The 2010-11 Memeview

After a summer full of speculation and drama, you know what to expect from a Blazers season preview. Before previewing it the right way, I'll post a preview review, in bullet form, TrueHoop style.

• The Blazers lost approximately 7,024 player games to injury last year. At one point, they started a Tigard child who had recently graduated from the Larry Steele Basketball Camp at the 2 guard.
• Greg Oden gets injured like all the time, what's the deal with that? Basically, the fact that Oden is oft-injured is obvious, cliched, and necessary to any preview. It's like three-word sentences in Canzano columns. It really is. It really is.
• Batum will make the leap this year. Everyone's told him. You know, it's a good sign when a player buys into the hype surrounding them. That's never gone wrong, ever.
• The Blazers have been terrible in preseason, yet Wesley Matthews has been great. Many are trying to take this as a sign that Matthews is a hell of a player, yet we shouldn't be worried about our terrible record. The truth: you can't have it both ways. Our preseason is irrelevant, and Matthews' play, though encouraging, is just as irrelevant. Depend on it the way you depend on reports of LaMarcus Aldridge gaining 20 pounds in the offseason.
• Brandon Roy is the offspring of the unholy triumvirate of Stephon Marbury, Vince Carter, and Allen Iverson. He plans on taking every single shot for the Blazers this season, and some for the other team, too.
• The Thunder really aren't that good, except when they're challenging the Lakers at the top of the conference. Evidently, having everything go right and only getting 50 wins means that you're jumping up to 70 wins the next season.

I think those are all the main storylines that we've been reading throughout this offseason in a desperate, flailing attempt to get any possible news about this team we all love so much.

Now onto the real preview.

The Blazers are the team with the largest presence on the internet, with the Raptors gasping behind them for second place. Blazer fans spread across the web, an army that attacks anyone who says anything negative about the team, taking over comment sections on ESPN.com and Yahoo.com. There's another group out there that's just as volatile and dogged as Blazers fans. They've gone after Apple, AT&T, Verizon, and Sarah Palin. That group? 4chan.

For those of us who aren't fans of corporate sabotage or images which you can't unsee, 4chan's greatest contributions to culture are memes. With two such large groups, there's no surprise that there's some overlap. That overlap: the Trail Post 2010-11 Memeview.

Nate McMillan: Serious Cat

Only one internet meme could ever hope to match Sarge's no-nonsense approach to basketball. That computer in the back matches well to assistant coach Kaleb Canales' sophisticated video review system.



Leeroy Jenkins: Jerryd Bayless

Jerryd Bayless charges in, no matter how heavy the defense is. So does Leeroy.

Dancing Baby: Andre Miller

Both have been around forever. Also, Andre Miller had a 2-episode arc on Ally McBeal.

Sad Keanu: Rudy Fernandez

So much bench-related ennui.



Trololo: LaMarcus Aldridge

Eduard Khil's smooth breed of singing matches the matches the smoothness of LaMarcus Aldridge. Still, you feel like something's missing. In Khil's case, it's actual words. In LaMarcus', it's post game.

Watermelon Head Shot: Armon Johnson

Did you see the way that watermelon face-guarded her? Armon taught it everything it knows.

Yo Dawg Xzibit: Marcus Camby

Just as the Xzibit meme has the rapper constantly stuffs cars into other cars so you can drive while you drive, Marcus Camby stuffs the stat sheet.

Zidane Headbutt: Nicolas Batum

They're French. Of course, Batum's not particularly violent, but we can hope him to become to French basketball what Zidane was to French soccer.



Keyboard Cat: Brandon Roy

There's only one match for the Blazers' ultimate finisher: the internet's ultimate finisher. Brandon is the one who plays the team off during games, and we all know what Keyboard Cat does.

After all of that, what do we have? What can we expect from this team? Well, anything less than 50 wins would be a disappointment. There have been statistical projections that put our ceiling at more than 65 wins. That doesn't pass the smell test, either. Basically, we should expect at least 52 wins. Ideally, if everything comes together, our ceiling is at 59. Why can't this week be over?