The Oregonian

Well, lets just start off that was an amazing game to be at. It was my first trip to the Rose Garden (sadly), but it was well worth it. With being a die-hard Blazer fan for many years now, finally getting there to witness was a dream and I couldn’t have picked a better game.

Although I was about as high up as you could get, the seats were still amazing. The Garden was packed and pumping. By the time the game was over, my throat was coarse, my voice was gone and my legs were tired from standing all season.

Now lets get to the game. Portland came out gunning. They were not going to lose this game under any circumstances. At times it seemed like the Blazers were just toying with Denver. They would build a huge lead, let Denver linger and get within 4-5 points, then build the lead up again. Portland was up by about 20 at half (sorry, I was actually at the game didn’t have time to take notes).

After Chris “The Birdman” Anderson got a put back dunk he faced the crowd on the baseline and taunted the fans. Not a smart move. Karma got him back though, because a few plays later Oden smacked him in the nose (unintentionally) and he had to leave the game for a bit.

Rudy came into the game needing five 3-pointers to tie the rookie record (158 held by  Kerry Kittles) and six to own it outright. Rudy only had two at half, so the chances of him owning it outright looked pretty dim. He came out gunning in the second half, with numerous “Rudy, Rudy” chants erupting throughout the night. He ended up going 6/9 from the arch and breaking the record. The crowd was amazing…….

We achieved quite a few things that night.

1) We clinched Home Court Advantage for the first round of the play-offs, which start tomorrow at 7:30 PST on ESPN against the Rockets. A full first round schedule will be put up later tonight.

2) Rudy went an amazing 6-9 from the arch to break the rookie record of 3pt FG’s in a season at 159.

3) Two of my least favorite players, happen to play on the Nuggets. Crymelo Anthony and the “Birdman”. We punked the crap out of Carmello, he went 3-18 from the field and Birdman was just booed ALL NIGHT long. Those two players are my two bugaboos in the league…….I cannot stand them.

There will be no “Solo Act’s” in today’s re-cap because I cannot pick out three players to give them to. Every Blazer and Blazer fan deserves them today!!

Yankee Home Opener

This was a game I did not get to watch (like most). C.C. put out another solid game only to have the bullpen falter in the late innings.

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9		R	H	E
Cleveland	0	0	0	1	0	0	9	0	0		10	13	1
NY Yankees	0	0	0	0	1	0	1	0	0		2	9	1

Here is the info on your batters.

I’m going to skip the re-caps since I’ve been gone. I’ll continue tonight with a recap of the Blazers-Nuggets last night and the (bleh) Yankee game today.

Check back tonight!

Anthony

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9		R	H	E
NY Yankees	0	0	0	3	0	4	2	0	2		11	13	0
Baltimore	0	0	1	1	0	0	0	0	0		2	7	1

Congrats to Burnett for getting the first W of the season.

Tex/Swisher/Cano all got HR’s.

Cano had an awesome night 3/4, 4 runs, 3 RBI and a HR. Great to see him being the hitter we’ve all expected him to become, he has simply started the year off great.

I’ve been searching for a link to todays game but haven’t had much luck so expact another re-cap similar to today.

It seemed like Wang was trying to knock off some rust after missing majority of last season with his foot injury. Too bad nobody had any WD-40. Wang gave up 2 earned runs and back-to back-to back doubles during the small timeframe I got to see him pitch.

Since I did not get to watch the game, I cannot offer much more insight than the boxscores so check them out at MLB.com

Teixeira got his first hit as a Yankee, rasining his batting average to .111. It’s nice to seen Cano getting his bat going early in the season, who is hitting .429.

There really isn’t much to say so I’m not going to make this more complicated than it needs to be.

By the way, we got one earned run off of a 34 year old rookie in Uehara.

Hopefully we can put it together tomorrow and hopefully leave Baltimore without getting swept.

AP Photo

Amazing, epic, phenomenal, call it what you want, but what a great win. Portland snapped a 11 game losing streak at the AT&T center and did so in an impressive fashion.

