Us young Blazer fans have heard the stories since we were born.  The older among us can actually remember every damn incident against that horrible rival.  No, I’m not talking about the Lakers.  I’m not talking about the Jazz.  I’m definitely not talking about the Sonics.  It’s knees everywhere, and even more specifically - our knees.

It’s the knee of Sam Bowie that turned Portland into a punchline in the NBA’s cruelest joke.  The knee of Sabas hobbled our favorite geriatric big man.  Then there’s the recent knee issues.  The knee of Brandon Roy sidelining him for a brief period, a constant jabbing in the side of the collective fan base compared to the knee of Greg Oden, which was like a screwdriver in the calf for Portland.

The true mark of knee hatred isn’t getting hurt at inopportune times, though.  It’s the fact that they recover, too.  I was tempted to put the knee of Darius Miles on that previous list, and would have done it a week ago.  The knee of Darius Miles grounded one of the better high flyers in the league, and made him a drag on our cap and our roster (and apparently he was carrying some sort of contagion, as I distinctly remember articles and board posts about his potentially “infecting” young players, as if each of his headband slaps would release spores that make players go to strip clubs and hide guns in pillows).  Now his knee is taking the revenge that no knee has ever taken.  It got better.  It lied to the doctor to get off the roster, and then groveled in front of Danny Ainge to spite the Blazers.  Take a second to think of what a knee groveling would look like, if you please.  Now it’s signed, and we’re worried.  Damn knees.

Robert - So, why do you hate me so much?

Robert’s knee - It’s not anything personal, honestly.

R - How can this not be personal, I depend on you, I work with you, we’ve lived together since the 80s!  Reagan was in office!

RK - You think I don’t know that?  It’s difficult stabbing your benefactor in the back.  The reason is purely geographic.

R - Geographic, how?  Like geography?  Do you and other knees get together and try to map the rivers of Mongolia?

RK - *annoyed* No.  We dislike Portland.  It’s the moisture!  It makes us creaky.

R - Creaky?  That’s not much of a reason, you know.  Portland is regarded as one of the most healthy cities in the world.

RK - Okay, okay, okay.  That’s not the real reason. *motions me closer*

R - What is it?

RK - We just don’t like you!  Is it wrong to have a vast international conspiracy that stretches back decades in order to screw over one small market franchise?

R - Umm…

RK - That’s rhetorical.

R - Well, at least having unending, unprovoked anger from one of your most important joints is still better than being a Laker fan.

RK - You said it, brother.  Excuse me, I gotta go.  *ACL explodes*

R - Why?

“Thursday morning, Brandon Roy went in for arthroscopic surgery on his knee.”

There it is.   Those damn words.  Certain ones just flare up in day-glo when you read a news story.  Roy.  Surgery.  Knee.  Damn.

I think I took the wrong track when I used pessimism to downplay the expectations of the season.  Real life is much worse.  This knee issue was the one brought up by Steven A. Smith on draft night two years ago, saying it was a reason why Roy wasn’t taken higher even though he was the most NBA-ready player in that draft.  It’s the reason a year ago when Bill Simmons ranked Roy surprisingly low.  Now they’ve just been proven right.

We dodged a bullet this time; the surgery was minor and it was during the right time - well into the offseason and still before training camp.  Still, it gives the sadness mongers out there something to hang onto.  The ones that will say, the Blazers won’t be anything, they’re only one bad jump away from last place.

I say these people need a hobby.

The team is far too well-constructed and the talent overload that some are predicting to be the undoing of the team finds its greatest use in situations like that.  The fact that if we lost an all star for a bit of time, it wouldn’t be the end of the world for us shows the cohesiveness of the team, the coach, and the front office.  The players know work, and they can step in and do whatever job is needed.

Still, I take this kick in the seeds as a little nicer than recent ones.  Last year’s DDR fiasco had me doubled over.  The saga over Paul Allen potentially selling the team two years ago was a perpetual vice grip on them.  This one was just a love tap.

I think that’s how you know that you have arrived in the NBA - even getting hit in the nuts doesn’t seem so bad.

