Portland Blazers's Portland Blazers friend's fan blogs

He fooled me yet again.

We’ve seen this act before. Andrew Bynum, through the first five games, is averaging over 20-10, yet again.

 

It’s nothing new. For the third straight season, the young, potential stud, center for the Los Angeles Lakers has hit the ground running and has shown flashes of being an all-star caliber center in the NBA.

 

And, for the third straight season, Bynum’s great start may be overshadowed by, yet another, major injury.

 

With 24.7 seconds left in the Lakers overtime win over the Rockets last night, Kobe Bryant dished a perfect pass to Bynum under the hoop and he was fouled as he tried to convert the lay-up. It wasn’t an obscenely hard foul, but certainly one in which the Rockets were making it clear they weren’t about to allow Bynum to score without heading to the free throw line.

Continue reading "Andrew Bynum: The Oldest 22-Year-Old in the NBA"

From the who-didn’t-see-this-coming-department, Allen Iverson is not happy with his role after his first game in with the Memphis Grizzlies.

After coming off the bench and playing just 18 minutes in the Grizzlies 127-116 overtime loss to the Sacramento Kings last night, Iverson dropped this gem to reporters after the game:

 “Go look at my resume and that will show you that I’m not a sixth man,” Iverson said. “I don’t think it has anything to do with me being selfish. It’s just who I am. I don’t want to change what gave me all the success that I’ve had since I’ve been in this league.” 

First of all, what did Iverson expect? He barely played in the preseason and then missed the first three regular season games with a partially torn hamstring. Even superstars would be eased back into the rotation after something like that. Iverson is far from a superstar these days. 

Continue reading "Allen Iverson Is Unhappy (again)"

In the NBA these days, it seems like there is a stat for everything. We’ve got PER, offensive efficiency ratings, defensive efficiency rating, and so on and so on.

It seems like every team in the league now employs their own stat guru. And while I’m not one to question the use of all these new statistics to evaluate NBA players (I actually kinda like them), I’m old school.

 

To me, all the new stats in the world can’t tell the story of an NBA game as well as the good, old fashioned box score.

 

Therefore, I’m starting a new feature today called “Fun With Box Scores”.

 

Every Monday, I’ll be posting some of the more interesting things that jumped out at me from the previous week’s box scores.

 

Continue reading "Fun With Box Scores"

The NBA season is officially underway (unless you live in Chicago or Milwaukee).

 

After several hours parked in front of the NBA League Pass for the past two days, it’s time for some first impressions.

 

The Good

 

Ty Lawson

 

How good was he last night? I predicted the Denver Nuggets to be the third best team in the West this season, and that was assuming that Ty Lawson would play like a rookie point guard.

But his 17 points, six assists, and four rebounds, plus very solid fourth quarter minutes in a close game against a decent Utah team, shows that he may be a real X factor for this team moving forward.

 

Brook Lopez

 

Lopez was a monster last night, finishing with 27 points, 15 rebounds, five blocks, and four assists. Of course, the Nets lost, mainly because they couldn’t hold off the mighty T’Wolves down the stretch, but it certainly wasn’t because of Lopez.

Continue reading "First Impressions"

Happy New Year!

With the new NBA season set to tip off with four games tonight, here are some of the things I’ll be watching for in tonight’s action.

Boston @ Cleveland, 7:30pm

I can’t wait to see LeBron again this season. Last year, coming off the Olympics, you could see that his focus was on improving defensively. Now, without a summer in the spotlight, I’m curious to see if he’s made any improvements to his already unreal game. Is this the year we finally see LeBron use his Karl Malone-like body to beast on people inside?

Also, I’m curious to see what kind of pregame theatrics the Cavs come up with. You know Shaq can’t stand to be out of the spotlight, I wouldn’t be surprised if he tries to one-up LeBron’s chalk thing with something of his own.

