C Greg Oden (Portland Trailblazers)

[Buckskin86]

Greg Oden's radio comments raise eyebrows
YouNewsTV?Story Published: Jul 17, 2008



NBA player Greg Oden arrives at the ESPYs Awards on Wednesday July 16, 2008 in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Matt Sayles)

By Katy Brown and KATU Web Staff Video LAS VEGAS - Is Greg Oden finally ready to start for the Blazers or isn't he?

That's the question after a comment by Oden himself has some wondering whether he's really healthy.

Greg Oden did a series of interviews Wednesday in Los Angeles and repeatedly said he is ready to play.

But in an interview with ABC Radio the same day, he also made a comment about his health that is, understandably, raising a few eyebrows.

"I would say I'm in the 80s percent-wise healthy," he said. "I won't be back to 100 percent - not this year, not next year. It's going to take some time and I'm ready to play."

Won't be 100 percent? Even next year?

According to the Trail Blazers, Greg Oden's surgically repaired knee couldn't be better.

"What we do know, and the facts state, is that we feel like his rehab has gone fantastic," said Trail Blazers General Manager Kevin Pritchard. "He's moved in a great direction. The knee looks great. There's no swelling. He's got full range of motion. His leg is now completely as strong as his other leg."

Greg Oden's radio comments raise eyebrows | KPIC CBS 4 - News, Weather and Sports - Roseburg, OR - Roseburg, Oregon | Professional

[Buckskin86]

Oden anxious to get Blazers career under way
July 18, 2008
By Mike Freeman
CBSSports.com National Columnist
Tell Mike your opinion!



Greg Oden was asked about his dream scenario for his comeback and if it involved cheerleaders and whipped cream?


Greg Oden spent his first year in the NBA on crutches. (Getty Images)

He laughed. "No cheerleaders or whipped cream," he said. "My dream scenario is to help my team win more games than it did the year before. I want us to make the playoffs and win a title. That's my dream."

That dream has been on hold thanks to microfracture surgery last year to repair the massive amounts of hyperviolence inflicted upon Oden's knee. Oden missed all of last season but began rehabbing soon after the surgery, some four days a week, week after week, month after month. But there is only so much rehabbing one can do.

So how did he fill the time?

"I went to a lot of movies," he said.

Which ones?

"I saw Hancock twice," Oden remarked.

Twice? It was that good? Twice?

"I really liked it," he said of the superhero flick. "It wasn't too long. I'm a big Will Smith fan. I even liked Wild Wild West. That movie cracked me up. I'm probably the only one who liked it."

I'm not even sure Smith likes that movie.

Oden has always had a splendid sense of humor and though he stands at 7-feet tall, his head has never been in the clouds. He's as down to Earth as they come.

The real question is when will the NBA see the Oden who dominated college basketball, nibbled on backboards and was said by some to have the potential to be one of the greatest havoc-wreaking big men we've witnessed in years?

Will Oden get the best of the NBA or will that pesky knee get the best of him?

Oden anxious to get Blazers career under way - CBSSports.com Live Scores, Stats, Schedules

Katy's Take: Is Greg Oden ready to play?
Story Updated: Jul 18, 2008

By Katy Brown I spent 11 hours on Thursday dealing with the aftermath of Greg Oden?s 11-second soundbite about his health.

I talked to his agent, Michael Conley, Sr. - three times. I got through to Blazers General Manager Kevin Pritchard at NBA summer league - on his 41st birthday.

I interviewed them both about Oden?s ?I won?t be 100% this year or next? statement. Then I thought. And thought some more. And here?s what I came away with: Oden is a 20-year-old rookie who, understandably, is both excited and scared about next season.

Think about it: In one breath he leads us to believe his surgically-repaired right knee isn?t as healthy as we?ve been told. A split-second later, he proclaims he?s ready to play.

Sounds to me like a young man who is trying to make sure we don?t run wild with any thoughts of him leading a parade through downtown Portland next June with the NBA championship trophy in hand.

Here are the important points both Conley and Pritchard made in my interviews with them on Thursday:

1) Oden?s knee is in great shape. Both camps tell me he has full range of motion and that both legs are back to being equally strong. His agent says he will be at full strength by the start of training camp, and Blazers insiders are secretly giddy over how fantastic he has looked in closed-door workouts.

