Now I'm pissed at Oden

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We can't get too caught up in subjective issues like "Oden LOOKS like he doesn't care". If he walked off the court, refused to check in, or did anything that jeopardized our chance at winning, then maybe you could say that he's not interested in basketball.

It's barely been a quarter of a season and so many people are already growing impatient with the guy. Unbelievable.
 
But...but...

Oden is a "certain HOFer" and a "once in a generation talent!"

You can't sell that kind of hype without it coming back to bite you. You can't anoint a 20 year old kid as the saviour of the franchise and then turn around and demand patience. If the fans are getting restless and cranky, the front office has only themselves to blame.
 
Yes, they said after micro surgery and a year off he was going to dominate immediate. I agree if he didn't have his injury last year I would have expected more at this point, but that's not the case. So to be really critical of Oden now is a total loss of perspective. I hear people say they know he's been off a year, but then seem to have expectations as if he hasn't.
 
Cake said:
You're such a drama queen.

Amare and Zach had NBA experience to fall back on, even if their athletic ability wasn't there. Oden doesn't. He's recovering from a year away from the game AND he's adjusting to life in the NBA. On top of that, he's completely out of shape. It's unprecedented and absolutetely dissimilar to the situation for Zach and Amare when they were coming back from microfracture. By the end of the season, Oden will be confident about his knee, he'll be in shape and he'll know a lot more about how to play in the NBA and he'll be dropping monster numbers on teams.
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He's also not had much time to develop much as a player. When a young guy dominates HS like Oden did, it's because he was bigger and stronger and simply could jump over the competition. His one year in college was marred by injury (he shot FTs left handed, right?).

He's physically gifted, and simply because of his size and willingness to jump, he can do some things at an NBA level - like rebound and block shots.

Give him 2-3 years with a great big man coach like Lucas and he's going to be superb.

Nothing wrong with pointing out the state of his game now, though.
 
oldmangrouch said:
But...but...

Oden is a "certain HOFer" and a "once in a generation talent!"

You can't sell that kind of hype without it coming back to bite you.
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Who's the "you" here? And who's doing the biting? Oden certainly never said any of those things. And are you annointing yourself in charge of meting out justice on those who overhype? You are not The Punisher and the Blazers are not The Hyper.
 
Rastapopoulos said:
Incidentally, guess who leads all rookies playing more than 7 minutes per game in EFF/48? Not bad for someone apparently playing like shit. What happens when he gets in shape?

Oh, and anyone remember what happened with Aldridge his rookie year? Remember how he didn't even make the squad for the All-Star rookie game, but then was first team all-rookie?
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:check: It's unbelievable. Oden. more games than not, changes the way teams attack and defend us. He's been playing great while rounding into shape and learning the league. Hell, even his own teammates don't recognize how to get him the ball on the P&R and feed him in the post.

For those whining about him, give it time. All this kid wants to do is please. He's going to be great. You see it in flashes, and those flashes will become longer and longer in duration.
 
oldmangrouch said:
But...but...

Oden is a "certain HOFer" and a "once in a generation talent!"

You can't sell that kind of hype without it coming back to bite you. You can't anoint a 20 year old kid as the saviour of the franchise and then turn around and demand patience. If the fans are getting restless and cranky, the front office has only themselves to blame.
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If you want someone to blame for your issues, look in the mirror. He is a "certain HOFer" and a "once in a generation talent". If you can't see flashes of what he's going to be in short order, then you're not watching enough basketball games. His affect doesn't just show up in stats; it's how teams change their schemes to deal with GO in the post, both on offense and defense. He changes the game without doing a thing.
 
HispanicCausinPanic said:
I can't believe some of you guys. Your opinions are based on what? A couple shots of him on the bench with a stoic look on his face? Nobody on here knows whats going on in his head. He doesn't seem to show his emotions, so what? Back off and let him play. I hope we all remember some of these reactions about him once he starts playing like we know he is capable of.
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By the way, for those complaining about him not being the open, fun loving guy he was when he came here, look at the posts on this board and others about him and ask yourself if you would change your attitude and become more guarded. I know I would.
 
SheedSoNasty said:
It's barely been a quarter of a season and so many people are already growing impatient with the guy. Unbelievable.
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Is it really so "unbelievable"? If Oden had scored 30 points and grabbed 15 rebounds in his first game this season, everybody would have been screaming, "Look how good he is already!" It's only natural that we would comment on him scoring only 2 points and grabbing 1 rebound in his 15th game, or whatever it was.

Oden was heralded as the second coming of Bill Russell, but he's looked more like Bill Wennington, if that. This is worth commenting on, and even being concerned about. If he keeps getting better, great. We'll all be thrilled. But in the meantime it's a little worrisome to see how slowly he is coming along and how poorly he performs some games.
 
