Sport:  Noun.  An athletic activity requiring skill or physical prowess and often of a competitive nature.  Nice try Webster, but it’s a little more complicated than that.
 
Sports help us build on a character trait that so many of us lack these days: Faith.  Faith that our team can come back from being down 20 points in the fourth quarter of a basketball game.  Faith that our Quarterback can drive 97 yards and score a touchdown with less than two minutes left in the game.  Faith that, even though our pitcher hasn’t hit a homerun in his entire career, he may still get his first one right here.  As a Grand Slam no less.  Yes, faith in the “impossible.”
 
My faith lies with the Portland Trailblazers.

Continue reading "It's Just A Game"

Steve Blake: 9 games, 197 minutes. 

Joel Przybilla: 5 games, 35 minutes. 

Michael Ruffin: 19 games, 254 minutes.

 

That is the total amount of playoff experience we have on the active roster of the Portland Trail Blazers, making Michael Ruffin our most experienced playoff player.  Let’s not forget he’s only played 35 total minutes this season for the Blazers.

 

Not scared yet? Okay, how about this…

 

Thursday, November 6th, Houston 99, Portland 101.  How? Brandon Roy’s incredible shot at the buzzer in overtime to sink a Houston team that just had Yao Ming hit a two point field goal and foul.  The free throw put Houston up one with 0.8 seconds left. 

 

Tuesday, February 24th, Portland 94, Houston 98.  How? Ron Artest’s 21 points.  Aaron Brooks’ 20 points.  Luis Scola, 15 points and 11 rebounds.  Sound familiar?  

Continue reading "An Inexperienced Team Shows Some Veteran Abilities"

With the first round of the playoffs slowly crawling towards the end, and so much excitement developing around the league, I want to take some time out side of the Blazer Box and take a quick look at the two conferences and what they have brought us this playoff season.

We’ll start with the West…

Los Angeles Lakers versus Utah Jazz:  It was no question as to which of these two teams would be moving on in the first round, but building up to their season finale match up, a lot of people wondered: “Is L.A. going to give their final home game of the season away to Utah for a chance to play Dallas in the first round?”  Most of us expected as much to happen, but there was obviously something the Lakers knew that we didn’t.    We saw it once Dallas destroyed San Antonio in the same fashion that Los Angeles destroyed Utah.  Not much excitement out of this series.

Continue reading "Playoff Excitement Part 1: Winning in the West"