Blazers Regular Season Recap

I feel obligated to do some sort of regular season recap, so here it is. From Deceptively Quick to you, regular season grades (Keep in mind I'm frantically trying to finish this before Toronto/NJ comes on):

Paul Allen: A

I'm not a Paul Allen fan. He gets an A because he is accepting his role as money man. Use the money to hire good people, and let those people do their jobs. You know, like how he runs the Seahawks?
He finally bought back the Rose Garden. He promoted Kevin Pritchard to GM (or at least approved it). He also is the guy that decided to poney up the extra few million to the Suns to snatch Sergio Rodriguez last draft day. All good calls, so high marks for keeping out of your own way.

Brandon Roy: A+

After pre-season I enjoyed telling people that Roy would average what D.Wade did his rookie year, 16 4 and 4. Of course, Wade was on a veteran team at the time, and they're different kinds of players, but both have a great all-around skill set.

I really wanted the Blazers to draft Roy, and its hard to not respect the guy even more for surpassing high expectations. I didn't think he would lead like this so early. I didn't know he was so clutch. I didn't expect him to be such a competent 3-point threat (.377, seems higher in the clutch) or have an animal post up game. Not to mention he seems to be a very good guy. Roy is special, the type you put a franchise on. The Blazers really needed this guy to come along.

Zach Randolph: A

What, just because I rant about how he needs to be traded you expected less? Statistically, Z-Bo had his best season at 23.6 points and 10.1 boards per game. He did this after an offseason of busting his ass to both get in shape and rehabilitate his knee from the less and less threatening arthroscopic knee surgery. He had a few legal troubles, but hey, he didn't get arrested. He pulled some other stuff too (like the bereavement thing) that reminded us he was still our Zach. He had an inexplicable outburst of leadership at least once. I'm still not sure if any teams are willing to touch his contract, but his value is about as high as it will get right now, and I think our man Kevin Pritchard isn't afraid to pull the trigger if someone bites.

Wait. This is quickly turning into a homer style disgusting love-fest. I'm making myself sick as I read this. NJ/Toronto is coming on soon, so I'll return with what will hopefully be more critical and entertaining grades for the rest of the team later.

Paul Allen an A? I'm ashamed. I'm a guy that booed him at a game when they announced it was his birthday and showed him on the big screen. I'm one of the many that cackled at the Nate McMillan hiring press conference when he waved to everyone and almost fell down the stairs. I am ashamed.

Playoff hype, what about Boom Dizl?

The playoffs will be here in the morning for us Westcoasters, and I can't wait. Today has been a day where I got to read everyone's playoff predictions and what they are really excited to see.

For the record, I can't wait to see New Jersey vs. Toronto either. Toronto has become the darlings of the post-regular season/pre-post season gap, and with good reason. I'm also on board with the Utah vs. Houston excitement. Actually, I'm excited about everything.

I'm just wondering why nobody is putting any noise behind a very Baron playoffs. I've heard plenty about how interesting the Mavs vs. Warriors is: the Mav's haven't beat the Warriors yet this season, the Don Nelson thing, Warriors peaking.

What about Boom Dizl? I can't shake his 2002 playoff performance out of my thoughts. That was the year he carried his team (averaging 22 8 and 8), before losing a crucial game due to the ref incorrectly waiving off a sweet buzzer beater.

Baron isn't a big fan of keeping in shape during the offseason, and he's hurt all time (the former definitely isn't helping the latter, I wonder if he gets the connection). But when he's locked in, he's shown he can take it to a level very few others can.

Does he still have it like that? He's had a great season, but that playoff performance was greatness, rather or not his critics want to give him that kind of credit. With that Baron Davis on your team, you can beat anybody in the playoffs.

Dallas is a juggernaut on a mission, watching them play reminds me of the last levels of Mario 3. You have to run across that big ship and all these cannons and bad guys are coming at you from all angles. It's overwhelming, you feel helpless.

Unless you got a P-Wing:

The new tat signifies Mr. Dizl is ready to continue his playoff dominance.

I realize how nerdy I am. And how pointless this post was. But seriously, Baron can be that good. I wouldn't be as surprised as everybody else if the Warriors pulled this off.