2) Oden is ready to go for next season ? with one important ?if?. That is if his knee keeps holding up once he?s cleared for five-on-five full-court basketball in September. At this point, both sides say, there?s no reason to think it won?t.

3) Oden understands he is viewed as the franchise savior and he does not want to disappoint. Conley told me he?s had to remind Oden that he?ll need time to adjust to the speed of the NBA game. Pritchard conceded he may need to start taking steps to take the mental weight of next season off Oden?s shoulders.

Katy's Take: Is Greg Oden ready to play? | KATU.com - Portland, Oregon | News

[Thump]

Originally Posted by Steve19

I still remember Fred Taylor camps with Lucas, Havlichek, and Bradds.

It's spelled "Havlicek."

[ScriptOhio]

Originally Posted by Thump

It's spelled "Havlicek."

[OregonBuckeye]

ESPY videos of Greg.

? ESPY Host Auditions: Greg Oden Dotting The “I”: The Student Perspective on The Ohio State University Athletics

[BuckeyeTillIDie]

I had never seen that Oden commercial, funny stuff!

[Best Buckeye]

that made my face smile..

[bucknut11]

Looks like Greg really wants that trophy



2007 ESPY's. This was linked from SI today. Not sure if it's been posted or not.

[BuckWrestler141]

Oden's back!!!

Aug 05, 2008 10:34 AM EST
The rehabilitation of Greg Oden's right knee is officially over, according to The Oregonian.
On Monday, the number one overall pick in the 2007 draft practiced for the first time in full-contacts drills. He battled teammate Channing Frye for 45 minutes at the team's practice facility.
The center revealed, though, that he's definitely out of game shape.
"It just lets you know that I'm not ready to play 82 games right exactly now," Oden said. "But if I keep working, I'm eventually going to get there."

P.S. love the ESPY picture of Oden and Durant above lol.

['BusNative]

Originally Posted by bucknut11

Looks like Greg really wants that trophy



2007 ESPY's. This was linked from SI today. Not sure if it's been posted or not.

that picture...

[matcar]

FWIW (nothing), Oden is currently averaging 150.1 points per game when playing 5 minute quarters on the EA Sports Cell Phone bball on my phone. Next highest scorer is Kobe averaging a shade over 27 ppg. Oden is DOMINATING.

[jimotis4heisman]

Originally Posted by matcar

FWIW (nothing), Oden is currently averaging 150.1 points per game when playing 5 minute quarters on the EA Sports Cell Phone bball on my phone. Next highest scorer is Kobe averaging a shade over 27 ppg. Oden is DOMINATING.

keep me updated on how troy smith does in your paper football league...

[Buckskin86]

Posted: Tuesday August 5, 2008
Steve Aschburner > INSIDE THE NBA
With Oden on track in his bid for a comeback, let the hype begin anew


Greg Oden hasn't played in a game against NBA-type competition since last year's summer league.
AP

With all due respect to Derrick Rose and Michael Beasley, the consensus-turned-actual Nos. 1-2 picks in the NBA draft six weeks ago, they are consensus nothings when it comes to projecting the league's likely Rookie of the Year for 2008-09.

Greg Oden still lists that honor among his unfinished business from last season, a rookie year wiped out by surgery on his right knee. Which makes Rose and Beasley -- in addition to being fortunate not to be the Nos. 2-3 picks in the draft, had Oden come out this year -- definite underdogs for the trophy you only get a shot at once.

Oden, the old/young face of an exciting Trail Blazers team bursting with potential, hasn't played a minute more of legit NBA ball than either Rose or Beasley. But as Samuel L. Jackson purred coolly in Shaft after he had lost his cop's badge, Does that make him less dangerous, or more dangerous? His year in physical therapy, in the swimming pool and in the weight room has left Oden stronger, bigger, healthier and hungrier than ever. He's been forgotten about a little bit, too, always a good thing for a highly touted player; it either motivates him to reclaim his crown or allows him to work with less glare from spotlights.

Oden took the most public, significant step yet Monday in his long comeback, participating in full-contract drills on the Blazers' practice court in Tualatin, Ore., with teammate Channing Frye and assistant coach Dean Demopoulos. Three-quarters of an hour in duration, the workout was open to the media -- a simple but smart marketing move, given the interest in Oden from fans in Portland, nationally and globally -- and the reports were largely ecstatic.