Continue reading "NBA Opening Night Quick Thoughts"

Disappointing news for NBA fans everywhere, courtesy of yahoo:

 

"LOS ANGELES (AP)—Blake Griffin’s (notes) NBA debut has been pushed back indefinitely after the Los Angeles Clippers revealed late Monday night that their No. 1 overall draft pick has a broken left kneecap.

The stress fracture could sideline the Oklahoma star for six weeks, the team announced, promising further information Tuesday."

What a disappointment this news is. Watching Blake Griffin debut on Tuesday night was going to be the highlight of the TV schedule for me. The Lakers, Cavs, and Celtics are all going to be good this year, we already know that.

And while it’s always fun to watch really good teams play, one of the best parts of the new season is getting to watch high profile rookies make the transition to the NBA game.

Continue reading "Disappointing First Impression of Blake Griffin"

Welcome to the Diary of an NBA Junkie.

My Name is Scott Shepherd, and I’m addicted to the NBA.

 

After a few years of covering the NBA for a great website, www.sports-central.org, I’ve decided to branch out and start my own blog.

 

The idea for the blog is simple: I’m addicted to all things NBA, but writing a weekly column for Sports Central sometimes just isn’t enough space to get all of my basketball related thoughts out there.

 

The idea with the Diary of an NBA Junkie is to post a series of short NBA-related posts several times throughout the week.

 

It may be a reaction to a particular game, player, or coach. It might be link to a good NBA story or video that I’ve come across. It might just be random thoughts I have while flipping through the League Pass.

Continue reading "Welcome to the Diary of an NBA Junkie"

Here on the eve of kickoff for the San Diego Chargers 2009 opener, I will take my annual stab at predicting the Bolts win-loss record.

In Las Vegas the Over/Under total for the club has been about 9.5 wins. I said it last year, and will say it with greater emphasis this time around, but this season has got to be the greatest odds for a division title that the Chargers have ever seen. And it's no stretch to say they will probably be favored in all six divisional contests.

9/14 at Oakland (WIN) - Chargers currently have franchise-record 11 game win-streak vs. the Raiders. No reason to think it stops now.

9/20 BALTIMORE (WIN) - This should be a very tough game, and perhaps low scoring. I'll take San Diego at home but wouldn't be surprised if they drop this one, knowing the slow-start history under Norv Turner.

Continue reading "Predicting the Chargers record in 2009"

The center position is one of the strongest spots on the Blazers roster.  And if you combine last seasons stats for Joel Pryzbilla and Greg Oden the numbers look pretty good. 13.4 pts, 15.7 rbs, 2.3 bks.  What team wouldn't be happy with that? 

Last season began with the Trailblazers annointing Greg as their starter at the 5 spot.  It was and up and down year for the youngster from Ohio State.  He started 39 games for Portland, had a career-high 24 points and 15 rebounds in a win against the Milwaukee Bucks on January 19.  If he'd been able to average 36 minutes per game his PER would have been 14.8 pts, 11.6 rbs, and 1.9 bks.  The season also had its low points for Oden.  Not only did he have trouble staying in games due to foul trouble, ( his PER for fouls if he'd averaged 36 min was 6.5) he had physical problems as well and suffered an injury to his foot during his first game against the Lakers, and fractured his kneecap in February during a collision with Corey Magette and missed three weeks. 

Continue reading "Breaking down the Blazers....Part Five"

If you think about the power forward spot on the Blazers there is only one name that really comes to mind.  LaMarcus Aldridge.  LA.  L-Train.  After three seasons with Portland Aldridge has proven to be one of the best, if not the best young power forwards in the league.  And sometime within the next month or so he will likely be rewarded for his play with a near maximum contract.
 
The draft day move that brought the former Texas Longhorn to Portland has paid off.  LaMarcus has been a good fit here in not only on the floor, but in the locker room and in the community.  Touted by many as a future all-star, he has the starting 4 spot on the Portland roster locked up. 

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