I hate L.A.

So a little bit about this blog, this will be mainly about basketball especially the Portland Trail Blazers. Over the past few games I have watched a great deal of them with my friend Nat, and he hates LaMarcus Aldridge, hence the name I Hate L.A. (and even though it is about Aldridge, it kind of has a double meaning referring to the LA Lakers, because, well, as a Blazers fan, I also hate them). Anyways a little about my friend, he and I have been talking about, watching, and following the Blazers for about 15 years or more, we both grew up in Portland and have been friends since about the 4th grade.

We have stood by this team through thick and thin, suffered with them at their lowest lows and toughest losses, gotten psyched about them before each season, even buying into the hype about many of the players who have gone through our fair city.

And my friend Nat has always had one Blazer each season who he has hated on, I think it all really started with Derek Anderson, that guy was supposed to be some sort of 3-point specialist and a great 2 guard, well guess what, by the time we got him, he stunk. He would always woo you with his once-in-a-blue-moon stellar play and you would think, hey he's finally put it together, well after 3 or 4 seasons of this it just got old. During training camp they would always have articles about how he was ready to step up and be the leader and really make a contribution, well it never happened. Instead during his final season in Portland he kept sitting out with 'injuries' that he had conjured up, one of the greatest being his 'tooth ache' injury, in which during a Portland game in San Antonio, he was seen at a Portland area McDonald's drive through, must have been some tooth ache that all he needed to cure it was a quarter pounder with cheese and a McFlurry. Anyways, he was done in this town, and any game Nat and I would watch, Nat would boo and hiss D.A. He would call him nasty names, boo any time he got the ball, get pissed off anytime he would shoot, and on the rare times that he made it he still would hate on him. He just couldn't stand the guy, and well, frankly, neither could I.

Well that offseason, the Allan Houston rule came into effect, where teams were allowed a one time option to clear one contract off of their salary caps, effectively buying them out, for the Blazers it was Derek Anderson. End of the D.A. story right? Wrong, to further piss us off, D.A. wound up with Miami at the end of the season and won a ring as a bench cheerleader for the Heat that year, ultimately pissing me and Nat off, well that and the fact that D-Wade would get a foul call for himself if someone on Dallas farted in his general direction. (In fact for a time I went around after that finals, and if I did something to annoy someone or people, I'd just say, 'Wasn't my fault, I'm Dwayne Wade.)

Well, besides hating on Miami that season on the playoffs, Nat had to pick a new 'least' favorite Trail Blazer, enter Travis Outlaw. Outlaw is a leaper who at that time had tons of potential, but almost no brains, he had a beautiful looking running jump shot, but he ruined it by taking it at the worst time possible, and when McMillan came in as the new coach Trout was having a lot of trouble learning the new system. So basically natural raw talent with a horrible basketball IQ. However, Trout, (I love that nickname for him, especially since he loves fishing) was still extremely young, with that natural skill set, had come right out of high school and was dreadfully skinny when he first came in the league, because of this I still had high hopes for him. Nat did not, every time Outlaw would get the ball Nat would boo and hiss, yell at him to pass, get pissed at him when he took one of his famously horrible shots, and not be swayed at all when one would happen to fall, he got me to notice lots of little things, like Trout didn't play defense, didn't rebound particularly well, never passed and always shot the ball. Two, three defenders surrounding him, he didn't care he never passed, unless he was inbounding the ball. Nat hated Trout so much that this past summer, as a restricted free agent, Nat did not want the team to sign him, well they did Travis signed a 3 year, 12 million dollar contract, which in NBA standards was fairly modest. Well Nat was pissed, until the season started, Trout has been clutch in the fourth quarter, makes a lot better shot selection, passes more, blocks shots, gets rebounds, has completely changed as a player, enough so that Nat is happy with Trout now and sees him as a great bench players for the Blazers down the road. Finally, I thought, Nat's chilled out a bit on the Negative Nancy routine.

That is until I started to notice the early grumblings towards LaMarcus Aldridge, #12, sophomore year for the highly touted power forward, the player that led the Blazers to believe it was finally time to get rid of the much maligned Zach Randolph. It all started about his rebounding, Nat kept saying Aldridge wasn't a very good rebounder, well this developed to his jump shot, especially around the baseline, where Nat has pointed out that he has done particularly poorly, and the fact that LA has no post game, he is soft, he doesn't play good defense, and most of all he couldn't stand the smug smile he has seen on LA's face when he was playing poorly, completely convinced that LA is developing an enormous ego about himself. At first, I just kept saying, 'Chill out Nat, he's young.' And Nat is right about a lot of things regarding LA but he is in his second season, first as a starter, defenses key up on him more than they used to, less open looks, better defense on him in the post, so there is a lot of potential there. And while Nat realizes that in a couple of years LA will more than likely be a great complement on this Blazer team, he has chosen to hate on him. At first I was like alright whatever, but over the past few games, his hatred has reached such a crescendo that I told Nat I was going to start a blog called I Hate L.A. and that I was going to tell his story, we were kind of joking, but I was also kind of serious about it, so this is the start to I Hate L.A. So for every boo, hiss, and negative comment about LaMarcus Aldridge, just know that I am not a stat cruncher (although my friend's resounding crescendo has reached its zenith over LaMarcus' worst stretch of the season shooting wise) but if anyone would like to add comments regarding stats I would welcome them and anyone who is a Trail Blazers fan, please feel free to come and browse and see what I have cooking up here!