I was doing my normal morning run-through of the sports sites and the pop culture sites and this rumor comes up - the Blazers are in talks to get a great athlete that is extremely well-known.  I’ve seen this subtext, this code before.

The Blazers are in talks with the Los Angeles Galaxy to trade for David Beckham.

It’s an obvious trade for both teams.  Beckham is getting older but he’s still an athlete at the peak of his game, and could add a veteran presence to the youngest team in the NBA.  He’s fast and has leadership that just can’t be quantified, leading his teams to multiple Premiership and UEFA titles.  Also, he will bring much-needed publicity to Portland.  What’s better to get the team on national and international television than having the most famous athlete in the entire world playing PG for the team?  We can’t forget his international popularity, also.  He will be a great link to Europe and our European players.  What better for a young gun like Rudy or Sergio than having the player they grew up idolizing on Real Madrid come in and help them?  What an ambassador!

I assume that Paul Allen is buying the MLS in the trade for him, along with unloading Darius Miles’ contract on Los Angeles, which finally returns him to his head-bump roots.

The future keeps on getting brighter and brighter for the Blazers.

All the talk on this forum has been towards how far we've come and how happy we should all be.  It's tiring.  How about some reality?

The Blazers are the most hopeful young-talent-loaded team in the NBA.  That’s impossible to deny.  They stole the NBA summer league MVP, and he won’t even be one of the two best rookies on the team.  The general wisdom is that the Blazers will be perennial contenders with that time period starting as early as this year and without a doubt in the next three.  However, all this optimism really needs some tempering.  What could go wrong?

The Blazers are a young team.  What the entire team operates in is that unknown quantity - words like potential and upside.  There are no tangible figures about what the team will be.  Sure Travis Outlaw could be a 20-plus scorer with his jumping ability, but the operating form is the conditional “could.”  He could also never get his head on straight and become the player he has the potential to be and continue firing those foot on the line Outlaw specials.

There are the injury concerns, as well.  Oden is the obvious choice for this, so I won’t really go into it.  The greatest example of potential becoming reality for him that we’ve seen so far is the fact that his leg issues turned out to be gravely serious.  He’s not alone.  There is the man behind him that many call the best back-up center in the NBA: Joel Przybilla.  He hasn’t played a full season since God knows when.  A thin, injury prone front line would kill any chances this team has for a playoff run.  Do you really expect Channing to play the role of bruiser in the playoffs if Greg and Joel go down?

There is also the condition of the overseas transition.  Everyone knows the success stories; the guys like Tony Parker, Dirk Nowitzki, and Manu Ginobili.  Even our own people like Sabas and Petrovic.  Those guys aren’t the rule, though.  The rule is just as much the failures or the fizzle-outs; Darko, Sergio, Monia, and Veektor.   Yes, I intentionally included three Blazers.  We know better than anyone the highs and lows of potential foreign players.  Until we see anything on an NBA court, Rudy, Batum, and Koponen are just potential, and nothing more.

Finally, there’s just the issue of other teams being good.  The Blazers aren’t working in a vacuum. All the other teams are trying just as hard to win the championship as the Blazers are (except the Bucks).  There are plenty of teams peaking or looking to peak at the same time as us.  The Jazz will be great for the next decade, as will be the Lakers.  We are not alone.

Don’t take this as negativity - it’s not.  Just take it as pragmatism.  Not every move Kevin Pritchard makes will be perfect.  It’s impossible (I hope it isn’t, though).  With standards that high, you’re destined for disappointment.  Then again, with lowered standards, the highs will be a little higher, too.   Things are looking up, but let’s not go crazy, okay?

This beast has been stalking the woods of the Pacific Northwest for 15 years, loved by all for his feats of flipping, dunking, and, of all things, roller-blading.

Squatch ascended the ranks of mascotry quickly, becoming one of the best in the NBA, if not in all professional sports.  Now he’s unemployed.  How can it be that Stuff the Magic Dragon in Orlando has a job, but a legendary Northwest mythical creature will not because some idiot in Oklahoma City says so?  Which leads me to the question: Is Portland a good fit for Squatch?

