I don’t think this win is anything to get too fired up about. Sorry, don’t mean to be a downer, but Portland didn’t play very well — it’s just that the Sonics/Thunder played worse.

And Kevin Durant? Look, I give Martell Webster all the credit in the world for hustling around and doing his best. Webster’s effort level this season has been among the best on the team. But Durant was awful. He missed a ton of shots he’s usually going to make. He was just out of kilter.

I loved the way Portland came out of the chute in this game. They ran halfcourt motion and moved the ball. They moved bodies. Heck, the Blazers even once scored when Steve Blake made a backdoor cut and got the ball for a layup — the first such thing I can remember this season. Wow — actually a basket out of an offensive set, rather than from someone going one-on-one!

Greg Oden was getting the ball early, feeling a part of things and it all looked great. But coach Nate McMillan, apparently following a predetermined substitution plan, lifted Oden and Blake at the six-minute mark and it kind of went south from there. Oh well — a lot of coaches do that. When you have a long bench full of guys who need to play, such things happen.

It was a win and in the NBA you shouldn’t complain about wins. But as I said earlier this young season, don’t always confuse poor shooting by an opponent with good defense. Some nights, they just miss shots. I was shocked, actually, at how poorly the Thunder played.

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Greg Oden, Kevin Durant, Nate McMillan, Oklahoma City Thunder, Portland Trail Blazers, Steve Blake

Kevin Durant said that Oden “looked like his old self” out there, which I presume to mean that he looked like the pre-injury Oden. I don’t think he meant just that he looked old.

This piece by Chris Mannix on SI.com mentions Oden decking Derrick Rose on his way to the basket. That’s nice.

Durant was the obvious hit of the first day at the camp and was the best player on the floor according to all accounts I found. The Blazers had a Twitter entry that included a quote from workout supervisor Jay Triano calling Oden “the surprise” of the first day, but I couldn’t find it in print anywhere.

In the ESPN story, though, there was this:

Others who caught the coaches’ eyes included Rudy Gay, Derrick Rose, Eric Gordon and JaVale McGee, and several team insiders said they were surprised how spry Greg Oden looked.

In the case of Oden, I don’t think you could find a more welcome description than “spry.”

UPDATE: Very sorry for missing this earlier. Casey Holdahl has video here of Oden running yesterday and yes, it’s a major change. He’s actually able to run now.

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Greg Oden, Kevin Durant, U.S. National team

Ugh. The Thunder brought nothing into town Monday night. Not that Portland didn’t play well — the Blazers were terrific. But you really would like to see the other team at least make it look as if it cared. It didn’t.

Man, that was some rotten effort. Hey, I almost forgot — which one of those guys was the Durant kid, anyway?

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Kevin Durant, Oklahoma City Thunder, Portland Trail Blazers

Just in case you missed it, he’s sidelined for seven to 14 days with a sprained ankle. But that’s OK, because HE’S not injury prone.

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Kevin Durant, NBA

This game should be fun. The Thunder Sonics are a fun team to watch in a wacky kind of way and coming off a tough game at Dallas, the Blazers might be a bit vulnerable. However size gives OKC fits and if Portland can pound the ball inside, control the tempo and just keep from coughing the ball up, it should not be a difficult game.

This, in fact, is a game playoff teams win.

The Thunder Sonics come  into this off a very tough one-point loss to Denver and has been much better since Scott Brooks took over the coaching reins from P.J. Carlesimo a dozen games into the season. It’s obvious he’s more relaxed with the team than Peejay was and it shows — the Thunder  Sonics play freely and with a style that would probably be fun for the players.

The obvious Kevin Durant-Greg Oden matchup will play out for the first time, even though, of course, they play different positions. Durant can score on anybody and is one day going to lead the league in scoring — particularly if OKC continues to flounder in the standings. He’s good and going to get better.

Oden, on the other hand, is a post player on a team still incapable or unwilling to feed the post. It hasn’t exactly accelerated his development.

The game’s a good runup for Portland to the Sunday afternoon tilt against the New York Knicks. Two running teams in a row.

And at the very least, Friday’s game should give us a chance to pause and remember a long-time wonderful rivalry with the Seattle Sonics. What a shame that whole thing had to end.

In fact, why not just — in a tribute to the rivalry – continue to call them the Sonics?

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Greg Oden, Kevin Durant, Oklahoma City Thunder, Portland Trail Blazers

After his 22 points, 10 rebounds, two steals and two blocks Tuesday night, here are some things to consider about the guy right now:

He still has to physically gather himself under the basket for a couple of seconds before being able to lift off well enough to dunk. Doing that puts him in jeopardy of getting stripped by smaller players (he has the ball all the way down to his waist) and leads to travelling and three-second calls. The time it takes him to get his feet under him and jump allows the defense to swarm him — if he could go up quicker he’d do so with a lot less traffic around him.

He’s not running well and still can’t jump much. And people seem to forget that at one time, Oden was known for his ability to move – remember back before his injury when Oden ran the agility drill at the NBA pre-draft camp about a second faster than Kevin Durant?

And with all that said, he’s still looking like a very dominant offensive player. I do believe, over time, he’ll get most of his speed and agility back but recovery from microfracture surgery takes a while. You can say all you want about evaluating basketball players but never forget one thing:

Size matters.

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Greg Oden, Kevin Durant, NBA, Portland Trail Blazers