Within the first 5 minutes of the quarter, Tim Duncan and the Spurs seemed to be dancing towards an easy win at the expense of the Blazers. They were running through Portland like my Lab runs through a Porterhouse steak; viscous, fast, and non stop. Aldridge hit his first two jumpers to give Portland a 4-3 lead and San Antonio didn’t look back until the middle of the second quarter. Portland shot an abysmal 6/16 from the field and went down 16 to 33 by the end of the first. It never helps when Joel Pryzbilla is the only Blazer to record a rebound in a single quarter. 5 rebounds by Pryzbilla and that was it…..nil for everyone else.

The second quarter started off looking pretty much identical to the first. Turnovers and missed shots utilmately ended up with Portland reaching its largest deficit of the night at 19 points. Midway through the second, the team seemed to awaken from their trance and decided that they were not going to lose this game. Outlaw, Oden and Roy chipped at the lead, captivating with a 1/2 court buzzer beater to end the half by Steve Blake (his only made field goal of the half) to put us down 47 to 49. Oden put in 8/6 and Outlaw/Roy chipped in a combined 16 points. Aldridge didn’t attempt one shot in the second.

Someone must have lit a fire under Aldridges butt, because he came out shooting. Aldridge went 7/10 from the field in the third. His jumpshot was silky smooth and I don’t think he even hit rim on any makes. San Antonio came out hitting for the first 7 or 8 minutes of the quarter. Portland would pull within one, then go down eight, pull within two, go down five and this continued on until Portland switched to their 2-3 zone defense. San Antonio couldn’t adjust to the zone and Portland ended up leading 70-67 at the end of the third.

San Antonio wishes that the game ended after three quarters. The fourth was ALL Portland. Portland’s largest lead topped out at 16, a 35 point swing. San Antonio had no answer for Portland. Blake and Rudy decided to put on a shooting clinic and Roy and Aldridge shot those pretty little jumpe shots  and put in work down low. You could not stop this team. You defended one thing and Portland would stop, giggle, point their finger and do something else.  There isn’t much other to describe this quarter other than domination.

Portland held a 25-16 advantage  in the fourth, but plenty of San Antonio’s 16 game in garbage minutes from bottom of the rotation players.

SOLO ACTS

Brandon Roy- He put up his usual 26/6/3 but the surprising part was his 6 total turnovers. That is not like Roy, but a few of those came off of dropped passes. He shot nearly 50% from the field and hit all 8 of his free throws. Empty from the 3pt line, missing all three of his attempts.

LaMarcus Aldridge- The first half Aldridge we ususally see was absent. He three total shots in the first half but atleast he hit two of them. First quarter Aldridge showed up in the 3rd quarter, with him hitting 7-1o shots. He hit some big shots down the stretch and ended up with 20/6/2.

Greg Oden-While he put up the bulk of his stats in the second quarter, he was key in our comeback. Again, Oden did much more than showed up on the stat sheet. He went 4/5 from the field and ended up with 8/8/2 in only 21 minutes of play.

Joel Pryzbilla- Joel was an absolute beast on the boards tonight, finishing with 17 boards and 3 points. Our center position combined for 11/25/2. Not too shabby. Thank you Pryz!

by Lance Murphey, AP

Well, lets just start of with the Blazer’s won. That is all that matters. With the Spurs, Hornets, and the Rockets winning tonight we couldn’t afford to lose this game if we have hopes of clinching home court advantage in the first round.

We came out with the same amount of energy as a 250lb man just finishing up a marathon. Which is strange, it is usually the exact opposite after suffering a tough loss. Considering how tough it is to sweep a season series (4 games against the Grizz this season) and how horribly we played, I’m very surprised we escaped with a W.

The first two quarters pretty much blurred into one big “oh hey open shot, clank” or “your wearing a different colored jersey than me, but I’m feeling generous so here is the ball”. It was all turn overs and missed opportunities and Pryzbilla and Oden picking up 5 combined fouls in the first half didn’t help the cause.