Proximity: Portland is the closest franchise to the former Seattle Supersonics, and makes them a fitting target.  Obviously, there have been sightings of Sasquatch from southern Oregon all the way up to BC, so, in terms of a geographical fit, Squatch fits the Blazers as well as any team in the league.

Familiarity:  The shaggy hair of Squatch is quite familiar to Blazer fans - especially the ones who remember Bill Walton’s armpits in the 1970s.

Blaze: A major argument against him could be the presence of our current mascot, Blaze.  If we have one already, why would we want two?  The real question: why wouldn’t we?  Let’s consider what we gain from having two mascots: double the t-shirts, double the fans with away jerseys being covered with silly string in the stands, double dunks, double pizza deliveries, double fun!

Squatch himself: Moreover, what would you prefer?  Would you prefer this great idea go to waste, waiting until Seattle gets another franchise in some unknown time period?  Or would you prefer a mascot, which is just a person in a suit, much like any one of you in the working world, get to keep their job and keep doing what they want to do?  Why is it that guys like Raef LaFrentz and Darius Miles are still getting money from the Blazers but Squatch isn’t?

There’s injustice here, and it must be remedied.

Hey Greg,

It’s me, you know, the DDR Pad. Where have you been? I’ve been rolled up in a closet in the basement for almost a year. I remember we used to have so much fun before, you’d jump around on top of me, and I’d give you points on your plasma screen. It was great. Since I’m made out of plastic and fabric, your jumping would never break me, and I always stayed in place. We were a team, Greg. A team!

What now, though? I’m living in a basement in Tualatin, Oregon, like some sort of suburban hermit. The only company I get are curious ants or that dog repeatedly declaring, that yes, I am his territory.

And I know you haven’t stopped playing games either, that’s the worst part. I hear you up there; with Master Chief last fall, with Call of Duty, with Guitar Hero and your unexpected love of ZZ Top and Foghat, with 2K8, yelling at the screen as digitized you swatted away another shot into the seventh row. Why won’t you play with me?

What did I ever do to you, man? I thought we were friends. We can still be friends! Just take me out, we can reminisce on the good old times, maybe even make a new ones. What’s the worst that can happen?

Yours,

DDR Pad

Hey guys, I'm over in New York doing really nothing at all, and I decided to stroll over to Rockefeller Center, in hopes of maybe running into Conan O'Brien and accosting him into giving me an autograph.  Unfortunately, that never happened.  On the other hand, I found a rally for Team USA Basketball going on instead.  The whole team was there, but I had the nasty luck to show up for only the last introduction - Tayshaun Prince.  Still, the team seems to have great chemistry, as you could see guys like Deron Williams and Chris Paul joking during the PR events.

The spectacle itself was silly, as it involved a game of USA (A patriotic version of HORSE) for a pair of shoes for a section of kids from the inner city.  Why Nike didn't give shoes to both sides, I'll never know.  Those have always been my favorite kind of charity competitions.  Both sides don't know they'll win, but then afterwards, they both get prizes.  It's the pride that counts, right?

At the rally, Portland was well-represented, as I saw a few fans with Oden jerseys, and then there were my manic screams for Nate.  If only The Marcus was there today.

I'll update this further when I go to the NBA Store, and see what kind of representation the Blazers have there in comparison to, say, the Milwaukee Bucks or the Oklaseattle Sonics.

Update:

The NBA store is a concrete-made-to-look-like-marble mammoth on Fifth Avenue in New York, across the street from a Salvatore Ferragamo flagship and down a block from the main locations of The Gap and Zara.  It fits in nicely, as everything is a hue of gray due to the area receiving sunlight for about one hour a day because of the monstrous buildings.  You're welcomed in with an HR Giger-esque revolving door that has the disembodied arms of Michael Jordan in place of bars on the door for pushing.

Inside, you immediately see what you expect: Knicks merchandise and Boston merchandise (They're the champs after all).  As you go around the top/first floor, you get the range of normal touristy stuff: Adidas apparel, T-shirts that just say "NBA Store" for $35, (Nice, David Stern) and for a comedic break a small WNBA section.  I have no right to expect the Blazers up here, because, after all, we weren't even in the playoffs this year, although we had an all-star.

