coach. This GM. And their ability to seamlessly mesh, come together for a common purpose. And win. As in, it all.

Are you paying attention, Blazer Fan?

Because you’re not paying attention to the real stories. Nor understanding the strain that success—boring, copasetic success—has on the media. Particularly a certain bald-headed, immensely successful sports columnist and radio-show host.

Yours truly had an interesting late summer. In August, I had the opportunity to cover and pontificate on UFC 102 at the Rose Garden. I met up with UFC fighter Dana White, who looks just like me, poor guy, and went waterskiing with him on the Willamette River. And it was a gorgeous Portland summer day. And I gave Dana some really good pointers about the differences between dock starts and deepwater starts. (Barefoot skiing is a little above his pay grade.) And while I was cruising down the river, dodging the PCBs and waving toward well-wishers on the shore, I suddenly saw something highly unusual.

A shark’s fin.

There was a medium-sized shark, possibly a hammerhead, in the Willamette. And without thinking, I pointed up my skis and launched myself over the shark. It was a clean jump. And a perfect landing. And all was good. And then we headed down to the RG for fight night.

As you may know by now, UFC 102 was amazing. Amazing because a particularly appalling, bloody fight gave me the chance to really bring it hard in my column. And I got hammered for hammering on UFC, but I’m paid to give my opinion. And I did, righteously. And straight from that controversy the sports-journo gods sent me Byron Hout and LeGerritte Blount.

Understand.

It was a fantastic couple of weeks. And frankly, it's the sort of thing I'd like to see more of from Portland's only major professional franchise.

While the NBA and the Blazers are two areas of personal expertise, covering this team is not always easy for America’s #1 Sports Columnist. And these guys are good. Make no mistake. But they are, for lack of a better term, vanilla—even the brothers on the squad. Can you say, “controversy-free zone”?

You bet.

Cranking out three columns a week for possibly the next seven-plus months will be a tall order if the Blazers realize their immense potential and start dominating the NBA. You might like it, but me? I get a particular thrill from being able to insert myself into dicey, acrimonious situations.

So concern yourself with the pedestrian technicalities of wins, losses, player efficiency ratings and trade talk. The bald-faced truth will not concern any of that. It’ll be following Nate McMillan after practice to suggest his players are tuning him out. And it’ll encourage Brandon Roy to think he knows better than Nate. And it’ll get in Greg Oden’s face to question his heart when he has three single-single performances in a row. And it’ll get Joel Przybilla to admit that he knows deep down he should be starting at center. And it’ll translate Rudy Fernandez’s muttered curses when Nate pulls him from a tight game with three minutes to play, electing to have Brandon Roy and Andre Miller close it out instead. And it'll bang on Kevin Pritchard consistently for squandering the pot of gold that was Raef LaFrentz's Expiring Contract.

And it’ll break down Jerryd Bayless’s steely demeanor and help him see that he’s not the reason he’s not playing meaningful minutes; it’s Nate and the coaching staff constantly underestimating and undermining him. And it’ll be there when Juwan Howard realizes that for all his billions, Paul Allen skimps on the cold cuts at the post-game buffet. And it’ll assist LaMarcus Aldridge in questioning his value as a near-max-contract player, and as a human being, after another low-rebound effort. And it’ll expose that Andre Miller isn’t really the team player he’s cracked up to be when he’s neither starting nor dominating the ball. And it’ll exploit the fissures in Steve Blake’s professionalism when Miller finally takes over the starting point-guard spot and Blake is reduced to spot minutes.

And it’ll minimize the ups and maximize the downs of Nic Batum’s arduous recovery from shoulder surgery, and suggest that the Blazers made the injury worse by encouraging Batum to play through it. And it’ll call out Travis Outlaw’s defense and shot selection. And it’ll give Martell Webster tough love about fulfilling potential and being more than just a sweet-looking jumpshot. And it’ll call out the Blazers’ veterans, Juwan Howard in particular, for not hazing rookies Dante Cunningham, Jeff Pendergraph and Patty Mills more creatively and mercilessly.

But not everything will be so hard-hitting. The awards committees like human-interest stuff, so yours truly will insert himself in the middle of some really heartwarming, tear-jerking inspirational, sub-Mitch Albom-type pieces. Soon you’ll hear the story of a homeless, double-amputee, terminal cancer-stricken Iraq War vet, an Army sergeant who, having had his (sadly ineffective) chemotherapy partly paid for by the Blazer organization after the VA denied his coverage on a technicality, appealed to the Make-A-Wish Foundation for the chance to use his remaining shreds of strength to scream and yell at players during a Blazers practice, selflessly sacrificing himself so that this team of tall millionaires can improve themselves and bring happiness to so many Oregonians. It’s a story you can get only from me…Calzone.

It’s one thing to play it safe and just be good, even great. It’s so much better to be interesting.

See you down at the RG.