Follow up to Dunleavy Humor of the previous post...

When I read my blog (I am by far my most loyal reader) regarding Mr. Mike Dunleavy's ability to decrease the value of a basketball by autographing it, I realized I made reference to another picture on my phone of Ime Udoka handling Mike Miller. I thought I'd follow up and post it:

There's so many more penis grabbing jokes to be made here. I'll leave coming up with the rest of them up to you, since I don't want to develop carpal tunnel. Both the facial expressions are funny, Ime like he can't bare to do it, as if he is ashamed/disgusted but has been pressured into it. Mike's face as if, well, he's getting his reproductive organs grabbed by Ime Udoka.

Thats it!

On the last night of the season, I stumble across some old gold

I was walking down the street and saw some cool looking graffiti, cool enough to take a picture of with my phone and make my new wallpaper. The occasional trip through my stored images file is always entertaining (to me). I came across a picture of the first smart car I saw driving around Portland, a shot that was the front page of the Oregonian sports section that includes Ime Udoka grabbing Mike Miller's groin (and Mike making a hilarious face of anguish), some shoes I saw, and then......











Oh man. Drink it in.

This picture was taken 11/25/06. Something big must have been on my mind to forget about this and not share it. The ball was in a bucket, which was also for sale (but NOT included with purchase of Dunleavy memorabilia). I must also add that this little bit of comedy was found in the second hand section of a small mom & pop style general store in a town that has less people than Johan Petro has points in his career.


By the way, it was a BRAND NEW leather Spalding basketball, seen here retailing for 39.99. I know the fans were rough on Mikey out in the Bay, I know he hasn't really lived up the the #3 pick and huge contract, but to decrease the value of a ball 75%? Ouch.

Spoken Word with Jack Brown...

I bet you couldn't tell if you've ever read my blog, or met me, but I'm quite an accomplished poet. My style of choice? The Haiku.

As far back as I can remember receiving poetry assignments in school it has been so. This is an amazing world we live in where a format coalesced by great Japanese poets to describe the beauty of the natural world spans the globe to become the lazy American student's best ally when it comes to getting out of work.

I'm not sure when I had to write my first poem, but I remember I got some Haiku's about Shaq in some school poetry publication at some point. This came flooding back to me because my 3rd grade teacher found a haiku I wrote in her class (possibly my first of a long line of haikus, probably until 12th grade). Its about Kevin Johnson, take a look:

Another random memory from this poem, the nickname reference is to "Mr. Goody Two-Shoes"(sp?). I very distinctly recall hearing him called that in commercials and being very confused.

Remember that commercial where he was running around the sun and some women were singing about him? AWESOME.

Big ups to KJ, I wrote him a letter (probably one of the first letters I wrote) and he replied back with his actual autograph on a little picture of him. I immediately put it on my wall where it remained for years. Thanks Mr. Goody Two Shoes.

Darius Miles the Ghost

Remember D.Miles? Remember how, if you are a Blazer fan, we cringed at his very prescence? The contract, the lack of work ethic, the bad attitude, the cancer. He came to town and tantalized us with flashes of his talent, making us think maybe he would work out in Portland. Remember when he nicknamed himself 'The Punisher'? We only hated him more for this, clearly the only thing being punished was the franchise.

Due to the above negatives, the team has wisely preferred he not hang around with the young squad. He's not at games, which is kind of a bummer because he did wear really nice suits. We never see him anymore. We don't even hear tabloid-like reports of his exploits any more (remember the sort-of news of him downtown having a drink while he was supposedly scheduled for rehab? Pure Inquirer, baby).

Poof.

Darius Miles has vanished from the collective consciousness of us all. Like a Ninja Turtle with a smoke screen. I haven't been able to find anybody that really knows what he's been up to. Even worse for Miles is that I haven't found anybody who cares. He clearly doesn't anger us anymore, which probably means we've stopped even pretending to care. We likely won't hear of him again until this summer, I really doubt he'll be traded. Not even Isiah would touch him now, and when Isiah won't touch you, nobody will touch you. But we'll see if he attempts a comeback (and thus returns to his role as franchise punisher), or if the Blazer are able to orchestrate a buy-out/insurance break kind of deal where they can at least reduce the impact of that contract.

