Rip City Slideshow

b/c it signifies the age of dominance of the Blazers, as well as for the Oregonian.

Thankfully, the Blazers don’t suck anymore and with the demise of the print industry, im even more grateful to have Blazersedge and Flikr (instead of full page color) .

Excellent

Sophia

I remember the Uncle Cliffy headband craze, and how he hated to be called “Uncle Cliffy.” ha.

A high school buddy and I were lucky to get good seats at a home game in the Coliseum during the playoff series against Utah (I’m thinking 1989 or 90)..the sheer electricity and energy in the arena was amazing, and sticks with me to this day.

Great stuff Ben, brings back memories. I was up in Bellingham in college during the finals run, and even everyone up there in Sonic’s country was rooting for the Blazers. There were signs all over campus reading “Go Blazers”. I still have some newspaper clippings examining the Jordan vs. Drexler matchup.

Goosebumps… Can’t wait for Oct. 27th.

That was the feeling nationally, and it became painfully clear to even die-hard Blazer fans that the team got by with a lot of heart and hustle, but they were out-coached in the finals. Adelman has progressed into a fine NBA coach, but at the time he got the head coaching job because he could “relate” to Clyde better than Mike Schuler.

There were a lot of exciting wins along the way to the finals (series’ against San Antonio, Phoenix and Utah come to mind) but the Blazer fell short in their preparation and execution when it mattered the most. Adding an experienced veteran like Ainge helped, but the guy who would’ve helped the most was Sabonis, but “Ourvydas” was still bound to his European commitments at that time.

I’ll always have a soft spot for these players, but I learned a valuable lesson that it’s not “enough” to assemble a team based on their athletic ability, what’s between their ears (and this includes the coaching staff) is even more important in the finals

That should be in a future “That’s G, too” campaign :)

…there’s a good chance I’ve got most of this tucked away in storage somewhere within the confines of my home, but I haven’t seen any of those articles in nearly twenty (!) years. I can’t thank you enough for generously sharing these here.

BTW, I vividly remember all of the discussion regarding their “BBIQ,” but I’ve always thought what hurt most was that they really lacked the bench firepower (or experience or plain direction) the Pistons, L.A. and the Bulls had in those years. I do agree, two4larue, that Sabonis would have made a huge difference to that team, if only for his length and passing ability. It’s a real shame he never got to team up with Clyde or Terry.

down memory lane.

Sure fire sign of impending old age….when those games don’t seem that long ago.

Talk about some memories.

Seems like yesterday….was it really 20 years ago!!

Of course it can be dated by the Buck / Ainge fist pound picture. The fist pound replaced the high five, and was subsequently supplanted by the the sideways five, the forearm slap, the fist bump (not to be confused with the fist pound), the chest bump and eventually the flying chest bump (can be executed with or without the half hug).

Natural progression would suggest a new celebration trend is past due. I predict some sort of crouching foot slap affair.

I think the derivation of Schonely’s most famous term is often misinterpreted today but the Oregonian article laid it out accurately. “Rip” from the sound of a shot going through the rim hitting nothing but net. “City” was just a popular expression of the day. If you ate too much you might be headed to fat city, or if a person took a bad fall you might have heard someone utter, “ouch, bruise city”. Loretta Lynn even published a song in the 70’s named “Fist City” (the theme being if someone was going to try to move in on her man they would be threatened by her fists …. going to Fist City).

It wasn’t like the Schonz back then was calling Portland "Rip City’. But today it’s kind of cool I guess that Portland is referenced that way.

Jack Schalow!

Paul Allen looked a lot younger back then eh? – Elgin