You all sound like teenage girls and Greg is your latest boyfriend who you wanna break it off and are just looking for a reason. You really want your friend's boyfriend, no matter who/what he is.

Greg is a rookie and is playing like it. Funny you basketball "fans" don't understand that.
 
Shooter said:
Is it really so "unbelievable"? If Oden had scored 30 points and grabbed 15 rebounds in his first game this season, everybody would have been screaming, "Look how good he is already!" It's only natural that we would comment on him scoring only 2 points and grabbing 1 rebound in his 15th game, or whatever it was.
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Actually, if he had done that I bet that there would be at least a 90% overlap with the people who are criticizing him for only getting double-doubles close to half of the time he plays.

Ed O.
 
Ed O said:
Actually, if he had done that I bet that there would be at least a 90% overlap with the people who are criticizing him for only getting double-doubles close to half of the time he plays.

Ed O.
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Agreed.

For some reason, SOME people look at the world in a binary way. Everything is either 1 or 0. Oden is either the greatest thing in the history of things or he's the worst. Nate McMillan is a 0. Brandon Roy is a 1. Oden used to be a 1, but now he's a 0. Rudy Fernadez is a 1. Rasheed Wallace was a 0 at the end of his time with the Blazers. etc. It's absolutely asinine.

Give it a rest people.

Oden will be excellent. He's already above average and he's still getting better.
 
Greg is struggling because this is the first time in his life that he hasn't owned his opponent on the court. It's obviously tough for him to deal with and it's creating confidence problems. The guy can turn things around, it just might take a while.
 
Cake said:
Agreed.

For some reason, SOME people look at the world in a binary way. Everything is either 1 or 0. Oden is either the greatest thing in the history of things or he's the worst. Nate McMillan is a 0. Brandon Roy is a 1. Oden used to be a 1, but now he's a 0. Rudy Fernadez is a 1. Rasheed Wallace was a 0 at the end of his time with the Blazers. etc. It's absolutely asinine.

Give it a rest people.

Oden will be excellent. He's already above average and he's still getting better.
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Obviously you haven't read the utterly insane posts classifying Roy as a 0.

Many Portland fans do not deserve the team they have.
 
Ed O said:
Actually, if he had done that I bet that there would be at least a 90% overlap with the people who are criticizing him for only getting double-doubles close to half of the time he plays.
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It's not the double-doubles that people are concerned about. It's the nights when he gets only 2 points and 1 rebound, or 4 points and 3 rebounds, or 6 points and 4 rebounds, and looks like he is barely interested in the game. For a journeyman center, those numbers are not surprising, but for a player of Oden's caliber, they are.
 
Cake said:
For some reason, SOME people look at the world in a binary way. Everything is either 1 or 0. Oden is either the greatest thing in the history of things or he's the worst.
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No one on this board has said Oden is "the worst" in anything. What's interesting is that people like you are classifying those who are concerned about Oden's performance into a simple stereotype. I'd say YOU are the one who is having trouble seeing the nuances of things.
 
oldmangrouch said:
But...but...

Oden is a "certain HOFer" and a "once in a generation talent!"

You can't sell that kind of hype without it coming back to bite you. You can't anoint a 20 year old kid as the saviour of the franchise and then turn around and demand patience. If the fans are getting restless and cranky, the front office has only themselves to blame.
Click to expand...

This kind of talk didn't start with the Blazers, this kind of shit has been inked since he was a freshmen in high school. The only thing I've seen KP or Nate say is that "He's a load," or "He does things on the court other guys can't." Certainly not the kind of "He's the next Bill Russell" rubbish that has been thrown around for 6+ years.

I think it is fair to say that minus the knee injury last year, we'd probably be seeing a much different Greg ... he's just got some physical and mental obstacles to clear right now that's all.
 
Shooter said:
Is it really so "unbelievable"? If Oden had scored 30 points and grabbed 15 rebounds in his first game this season, everybody would have been screaming, "Look how good he is already!" It's only natural that we would comment on him scoring only 2 points and grabbing 1 rebound in his 15th game, or whatever it was.
.
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He also only played 11 mins because of foul trouble, which he hasn't had near the problem I thought he would have. You have to keep it in perspective. Just like if he did score 30 and grabbed 15 rebounds but the team he did it against didn't have anyone over 6'. Of course he seems to have problems against smaller faster teams so maybe that would be pretty impressive. :)
 
Nikolokolus said:
This kind of talk didn't start with the Blazers, this kind of shit has been inked since he was a freshmen in high school. The only thing I've seen KP or Nate say is that "He's a load," or "He does things on the court other guys can't." Certainly not the kind of "He's the next Bill Russell" rubbish that has been thrown around for 6+ years.

