PORTLAND, Oregon--In another place, involving someone else, the moment might have meant nothing. When Portland Trail Blazers center Greg Oden rolled his ankle during the team’s first training camp practice Sept. 30, it sent this city into a tizzy.
“Our phone lines lit up,” said Jason Swygard, executive producer of the city’s prime-time sports radio talk show (ESPN 1080 The Fan).
“No question, Greg Oden, right now, is the most scrutinized person in Portland.”
Maybe in the NBA.
Since Oden, the No. 1 draft pick in 2007, missed all of last season after microfracture surgery on his right knee, his health is big news….especially for a team that has missed the playoffs the last five years.
Blazers guard Brandon Roy hears it around town.
“All everybody wants to ask me is, ‘How’s the big fella? How’s he doing?’
“The expectations for him are at a level that I couldn’t imagine. Not only was he the top pick, he’s a top pick that could change a franchise.”
The frenzy over his ankle baffled Oden (7-0, 279), who is 20 and played one year at Ohio State University.
“It wasn’t that bad,” he said. “I walked to the training room. I practiced the day after that.”
Given his potential--and health history, which includes 2006 surgery to repair ligaments in his right wrist, which he damaged in high school--the incident provided a glimpse into the pressures he could face in his delayed rookie season.
The heat was on early, as the Blazers met the Western Conference champion Los Angeles Lakers in Tuesday’s season opener.
Then, Oden will face Tim Duncan and the San Antonio Spurs on Friday and Shaquille O’Neal and the Phoenix Suns on Saturday.
Such pressures have led Oden to refocus.
The public saw Oden’s buoyant side in 2007 when he filmed an ESPN “The Magazine” ad featuring his deadpan delivery, “I’m a chameleon.”
He appeared at the 2008 ESPN’s backing Justin Timberlake on the piano while wearing cartoonish Elton John glasses.
But this fall, the Blazers have seen a different person.
He’s declined special news media photo requests, including cover opportunities.
“I have a lot on my shoulders,” Oden said. “A lot of people are looking at me to change things.”
Larry Miller, president, said the team has tried to temper everybody’s hopes for a franchise that has one National Basketball Association title (1977) and finished 41-41 last spring, third in the Northwest Division. “But,” he said, “our expectations are pretty high, too.”
“This city is craving for them to get back to the success of 1977, and the conference title teams of the early ‘90’s,” Swygard, who grew up in Portland, said, “and because the team is such an essential part of the community, they need to be touchy-feely with them.”
Oden hasn’t been able to escape that pressure, and it showed in his first preseason game, against the Sacramento Kings on Oct. 7.
He flashed an array of unnecessary shimmies and pump fakes with the ball in the post, a sign he was trying too hard.
“Just go into your move,” Roy said. “They ain’t gonna stop you.”
Coach Nate McMillan senses the tension, too.
“We want to see his playful side,” McMillan said.
“He doesn’t need to worry about what everybody else is saying. Enjoy being a pro. Laugh about it. Smile about it.
“Everything else will come, but, if you come in here pressing, there will be some problems.”
In six preseason games, Oden averaged 11.5 points and 7.8 rebounds while shooting 58.1% from the field.
However, because the Blazers are stocked with young talent, Oden doesn’t have to average 20 points right away.
“We don’t look at Greg as our savior,” general manager Kevin Pritchard said. “We want to be 15 strong.”
Along with Roy, a 2007-08 All-Star, Portland features 6 ft. 11 in. LaMarcus Aldridge, who averaged 17.8 points last year; and guard Rudy Fernandez, a member of Spain’s Olympic team who scored 22 points in the gold medal game against Team USA.
Portland also features small forward Martell Webster, the sixth pick of the 2005 draft who is out until at least the second week of December with a foot injury.
“Greg’s going to have to figure out exactly what they need, from a team concept,” said Hall of Fame center Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the first pick of the 1969 draft (Milwaukee Bucks), who also carried the weight of changing a franchise.
“He has one good thing going for him: Portland has a good nucleus. I think he’ll be able to fit in very easily. I don’t know what his offensive deal is, but he’s ready now to anchor that team defensively.”
If Abdul-Jabbar could give Oden advice, it would be this: be patient.
Patrick Ewing, another Hall of Fame center and former No. 1 pick who came into the league with great expectations--but didn’t win a title in 17 seasons--understands Oden’s burden.
His advice: “Just go out and play. Playing basketball is not pressure. It’s something he’s been doing his whole life.”
Oden said his biggest obstacle this season is “just making it through an 82-game season.” He isn’t sure how his knee will respond to a schedule he calls “grueling.”
Nobody is sure how the injury occurred.
Richard Steadman, the orthopedic surgeon who developed the microfracture procedure and served as a consultant to the Blazers, examined Oden’s MRI shortly before the Sept. 2007 procedure.
“I made the point that he couldn’t get by without the surgery,” Steadman said.
Microfracture surgery is an arthroscopic procedure that involves drilling small fractures into the bone to stimulate new cartilage growth.
“Statistics show that 85 percent of the time it is very successful,” Steadman said.
The key, he said, is the rehabilitation process.
It involves sitting for eight hours a day in a machine that moves the knee up and down--for eight weeks. Another eight-week phase, which begins one to two weeks after surgery, includes riding a stationary bike and doing deep-water running.
Then, Oden could begin bearing weight on his knee.
Phoenix Suns forward-center Amare Stoudemire had microfracture surgery in Oct. 2005.
He unsuccessfully tried to return later that season, but in 2006-07, he played in all 82 games, averaging 20.4 points and 9.6 rebounds and making the Western Conference All-Star team.
Stoudemire talked to Oden shortly after Oden had the procedure.
“You’ll wake up one morning feeling great,” Stoudemire said, “then, the next day, you’d feel like you need the procedure done over again.”
Stoudemire said he still felt “a little pinch, a little pain” for seven months after his return. “It takes a year, year-and-a-half to fully recover,” he said.
As Oden recuperated, he accompanied the Blazers on the road.
His lowest moment came Dec. 21, when Portland earned its 10th win in a row.
“I wanted to be part of that so bad,” Oden said. “Just put me on the court for 15 seconds! Walking out of the arena that night, watching everybody celebrating, I was in my own zone.
“Driving home, I don’t think I even saw the road.”
Providing solace at home was his blind Boston terrier-beagle, Charles Barkley McLovin, named after the former NBA All-Star-turned-TV analyst and the character in “Superbad.”
“When I got him, I didn’t know he was blind,” Oden said. “You know, when you first get a dog. “They’re not used to the surroundings and they run into stuff, but he just kept doing it. I’m like, what’s going on here?’
The vet said surgery wouldn’t help.”
McLovin has an easy solution to his situation.
“He literally sleeps eight hours a night, then all day,” Oden said. “It’s amazing.”