To me, it has just been too much of a tumultuous ride to end so quietly. Doesn't feel right. Come on D., low-profile was never your style.

I've Missed A LOT

Too much has happened since my last post. Some news would come out, I'd think about starting an entry and then some even bigger news would come out. I really wanted to finally outline my position on the Blazers mascot Blaze the Trail Cat (he sucks, but I want to go in depth about why, because that really needs to be said). Florida won. Paul Allen bought back the Rose Garden for real. The Blazers announced plans to retire Lionel Hollins Jersey , which is fine and dandy, but demands I remember how badly the Blazers have messed up on retired jerseys. Hollins was on the championship team in 1977, and they just announced plans to retire his number 30 years later. Hey Terry, hang in there. Ugh. Then I think about Terry Porter and it makes me want to get all nostalgic and talk about how he, in my opinion, is the most beloved Blazer figure to Rip City Fans. At least growing up in my house, Porter was god-like. Clyde's the most famous BLAZER, Walton's the most famous guy who was a Blazer. This could get messy, so I'll save it for another time.

Then, David Aldridge had a report about how the Blazers are ready and willing to use their lottery pick in this year's hyped up draft to bring in a good veteran. The link isn't on NBA.com anymore, but you'll have to believe me. Then I was cruising hoopshype and found a link to an SI article about Gasol still wanting out. Then my mind shoots off to entertain visions of Lamarcus Aldridge and Gasol running down the court together with pinwheels on. Not sure if Gasol would agree to it, but WOW.

And as always, I wanted to revisit the unresolved Fred Hickman issue (you'll have to dig in my old posts if you're curious). The playoffs are starting. Oh, and remember how Zach Randolph is sitting out the season to get back at me (he's on my fantasy team, and we're IN the playoffs)? Well I joked about having to replace him with Walter Herrmann. I did pick Walter up off of waivers, and he is NO JOKE! I still haven't seen him play, but the stats are keeping me competetive. Well ok, I've "seen" him play for the Argentina National Team, I think, I just don't remember. Why don't I remember? Well, he COMES OFF THE BENCH FOR THEM. Argentina's got some major talent, and here I always just watched because its my only time to enjoy Pepe Sanchez, who is one of my favorite players of all-time. I just checked out his site and saw that he's signed with And 1. Didn't know that, And 1 gets a couple cool points back.


Believe it or not, this was all just the beginning. The flood of topics, as well as recent life events that have drained my will/ability to be half-way funny, have created a log jam here at Deceptively Quick. I guess this means I just have to spend way more time blogging and watching basketball, life is hard.

Chinese nicknames are rad!

Have you ever heard Amare Stoudemire talk about how his nickname in China is something along the lines of Great Leader King? Pretty funny. Then I saw something great at NBA.com on the topic:

A Recent Description on NBA.com of NBA Player's nicknames in China. Please read, it is definitely the best thing on NBA.com, although sadly there is no mention of Amare.


The best part is the descriptions of what the nicknames mean, for example Boris Diaw is called "The French Magician." I thought to myself, "But why?" I was about to shoot myself in the face because I couldn't decipher the meaning of such an ambiguous nickname. Luckily, NBA.com thought ahead, and explains:

"Diaw's ability to play basketball as if playing magic. And he is a player from France."

Oooooooh! Now it all makes sense! Now let's find out the reason Dirk is called the German Racecar:

"Dirk's ability to roll on court like a racecar. And he is a player from Germany."

For the record, Tim Duncan has by far the best one, Stone Buddha. Awesome. I'm calling him Stone Buddha from now on, maybe if some marketing people got ahold of this he could sell some shoes. And why is there nothing for Yao here?


As usual, NBA.com made more omissions besides Mr. Great Leader King and Yao. Most notably, my research turned up this very interesting one:

Zach Randolph
Nickname: Indiana version of Will Ferrell from the Cowbell SNL Skit
Explanation: Zach might sound ok if you don't listen too closely, but he's ultimately a misfit, damaging to the group, and not really needed for the future. And he is a player from Indiana.