Downstairs is where I expected our players represented to a degree that was at least proportionate to the rest of the league.  After all, the Blazers were #7in attendance last year.  What do I find?  An Oden jersey displayed proudly as soon as I got down there.  Joy flooded my body, a home three thousand miles away from home, they have our guy.  Then I look at the jerseys surrounding him.  Zach Randolph.  Ugh.  Then I wonder, where's Brandon Roy.  Oh, he's tucked in the back, behind a ladder.  I guess he was only an All-Star and there's valuable space needed for those Eddy Curry jerseys.

Still, the most disgusting part of this excursion came when I was looking through the t-shirt section.  Here, there are a bunch of shirts with the retro logo of NBA teams.  You know the type: Washington Bullets, cursive Chicago, the skyline of Seattle for the Supersonics.  I was excited here.  I finally had a souvenir from the NBA store - a retro Portland logo t-shirt, our proud pinwheel turned vertical.  I looked all around.  It wasn't there.

"Where are the Blazers shirts?" I asked a nearby employee folding Nets shirts.

"Uh, we have the Bullets shirts over there."

"Yes, I know, but where are the Trailblazers?"

"I told you, the Bullets are over there."

"Yeah, I know, but the Bullets are the Wizards now.  I mean, the Blazers, you know, from Portland?"

"Oh!"

"So do you have them?"

"No."

Thus ended my search for an interesting Blazers shirt.  At least it should have, but I still pressed on!  I rifled through the area and found something of immaculate wonder: a back of a shirt with the number 22 and the word "DREXLER" spelled above it.  Here it was I found it.  I quickly unfolded it, to hold up against myself in that neutered form of trying on clothing.  As the front revealed itself, a lump of sausage pizza rose from my stomach.  It read "Houston Rockets."  According to the NBA, Clyde Drexler isn't a Blazer.

I take away one lesson from my experience at the NBA store.  We have every right to gloat and Pritch-slap whoever we damn please.  The NBA gives us no respect, so we should be just as disrespectful to them.  They don't care what happens in Portland.  One of the league's biggest success stories, and they're thrown behind a ladder.  We must continue with our pride.  The French have a phrase for this (ask Batum) "Je m'en fous."  It translates roughly to "I don't give a damn" (although slightly worse).  This should be our motto.  This makes me think more that Blazers really our team and not meant for anyone else.  If people find them, excellent, the more the merrier, but the NBA sure isn't going out of its way to let customers or employees know we exist.

I've been going to this site for well over a year now, and it's always been Dave doing the posts (and now Ben, of course).  What I'm wondering is how did this site spring forth?  Was Dave the founder of it?  How did he found this thing?  Was he hanging out on some other SB Nation blog and just jumped into it?  For some reason this nags me a little bit (I suppose it happens during the summer after school is done).

It's finally happened.  I feel like a castaway on Lost.  I've been on the Island for so long with my group, and now I'm joining the Others - I'm a Laker convert, at least for these playoffs.

The Celtics are pure evil.  They're a bunch of mercenaries, a bunch of old guys who couldn't do it themselves who band together for the most spoiled sports city in America.  They must lose.  They're the third biggest danger to the NBA (behind the Spurs and flopping, both related, I know).

The way I see it, it's choosing between two STDs, two things you'd never want.  The Lakers seem like they'll be around forever and are kind of itchy, hence, they're herpes.  However, the Celtics are sinister like Civil War syphilis.  So remember - choose herpes.

via img.photobucket.com

Okay guys, here's what's going on.  This coming summer, I'll be making my first ever trip into New York City proper.  (I say proper because a couple of times I flew though Newark and saw the Statue of Liberty from an airplane window.  Not mine, because I'm always seated on the aisle so I have to get up wait while an elderly person or a kid with no bladder control shuffle their way past me, stubbing my toes.)  Anyway, I'll be arriving on June 24.  The draft is two days later, on the 26th.  My question is, what does it take to get into the draft?  Do you need press credentials?  Is there a drawing?  Do you just show up?  Anyway, I don't know much about this sort of thing, so maybe you folks could help me, perhaps Dave or Ben also?