I know I'm not the only one who has chewed off his own foot in frustration of the nightly comparisons between Greg Oden and Durant/Sam Bowie/David Bowie/a large carrot/Mothra... If comparisons were a stat relevant to the PER rankings, Oden would be in the running on every geek-stat ranking in the country.

Enjoying reading over posting, usually, I have seen every kind of post imaginable regarding Greg Oden in the past 5 months. My favorites are the reactionary posts after he has a rough game, or Durant has a good one, watching one nights work summon emotional declarations of "bust" faster than a KP draft day swindle, as if the big guy loses a little bit of his soul every time Durant scores 40 for his cellar dwelling "not Sonics".

So, to celebrate his triumphant return to the court later next week (that's my hopeful soul, not insider knowledge) I am honored to bring you Greg Oden vs Milovan Raković, the last player taken in the 2007 NBA draft.

We all know the sad tale of GO's 07/08 campaign, a tour-de-crutch after being sidelined by micro-fracture surgery. But why does Milovan get off so dang easy, after being picked by Orlando, who traded the 44th pick for the right to choose Raković with the 60th? [Mavs owner Mark Cuban threw in a bit of foldin' money as well]

One might ask, "what did this promising 6'10" 270 lb Serbian do alongside Dwight, Jameer and Co. to make him worthy of being picked dead last in the 07 draft?" And one would be wise and helpful to my premise to ask such a question...

The answer: Without even a video game injury to blame, Milovan selfishly defected to Russia, where he currently plays for Spatak Saint Petersberg in something called a "Russian Super League"... So not only has he not scored a single basket or corralled one rebound in the NBA, but he plays second fiddle to Sergei Monia in a league that needs the word "super" on it's marquee to attact viewership and participants. Pathetic.

Greg Oden averages 9 points, 7.2 rebounds and 1.15 more blocks per game than this guy who was drafted IN THE SAME DRAFT!!!! So get off his back, and recognize, believers, that had KP waited on Greg (thinking we might pick him up in the second round) we could have ended up with "Super-friend" Raković, holding down the Blazer faction in the Eastern Bloc. And if GO can avoid injuries and learn to stay out of foul trouble, and doesn't get run out of town by nervous, emotional reactionaries, he will dunk on Mothra someday, too!

** Post is sarcastic, and author knows it's ridiculous to compare a top pick to a 60th... Sheesh!