Bill Simmons...He Likes Us?

He never actively hated us. Saying negative things about a team isn’t hating them, it’s just him thinking we aren’t as good as we actually are. He’s wrong about us but he isn’t a hater.

link

Passage about us (since this is a much larger article, I think excerpting the entire question and answer is okay, feel free to nuke this if not, mods):

Q: Did your book tour include a stop at the Rose Garden for Pistons-Blazers last week? I hope you checked out the way the Garden treats Greg Oden. Every time he does something basic, the place explodes like he dunked from half court. They are just willing themselves to think he will be good.
— David G., Portland

Yes, I did. And the best way to describe the crowd’s support for Oden: It’s like watching 15,000 parents rooting for their kid, only all 15,000 parents fathered the same kid. If he ever explodes for 30 points, 20 rebounds and eight blocks in a game, you’ll have to carry each deliriously passed-out Portland fan out of the Rose Garden individually like they were victims of smoke inhalation in a burning house. (The funny thing is, everyone in Portland is nodding right now. And yes, I know he’s had a couple of inspired games this season. You don’t need to e-mail me the stat lines. No, really. Save us both the time. Let’s not put too much pressure on him. Baby steps.) I also was startled by Portland fans arguably (see, there it is!) liking Rudy Fernandez as much as, and maybe even a smidge more than, the great Brandon Roy.

Two other things shocked me. First, that’s the whitest NBA experience you can have that doesn’t involve the words “Salt,” “Lake” and City." They didn’t play hip-hop either before the game or during the game, each team seemed to have more African-Americans than the entire crowd and the pregame video right before the introduction of Portland’s starting lineup was a local grunge band singing “Ballroom Blitz.” And second, during a second-quarter timeout, my buddy House and I ran into the concourse to grab beers and noticed there was NOBODY else in line for anything. We felt like Will Smith in “I Am Legend.” There was no sign of human life other than the workers. Everyone else stays in their seats. At halftime, those same people pour into the concourse like it’s halftime of a football game. I’ve never seen anything like it. I don’t know whether the Blazers have the most loyal, passionate, dutiful fans in the NBA, but at the very least, we can say nobody else tops them.

Here’s what I took away from my Rose Garden experience: Portland loves the Blazers the same way a single mother would love her only child. The city’s revulsion toward the “Jail Blazers” makes a lot more sense to me now. The team and the city are intertwined, and if one side isn’t holding up that bargain, it’s even more painful than usual. Anyway, I couldn’t be happier that I got a taste of it. Great NBA city.

Especially the whitest NBA experience part.

Although as a 5 and a half foot tall white guy I am starting to wonder if I should ask my wife for a paternity test… Greg just doesn’t look like me.

(hence the GB in my name for Great Britain), the phrase is ‘go on my son’, not ‘you are my son’, although the Liverpool accent is pretty hard to understand, even amongst us English, so an understandable mistake :)

It’s my ambition to get to Portland for a Blazers game at some point, and I would love it if you all adopted ‘go on my son’!

Portlanders really wanna love Greg. It’s a fact. It’s also a fact he’s never gonna have that kinda game (40/20/8). Nor will he ever have to. But I think he’ll eventually become more valuable than any other Blazer, maybe even this year.

It just might be that his value might be hidden by box score stats. The Simmons analogy is accurate. The Rose Garden is more of an amalgam between an NBA game and maybe a ACC basketball game. People are there to cheer on their team. In fact it might be the only place in portland where people aren’t trying to make the scene (j/k).

Simmons also really likes to antagonize Blazers fans because he’s the giantest Durant fan on the planet. It’s gonna be interesting to see Durant/Oden debate down the line because it represents the battle between traditional “scoring as ultimate indicator of value” point of view vs. “less easily measurable” skills and how valuable someone can be while compiling less raw stats.

I was literally nodding my head like “yep, that’s pretty much true.” right before I read this:

“The funny thing is, everyone in Portland is nodding right now.”

He actually describes Portland as a fan base and as a city in relationship with its team very very well. He understands the jailblazers era, and I think he really does, because his description is spot on.

I have always liked Bill Simmons, even when he is being so aggravating and ridiculous (at least, that’s how I feel about his stuff sometimes!) But I have a little bit more respect for him now. He earned that with those paragraphs.

A couple of things about Simmons…

He has, on many occassions, reflected the soul of Bostonians to the letter. Spot on. His articles during the ’04 Sox season (down 0-3 to the hated Yankmes, followed by glorious redemption) brought tears of laughter and joy to my eyes. He understands what it takes to be a Boston fan, particularly a Red Sox fan.

Now, interestingly, Sox fans are very much like Portland fans. They live it. Every day during the summer, Bostonians flip back two sections to the Boston Globe sports section. Sports rivals the weather for casual conversation (“How bout those Sox?” “Yea, they’re wicked awesome… Bot how about this weather?”) Every move by the manager is second-guessed at LEAST as much as Nate’s starting lineups. There are not just two sports radio talk shows talking about it – there are several. The sports leads the news (or at least the headlines are delivered in the first segment.)

This is how, I believe, Simmons “gets” the Portland fan. It’s not much of a stretch for him. His comment that we love the Blazers like our children, if delivered to a Boston only audience, clearly would have been “Portlanders love the Blazers like Bostonians love the Sox”…

Secondly, Portland is an incredibly white city. It’s changed a bit in the 16 years I’ve been here, but still incredibly white. Now, Boston has historically been a very white city, too. (Especially when compared to the other major cities in the Eastern seaboard…) Not sure I have any particular point about this, other than it’s something that Simmons would naturally notice (especially living in CA).

But, as much as I appreciate Simmons, I, too hope he is sitting next to Cowturd when Oden gets his first ring…

MAkes me hate him a little less for that 41-41 prediction.

from basketball-reference.com:

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