Lakers Looking Good In Season Opener

Coming into this season opener against the Portland Trailblazers, there were many story lines filled with very intriguing match ups, power forwards, as well as guards, and high expectations for the defending Western Conference Champions.

There is one thing that needs to be said before anything, fragile big men never last in this league. NEVER! Personally, I like Greg Oden and to me he seems like a great guy. He has a great all around game (at least he did while at Ohio State), a funny big man personality (a lot like Shaq), but after watching his first NBA game he is either not in shape to compete at this level or he is as soft as they come, it's that simple.

Oden looked good early on Tuesday night but after he came down rolling his right ankle on Derek Fisher's foot he came up limping. Many wondered if he would be able to play through what was evident, a great deal of pain! He thought he would be able to go out there and continue to play but it was clear he was injured and just could not play the rest of the game. You could see his long face and feel the frustration coming from him. This guy has either bad luck or just perhaps isn't as healthy as everyone may think including himself.


With only 13 minutes on the floor to start his NBA career, Greg Oden is already injured once again. Ending his night with pitiful numbers: 0 points, 5 rebs, 1 blocked shot, and going only 0-4 for the night. The specifics of Oden's ankle injury hasn't been determined just yet as tests were inconclusive after having x-rays taken. He will be having an MRI on Wednesday to see how serious the ankle injury is. Although my heart goes out to Oden, as getting hurt again has to be extremely frustrating, this game wasn't even close to as competitive as I thought it would be.

Brandon Roy and company were just absolutely dominated by a very good Los Angeles Lakers team. Brandon Roy, Travis Outlaw, and Rudy Fernandez tried to pick up the slack as they combined for 48 points, but it wasn't even close to enough to compete with the Los Angeles Lakers team that will be very tough to beat this 2008-2009 season. Apparently this young Portland Trailblazers team was not ready for the experienced veteran Lakers team.













In the beginning of the game Kobe Bryant was looking for his teammates, but after 5 turnovers to go with 5 assists, Kobe wisely started to take it to the basket. After Kobe started to get comfortable he attacked the basket time and time again just making the Blazers defense look stupid. Not only did the league's reigning MVP put up 23 points, but he also ripped down a game high 11 boards. Perhaps after the Trailblazers center Przybilla committed a hard foul against Kobe not to mention a stare down in the third quarter that was enough to awaken the beast. Kobe had 17 of his 23 points in the third quarter alone.

Andrew Bynum on the other hand still needs to polish up his game on the offensive end. He looked pretty good, don't get me wrong, but 4 of 10 shooting isn't going to cut it if he wants to be a dominate center in this league and play for the Lakers. Bynum did block three shots, but he didn't exactly crash the boards with only three rebounds. As for the other Lakers, Pau Gasol had a solid performance with 15 points on 7 of 10 shooting and 7 rebounds. Trevor Ariza also had a good game off the bench with 11 points, a couple steals and a blocked shot. The Lakers couldn't have started the season off any better, this twenty point victory over the Portland Trailblazers (96-76) will be a good momentum builder as their schedule only gets tougher in the first month of the season. The Lakers will now go up against the revamped Los Angeles Clippers lead by L.A. native Baron Davis. After the Clipps the Lakers face Allen Iverson and then it's back to L.A. again to play the Clipps. Then the Los Angeles Lakers will play a lot tough opponents in a row against the Houston Rockets, Dallas Mavericks, New Orleans Hornets, and the Detriot Pistons. One thing I am certain of.....this season the Los Angeles Lakers will give all the other teams in the NBA a stiff competition including the current 2008 champions, the Boston Celtics.

NEXT MATCH UP: Los Angeles Lakers @ Los Angeles Clippers 7:30 pm PST