Archive for February, 2009

To me, All-Star Saturday has always been the highlight of the NBA’s All-Star Weekend. You know how on an episode of MTV Cribs you can always count on the celebrity to make some sort of awful, corny reference to the “magic” or something happening in their bed? You can always count on All-Star Saturday to deliver some form of entertainment. But before we get to that… …we must address the debacle known as All-Star Friday. And yes I’ve got my ranting boots on. What the heck was that? First off the NBA All-Star “Celebrity” Game? Why the quotes? Because it [...]

Greg Oden will miss the Rookie-Sophomore game with a sore knee after banging knees with Corey Maggette yesterday. Notice how the report doesn’t even say bruised, just sore — sounds like the Blazers are trying to protect their investment and give him a few days off. Frankly, this is a little dissapointing, but in the grand scheme of things its probably for the best. I just hope we don’t have to hear people calling him injury prone all night. UPDATE: Here’s a longer story with some quotes.

Big surprise, huh? For a deal that involves two former All-Stars, it really doesn’t change much at all. Neither team is getting that much better, though D-Wade could be helped if Jermaine stays healthy. It’s a worthy gamble for Miami. What’s interesting is that Miami also managed to get Jamario Moon from the Raps, who does a lot of the same things Marion can (not at the same level, obviously). In other news, I don’t think you’re getting a Re-Thoughts from last night. I hate to even admit this, but if I were Nate McMillan I’d have a $30,000 fine [...]

Looking to head into a much needed All-Star Break with some momentum, the Blazers will travel to Oakland to officially end the first half the season at Golden State. This is the third and final matchup between the two teams with both teams having split, winning on their respective home courts. And let’s cut right to the chase today ladies and gentlemen. I don’t have the best of feelings about this game. Let me explain. The Blazers are tired. Not quite ‘I’m taking care of a baby tired’ but definitely ‘college girl whose been partying all weekend’ tired. You could [...]

I know I said it didn’t matter how we won as long as we won, but while I stand by that, it felt really good to watch the Blazers shift to a higher gear and leave the Thunder behind. They weren’t that much more smooth, efficient or even pretty during that 16-2 run, the Blazers just went faster and harder. And that’s fine. Portland wasn’t going to fix its defensive problems in the week before the All-Star break, so they did their damage where its most important: the standings. Fifteen turnovers doesn’t really tell the entire story of just how [...]

Revenge is a dish best served, OK, do we really need to go through the lyrical musings about revenge when it’s the Oklahoma City Thunder? I won’t waste your time rehashing what SJ said last week. The only thing that’s changed since then is the Thunder won that game and Portland can’t afford to go into the All-Star break with losses against either OKC or Golden State. You want the players going into their days off with a clear mind, not carrying the burden of losses against the league’s worst teams. Many of them already have enough to try not [...]

Everybody went and did my work for me today, and I’m not complaining. Boom, Blazersedge Ben has tons of links, including an interesting take on the Amar’e rumors. Boom, Sean Meagher has more rumor links, including Ric Bucher’s appearance on Courtside with Mike and Mike (and Rebecca) last night. Meagher also did the Chad Ford chat wrap-up I usually do, so check that out. Boom, done.

The Blazers deserve a lot of credit for that win. You’ll hear it often, but taking a hit like that second-half Knicks run and coming back to win is worthy of a pat on the back. The Spurs did it one the road at Boston today, and it was only more impressive because of the caliber of the team they were playing. But they way the Knicks were shooting for about six minutes, they might as well have been the Showtime Lakers. I’ll start with the positives. The Blazers had five guys with at least sixteen points, they out-rebounded the [...]

After what felt like forever, the Blazers will return to the court to (hopefully) aid themselves (and us) in washing away that one loss from Friday night. The opponent: The New York Knicks. And if it makes you feel better the Knicks also lost to Oklahoma City in OKC. More on the Knicks in a second. If you look at the schedule this opens up a very key stretch of games for the Blazers. Over the next two weeks, Portland gets 5 of their next 6 games at home and 5 of their next 6 games against teams with sub [...]

I’m not kidding. This one has to rank somewhere up the list for most random NBA trades of at least the last decade. In exchange for Vladimir Radmanovic the Lakers are receiving former No. 3 draft pick Adam Morrison and former Michigan State star Shannon Brown. Talent-wise, despite all of Morrison’s failings — and there have been a lot of them — the Lakers come out on top because of potential, however unlikely it looks like Ammo will ever acheive a fraction of what people had thought, and they get out of Radman’s three-year, $18 or so million contract. Neither [...]