I think it is fair to say that minus the knee injury last year, we'd probably be seeing a much different Greg ... he's just got some physical and mental obstacles to clear right now that's all.
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That's the main thing about this discussion. Sure it's been 15 whole games, but look at what has happen since he last played ball. That seems to be discounted fairly easily.
 
I can remember Zach Randolph (and I think Amare said it too) saying it took him a whole season to get back to 100% after his MF surgery. I'm really curious what people expected from him this year. No rookie has ever gone through this before so there is no "standard" for how fast one should learn the NBA game.

He was apologizing when they rolled him out of surgery. Then he spends almost the entire season not just missing practice but seperated from the rest of the team (he didn't go on most of the road trips). Now he's back, out of basketball shape, having to face guys that are way bigger and stronger than anyone else he's played and you really thought he'd dominate? We know he's not a slacker, rookies ARE inconsistent. They're not used to traveling like this, everything is faster, and they're playing about 4 times as many games in a season than they did in highschool and college.

Me... I'm excited and encouraged by the improvement he's made in just 15 games. I don't think there is any chance he's going to be a bust because he's MORE than that already. So we may have drafted a player who's not the next Shaq but we've got two centers on team who are better than most other team's starting center.

So, what did you "realistically" expect from Greg this year?
 
Spud147 said:
I can remember Zach Randolph (and I think Amare said it too) saying it took him a whole season to get back to 100% after his MF surgery. I'm really curious what people expected from him this year. No rookie has ever gone through this before so there is no "standard" for how fast one should learn the NBA game.

He was apologizing when they rolled him out of surgery. Then he spends almost the entire season not just missing practice but seperated from the rest of the team (he didn't go on most of the road trips). Now he's back, out of basketball shape, having to face guys that are way bigger and stronger than anyone else he's played and you really thought he'd dominate? We know he's not a slacker, rookies ARE inconsistent. They're not used to traveling like this, everything is faster, and they're playing about 4 times as many games in a season than they did in highschool and college.

Me... I'm excited and encouraged by the improvement he's made in just 15 games. I don't think there is any chance he's going to be a bust because he's MORE than that already. So we may have drafted a player who's not the next Shaq but we've got two centers on team who are better than most other team's starting center.

So, what did you "realistically" expect from Greg this year?
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You make some good points. Maybe my own expectations were unrealistically high. The only college game I ever saw Oden play in was the NCAA finals, so I was going mainly on the hype surrounding him. Perhaps he never deserved all those accolades, and we've just got to set our sights a little lower.
 
These growing pain struggles were supposed to happen last year. Instead, they're happening this year, with the added obstacle of regaining explosiveness in his legs and working his way into the insanely demanding shape that NBA basketball requires.

I don't know why this is confusing and provokes outbutsts of anger after every poor game Oden has. He's having a tremendous rookie season, so far, on a per-minute basis, and that's without his top explosiveness. Once he's in complete shape, he'll start playing more minutes. And once his explosiveness returns, he'll also look more dominant on the floor (as opposed to merely in the numbers).

I've resigned myself to the irrevokable fact that the rest of this season will involve "Okay, NOW Oden is a bust, for real this time!" threads after every down-game. For myself, I'm quite encouraged by how he's looked despite the obstacles and while I don't think it's a certainty that he'll become a dominant center, I still consider it the more likely outcome.
 
Shooter said:
You make some good points. Maybe my own expectations were unrealistically high. The only college game I ever saw Oden play in was the NCAA finals, so I was going mainly on the hype surrounding him. Perhaps he never deserved all those accolades, and we've just got to set our sights a little lower.
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You can have high expectations AND patience. The two aren't mutually exclusive. Just an FYI.
 
noknobs said:
You can have high expectations AND patience. The two aren't mutually exclusive. Just an FYI.
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Indeed. This year is really just a year to note that Greg needs to work on his footwork this summer, develop some post moves and learn how to condition himself better in the off-season. The first two can be worked on at a big man summer camp which I imagine the Blazers are already planning on having him attend one. The second is just learning how to pace yourself on your first real year in the NBA.

I still have high expectations but realize that a big time surgery coupled without ever playing in the NBA before said injury AND taking an entire year off is a big hurdle to get over and will most definitely not be done in 15 games or probably even 30.

So I'll wait next year and even the year after that until I'll re-evaluate where my expectations should be in regards to Greg Oden.
 
Shooter said:
You make some good points. Maybe my own expectations were unrealistically high. The only college game I ever saw Oden play in was the NCAA finals, so I was going mainly on the hype surrounding him. Perhaps he never deserved all those accolades, and we've just got to set our sights a little lower.
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Exactly.

There is a huge middle ground between "flop" and the outlandish expectations some folks have for Oden.
 
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