Greg Oden, the Portland Trailblazers’ first-overall draft pick in 2007, is scheduled to have season-ending surgery on his left knee Friday to repair damaged cartilage, and I simply can’t help but feel saddened for both this young man and the team that had so much faith in him.
His career is not over, mind you, but after having microfracture surgery performed on his right knee in 2007 followed by last season’s fractured left patella, it appears that Oden is the victim of unbelievably bad luck and I sincerely hope to see him bounding down the court as pain-free as possible in 2011 and off those crutches for once.
We have such a small sample size with which to judge him that it’s almost not worth attempting. I could try repeating that he was #4 in the NBA last season in TRB%, grabbing 21.9% of all available rebounds when on the floor. Oden was actually ahead of Tim Duncan, David Lee, Zach Randolph, Kevin Love, and Joakim Noah last season in this category and averaged 3.8 blocks per 36 minutes, good for third in the league. In Oden’s last full game before his latest injury on December 1, 2009 he tallied thirteen points, twenty boards, and four blocks. The potential for excellence was there, folks.
Unfortunately and understandably, Portland will ultimately be judged for whom they DIDN’T select with the #1 choice in 2007. They could have selected Kevin Durant, Al Horford, Jeff Green, and Joakim Noah – all of those guys are starters on teams expected to enter this year’s playoff field and Durant is a once-in-a-generation talent who is a scoring champ already and far away from his prime.
Hindsight is 20/20 of course, and the Trailblazers couldn’t have expected Oden to succumb to such an array of freak injuries in a consecutive nature. When analysts brought up Sam Bowie and Bill Walton’s injury histories post-draft I laughed it off – I’m not a believer in the whole sports “curse” thing. Now, while I’m still not superstitious, I feel for Portland’s fan base as these tragic circumstances are just not fair to heap on one franchise. Portland has appeared to have struck out twice at franchise-altering talents – a guy named Michael Jordan in 1984 and now Durant – in exchange for two big men who couldn’t stay healthy.
As it stands now, Oden was not offered a contract extension on top of his original rookie deal, becoming the first number one pick to not be extended since the venerable Kwame Brown in 2001. The chances of him receiving an offer as an unrestricted free agent will probably be slim-to-none and he’ll be playing out the 2011-12 season on essentially a one-year evaluation period.
There is hope on the recovery front, however – Amare Stoudemire and Jason Kidd are great examples that you can indeed come back fully from microfracture surgery and prosper.
Here’s hoping that Greg Oden works his tail off this year in rehabilitation and comes back strong for 2011. I have always been a sucker for underdog stories and I’m afraid that nearly anyone who follows the NBA won’t give him another look after hearing this news, with good reason at this point.
I hope you prove everyone wrong.
See you in 2011.
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