Oden ready to prove himself

LINK​

 

everyone has been clamoring for a 'big man' coach for greg, i think he got the best one in brian grant

 

Yeah I really appreciate what BG is doing. Basketball aside, he's a great mentor for Greg.

 

I like that BG has been metoring him. Grant played in the league just a few short years ago, and I would assume Greg appreciates that.

 

I think they make a great duo. BG has been thru the wars of living up to and then not living up to expectations as well as fighting in the trenches and GO is starting to learn about all of that. BG is an inspiration.

 

How long until we get to see Greg with dreds? I figure this year he grows out a big afro, to get the hair long enough, and then rasta them up for the playoffs?

 

What to think of Oden?

 

Greg was missing that "it" factor last year. Hopefully his time back in Ohio will bring "it" back.

 

Man, I can't wait for this season to start. I've always been a huge sucker for the summer hype of a big man returning to his peak form, whether it was Randolph, Kemp, Grant....I just can't help it. More often than not it seems a letdown, but not always....

Oden is finally able to really work out his knees and spend a whole summer getting ready for an NBA season. He's had time to work on lateral quickness, and time to think about how to avoid picking up the stupid fouls. Plus he'll be out of his rookie year, the time when refs seem most likely to blow the whistle on you.

Can't wait.

 

Whoo hoo! Let's go G.O. Hopefully we get to see a dominant Greg next season that undisputedly makes his case as the starting C over Joel. And I love that the Rasta Monsta is working with him, maybe we can get Grant to be an assistant and work with Greg all season with Mo down with his health issues?

 

Good news! Thank you BG for helping Greg out.

 

The best one??? who else has he worked with? I don't know why I should think more of BG then Lucas or any of the other Blazer assistant coaches and trainers... but what do I know? I've no reason to think he's an especially great role model or coach... certainly some of the stuff that came out about him as he was leaving the Blazers (and after) ran counter to the image that he had cultivated here. He was a pretty good player and had nice dreads though.

thats what I'll be looking for. Dude was not the same fluid athlete I'd seen before.

STOMP

 

I hope I'm wrong but even in this article I found something that makes me think Oden will never be one of the great ones. He says “They’re going to see a guy that can dominate on the court and change games,” Oden told Yahoo! Sports this week. “…They drafted me for a reason and I want to show them why they drafted me.”

He just seems to be a guy who wants to please people, not a guy who goes out there for the sheer joy of playing and for the rush of dominating someone else. And I don't think any sports psychologist in the world can give him the drive of a guy like Brian Grant. You just have it or you don't. Hopefully he'll still be able to contribute substantially to the team. I guess, thinking about a guy like Kareem, he didn't seem to really have that drive either, so maybe I am all wet on this whole thing. Or maybe i don't know that much about Kareem.

 

What does it matter where his motivations comes from? Your thinking too much. It's the results that matter.

 

No doubt. Words cannot describe how happy, excited and relieved I was when I first read Brian Grant was mentoring and training Greg Oden.

Yes, it was that good.

 

I'm guessing it was his answer to how the question was framed to him.

"What are they going to see different about you this year Greg?"
"What should we expect from you this upcoming year?"

Or something like that. You're reading way too much into it.

 

I actually thought the exact opposite when I read that quote because I don't remember ever hearing him talk like that. Last year it seems he was always talking about it being Roys team and just trying to blend in and over-respecting his opponents to the point he was intimidated. I thought he was too humble last year. This is actually encouraging to me and I'm having trouble following your logic and how you extrapolated from this article that he must not be someone who plays for the joy of the game.

 

For me, if he had simply said "I am going to dominate and change games." and "I am the top player in that class and I will show it this year"; then I would feel better. It's just a gut feeling on my part that a guy who is concerned with showing the fans (first "they") and management (second "they") how good he is, will not be great. It's possible the question he was answering has something to do with it; but there have been statements in the past that caused me to have the same concerns. Maybe I want too much from him.

 

Well I think you're making a big assumption, but even if you're right about Oden, you're wrong that it means he can't be great. To me, no one in the game is more concerned about his image and how others view him than Kobe Bryant.

 

Then Kobe should probably stop raping people. I have heard that some people have a problem with that.