"I've got tingles,'' Blazers assistant general manager Tom Penn told beat writer Jason Quick of The Oregonian after witnessing the sweat session. Quick described a few Oden dunks, one of them so ferocious that it threatened to redefine "shot-clock violation.'' What Oden lacked in conditioning (the easiest thing for him to improve in the two months left before training camp), he more than made up for in agility and strength. Romping at less than full speed, with mild intensity on halfway-ready game legs.

"It is an amazing phenomenon, what's going on here with him,'' Demopoulos told The Oregonian. But why take Dean's 11 words for it? Pictures, we've been told, are worth a thousand, and there was one floating around on OregonLive.com that, in time, might rival that grainy 1967 alleged photograph of Big Foot striding through the forest, in the subcategory of frightening man-beast candids from the Pacific Northwest.

Let the Oden hype begin anew - Steve Aschburner - SI.com

The Status of Greg Oden

August 5, 2008 10:21 AM


Yesterday, in a workout led by Blazer assistant Dean Demopoulos, Greg Oden worked out against Channing Frye. It was Oden's first such full-contact workout, against NBA competition, since his microfracture knee surgery.

Stamina was, predictably, a problem.

But otherwise all reports are excellent.

http://myespn.go.com/blogs/truehoop/...Greg-Oden.html

Big man's small step
The Blazers center is impressive at times and has no problems with his knee in a full-contact workoutFACTBOX
Tuesday, August 05, 2008
JASON QUICK
The Oregonian Staff

TUALATIN -- The rehabilitation of Greg Oden and his right knee is officially over.

Now, it's all about basketball.

So on Monday, the Blazers' 2007 No. 1 overall draft pick who missed all of last season because of a knee injury, began the latest and most significant step in his comeback. He practiced for the first time in full-contract drills, going up against teammate Channing Frye for 45 minutes at the Blazers' practice facility in Tualatin.

http://www.oregonlive.com/blazers/or...380.xml&coll=7

Rip City Revival: Big man's small step
Posted by Bruce Ely and Jason Quick August 05, 2008
Categories: Rip City Revival
An inside look at the Blazers pursuit of a second NBA title

http://blog.oregonlive.com/behindbla...mans_smal.html

YouTube - Greg Oden workout

[Buckskin86]

Part II - How Greg Oden is like Scottie Pippen
Posted by Jason Quick, The Oregonian August 06, 2008 00:01AM
Categories: Rip City Revival
Blazers athletic trainer Jay Jensen is entering his 15th season with the Blazers, and after a year of working closely with Greg Oden during his rehabilitation from microfracture surgery, Jensen says Oden deserves to join lofty company.

"I haven't seen Greg play basketball yet, but as far as work ethic, he is right up there with Scottie Pippen, Detlef Schrempf and Damon Stoudamire as the best I've seen,'' Jensen said. "He's a hard worker, very determined.''


I have never seen an athlete take care of his body, or work as hard in the weight room and in exercising as Pippen. The guy bordered on maniacal, which is one reason he will have an express ticket to the Hall of Fame.

Part II - How Greg Oden is like Scottie Pippen - Behind The Blazers Beat - The Oregonian - OregonLive.com

[Buckskin86]

Part III - Oden's secret
Posted by Jason Quick, The Oregonian August 07, 2008

Ask Greg Oden about his blind dog, Charles Barkley McLovin, and he will tell you all about how he hopes to get his eyes fixed through surgery.

Ask Greg Oden about his urge to play basketball and he will tell you how tough it was for him not to join his buddies and ex-teammates for a quick run at Ohio State this summer while he was attending summer school.

But don't ask Greg Oden about his weight.


First, he will try to lie. Then he will try to dodge the question. Then, he will just flat out tell you he's not revealing his weight these days.

To hear Oden's response to a question about his weight, click here.

Jay Jensen, the Blazers athletic trainer, said the last weight he took off Oden had the 7-footer at around 290 pounds.

"For me, to have him around 290, that's pretty doggone good,'' Jensen said. "Would I like him to be lighter? Yeah. But we haven't allowed him to do much until recently.''

Part III - Oden's secret - Behind The Blazers Beat - The Oregonian - OregonLive.com