As this season is on a downward spiral, I figured posting this great article last December would enlighten us on what we are currently missing on the roster this year.

At first, he felt the knees. Then,Brandon Roy heard them. 

It was last week, days before training camp was to start for the Portland Trail Blazers, and Roy was intensifying his efforts to come back from yet another round of knee surgeries the season before. 

His workouts, casual and playful during the lockout, became serious and strenuous, just like they always did as he prepared for a season during his storied career. 

He was determined to make a comeback. To prove people wrong. To prove that the people who were standing by him were right. 

But something wasn’t right. And he knew it. 

“The more I would try to prepare to have this big comeback year, the worse my knees would continue to feel,” Roy said Thursday in his first public comments since July. “As we approached training camp, there was clicking in there, there was something in there really bothering me, and I was starting to feel like I would have to have another (surgery) just to help me get by day-to-day.” 

Days earlier he had met with the Trail Blazers’ brass: president Larry Miller, interim general manager Chad Buchanan and head coach Nate McMillan. And later he would talk with owner Paul Allen. They all made his heart swell with unyielding support. 

But deep down, he knew about his aches. And he knew about the clicks. 

Read the entire article by Jason Quick here .

One of our favorite historic media coverage was the Behind the Locker Room Door series by Jason Quick of the Oregonian.  Jason gave fans an intimate look at the 2008-2009 season.

Reading back, it seemed so long ago that our city was full of hope and promise with our young budding core.  If you have some time, go back and take a read.  Here is my favorite read:  Quick describing how Roy, Aldridge and Outlaw tried to initiate Gregory Wayne Oden.

…I look over my shoulder and there is a sudden burst of chaos.

While I was talking to Aldridge, Roy and Outlaw had lured Oden over to the corner of the locker room by Outlaw’s locker. When they had him cornered, Roy alerted me. As I turned, they ambushed Oden. Roy went low to the legs, Outlaw up high. They were attempting the rookie initiation of Oden, which typically involves one of three treatments: a cold shower, a dunk in a tub of ice water or a dunk in a garbage can. This season, the team has already given Batum and Bayless the cold tub dunk.  

But Oden is a different beast.  

The action is violent and frantic, as if an animal is being attacked by lions. But it lasts for only a couple seconds.

 That’s how long it took for Oden to not only fend off the 6-foot-9 Outlaw and 6-foor-6 Roy, but get them both in a headlock.  

With Roy and Outlaw under his arms like little brothers, Oden parades them in a circle, all while he has a deliberate, ho-hum look on his face. As if …Oden releases them both and straightens his sports coat with a tug at the bottom and a couple of brushes of the sleeves.  

Defeated and short of breath, Roy red adjusts his cockeyed stocking cap.

“We need a big man,” Roy said panting. “Two of us ain’t going to do it.”

Oden proudly struts to the pizza table and woofs a piece. It is yet another reminder to everyone what a physical specimen Oden is…”  

Read the full article by Jason Quick here:
http://blog.oregonlive.com/behindblazersbeat/2009/03/behind_the_blazers_locker_room_2.html

Full series here:
http://blog.oregonlive.com/behindblazersbeat/behind_the_locker_room_door/index.html