When the third quarter rolled around it seemed like the Blazers got the first memo, they started hitting some jump shots and creating turnovers, but plenty of it was in vain. NO one, seemed to have any interest in playing defense which ultimately led O.J. Mayo torching us for 31/4/4.

Then comes the fourth and the Blazers got the second memo and actually started putting forth and effort on defense. Oden and Rudy played HUGE parts in our comeback and without them, we would have lost. We slowly started chipping away at the lead and eventually ended up  trading the lead a few times. Oden’s MONSTER block on Warrick (see above) was the play of the night and changed the course of the game, he said to Warrick “this is my basket and you didn’t pay the fee, nancy”.  Portland ended up taking advantage of some timely turnovers and just kept feeding Roy the ball to seal up the win.

I just want to say thank you to Mike Conely, for being paid millions to dribble the ball off of his foot and coughing up the win to Portland.

SOLO ACTS

Brandon Roy-  Brandon decided to take a vacation until the 4th quarter. 13 of his 24 pts came in the 4th and willed us to the win. This wasn’t his all around best game (7-16, 3 T.O’s) but he put the ball in the hoop when we needed him to. This is exactly why Roy is a Superstar, even on an off night, he does what it takes to win. He ended up with 24/3/4/3

LaMarcus Aldridge- The Aldridge that we have been seeing since the All-Star break, didn’t show up tonight. Everyone is bound to have their bad nights, but it especially sucks when he and Roy decided to have them on the same night. Aldridge kept us in the game during the 3rd until Rudy took over. He ended up with 15/8/3/1

Greg Oden- Well, lets just say that his stat line of 10/5/1 did not show Oden’s true effect on the game. He might not have done anything amazing tonight, but he did everything at exactly the right time. It was slam, when we need a slam, block when we needed a block, offensive rebound we we needed an offensive rebound. This was a great all around game for Mr.Oden, this game doesn’t go down as a W without him.

Rudy Fernandez- Rudy was big off the bench going 3-6 from downtown and being the key spark to the Blazers run at the end of the 3rd to pull this game within reach. We need to find a way to get Rudy on the court for 35 min a game. Rudy ended up with a HUGE 15/1/1 in only 18 minutes of play. Without Rudy, we never even sniff a W.

When I pick my teams, I stick with them through thick and thin. Growing up in Alaska, you don’t get many games to choose from. So naturally, I became a New York Yankee fan. I love baseball and I have my whole life. Yearly trips up to Seattle to catch the Yankees is something I look forward to every year.

It is by far my favorite sport, so why not be a fan of the best franchise to ever play the game? 26 ‘ships and counting!

Now onto football. I do not know why nor how I became a Miami Dolphin fan. Is it because Dolphins are my favorite animal? Doubtful. Is it because I look so damn good in Teal and Orange? Only if there is a Dolphin’s logo on it. Is it because the Dolphin Dancers? Ehh…err…no (the wife is looking). I’m going to contribute my Dolphin fan-dom to one of the greatest QB’s to ever play the game, the one and only Dan Marino.

Basketball? That is the sport played between the end of football and the start of baseball right? Just kidding, I love basketball.When  I moved to Oregon when I was 5,I would say I was a “general” N.B.A. fan (with a lean towards the Blazers).

Basketballs a sport I did not play until I was in 5th grade, so my interest in it was fairly lukewarm until then. After that, I went from 0-60 in no time. In Oregon, the Portland Trailblazers are our only professional franchise. I love them with all my heart. While basketball ranks 3rd on my favorite sports list, the love I have for them is undeniable. They are the only team I can geographically call my own.

Now onto soccer. I am very soccer illiterate and know next to nothing about the sport. In anticipation of Portland getting a Major League Soccer team in 2011 (Portland Timbers), I am going to pick the sport up by covering the Seattle Sounders. Like I said, I am very new to the sport so my coverage is going to be very bland and shallow.

Thanks for taking your time out to get to know me. There will be a re-cap on the Blazers-Grizzlies game tonight.