The Portland Trailblazers beat (barely) San Antonio on Halloween, 100-99. The win was a long time coming; the Spurs had won the last 12 match ups going back to 2005. I was at the game and made a few observations . . .

• Nicolas Batum is a damn good player.  I deliberately avoided paying much attention during the summer league and preseason, as they are seldom harbingers of things to come in the NBA.  I had heard the preseason chatter about Batum, so I did expect hustle and defense, but knowing he was a 19 year old rookie I just assumed that’s all he brought to the table.  Judging from his play last night, however, he also has a pretty shot, great all-around skills, and high basketball intelligence.  He’s ready to go now; no question he’d be a starter on the Blazers circa 2005-6.  For a rookie he makes remarkably few mistakes on either the offensive or defensive end.  And I, and Brandon Roy, love how he gets out on the fast break and finishes.
• Duncan in unstoppable, but the refs help him out anyway.  He doesn’t need the refs’ help, though of course this is the NBA so he gets plenty of it for large chunks of the game. (entire first half in this case)
• The Blazers have to come up with a new song snippet for LaMarcus Aldridge.  When LA does something impressive a snippet of Randy Newman’s I Love L.A. is blared out over the PA in the Rose Garden.  I cannot abide Lakers fans inside the Rose Garden, and I cannot abide that damn song being associated with a Portland Trailbazer.

The Blazers take on the San Antonio Spurs tonight in the 2008 home opener at the Rose Garden.

As everyone knows, Greg Oden sprained his foot in the season opener in LA and will be resting and healing for the next several weeks. Having watched this team come together last year I am not too concerned; we’ll miss James Jones’ sweet shot (though he’s out with an injury for three months) but this year’s team is stronger than last year’s Oden-less team with the addition of two Europeans, Rudy Fernandez and Nicolas Batum.

My (invariably overly optimistic) predictions for tonight’s game:

• Travis Outlaw will hit the game winner
• Rudy Fernandez will flirt with his first NBA triple-double
• Roy will shoot over 60% on the night

I will be attending the game in lieu of celebrating Halloween. Look for me on TV; I’ll be the one in red!

Update 11/1

So I was a little off on my predictions.

Travis Outlaw did take the last shot for the Blazers, and the shot would have likely iced the victory since we were up 1 at the time, but he did not make it. However, we won the game, which prediction was implicit in my Travis Outlaw predictions, so I give myself partial credit.

Rudy Fernandez flirted with a double-double (6 points and a team leading 8 rebounds), but 0 assists.

Roy shot 55.5% (10 for 18) on the night. Close!

7:30pm at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, the Portland Trailblazers begin the 2008-2009 season against last year’s Western Conference Champions, the Los Angeles Lakers.

With the expectations heaped onto this young Trailblazer team, it’s no surprise to see fans jumping back (or for the first time) onto the bandwagon. To keep up with the team, these blogs are required reading:

Blazers Blog

Blazer’s Edge

Both rich with original content, these blogs also link to interviews, videos, articles, and blogs around the world if the subject matter is directly or tangentially about the Blazers.

As a Portland blogger and season ticket holder, I too will occasionally blog about the Blazers this season . . . and post season?

Last year I predicted, accurately, that the Blazers would go 41-41 on the season (though that was 11 games into the season with the Blazers a perfect 4-0 at home and a perfectly awful 0-7 on the road).

This year I will make my prediction before the team starts playing: 49-33.

According to the LA Times, players around the league are paying bounties to teammates who “posterize” the Portland Trailblazers’ Greg Oden.

Pregame chatter landed, briefly, on the Sacramento Kings’ Kevin Martin, who collected $1,000 from teammate Mikki Moore for a two-handed dunk over 7-footer Greg Oden of the Trail Blazers on Monday in Sacramento.

The Clippers’ Ricky Davis, taking a break from his pre-game dinner, came up with another number. Why be predictable and imitate someone else?

Davis threw it down: $500 for dunking on Oden.

Frankly, I’m not worried. Most of the time going right at Oden is about the stupidest strategy a team could settle on.

Update: Looks like the Oregonian’s Canzano wrote a column about this. The formatting is all messed up on Oregonlive.com right now though.
Dwight Jaynes also blogged about this yesterday: The Clippers put a bounty on Greg Oden.