Henry Abbott of TrueHoop.com talks about Portland Trail Blazers forward LaMarcus Aldridge's All-Star candidacy...
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"The result is a top ten PER -- at the moment just behind Dwight Howard and ahead of Dwyane Wade, Carmelo Anthony and Blake Griffin -- and a new round of calls that this man deserves to head to Orlando with those certain All-Stars."

"Of course it's a big honor to make the game. But if I get that whole week off, I'm not going to be mad, because my body has been going through the fire. I always play a lot of minutes, and this season even more. If I got that time off I wouldn't even be mad."
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As ThisizKiki noted in the FanShots, the Blazers have launched their Aldridge All-Star campaign by sending out custom-made Beats by Dre headphones to Western Conference coaches and select national media members.

Interestingly, Fran Blinebury of NBA.com suggests that Blazers center Marcus Camby deserves some All-Star consideration too.
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At 37 years old in his 16th NBA season, Marcus Camby has never gotten the All-Star recognition he deserves because he simply doesn’t score enough points. For all that LaMarcus Aldridge has done for the Trail Blazers this season, Camby is the old man at his back getting rebounds and blocking shots.
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ed: text updated, bumped to front page

And this is with Oden and Pryzbilla projected at under 1700 minutes combined.

Go take a look!

Fake Rudy Fernandez of El Blog Ilusorio de Rudy is interviewed by Bust a Bucket.

Money quote: "...I’ve experimented with two things this summer: Frosted tips and notoriety!"

NBA Playbook's Sebastian Pruiti looks at Devin Harris of the Nets. In effect it's a scouting report on Harris, with some weight behind it as Pruiti also operates a Nets blog for Truehoop.

I found his criticisms of Harris somewhat telling in regards to his potential fit here in Portland:
"On these plays Harris is really just launching his body into the paint, hoping for contact, and when he doesn’t get it he just flings the ball at the rim."
"He’s quick, long, and has good foot speed, but he is just lazy in his technique. Instead of using his feet to beat offensive players, he reaches and goes in for steals way too much, this gets him caught flat-footed and is what gets him beat by slower points:"
"In addition, the way the Nets’ seem to be building their roster focusing on an athletic team who can run. That would be great news for Devin, because he thrives in transition:"

Anyway, go check out the video evidence and full article, if you're at all interested in one of the most mentioned PG trade targets.

Interesting article, college-focused, on how players who don't slot into traditional 1-5 positions are often undervalued.

I feel it's relevant for Blazers fans because at least to some extent, Bayless is a D1-Scorer while Roy is a D2-Creator/Handler.

This article also really demonstrates how on defense you have to fit roles because most other teams will fit those roles, but on offense you can switch things up because you have the initiative and are attacking.

This makes me think maybe LMA has a chance to make the team...he was one of the 31 that they looked at last summer, correct?

I just had to link this so we can all laugh at David Kahn some more. Seriously, the guy can't work on more than one position a year, apparently. This year it's SFs: Martell, Wes Johnson, and now Rudy Gay?!

This would suck for Martell if it happened, in my opinion. I hope it doesn't.

UPDATE: Grizz are overpaying Rudy Gay to the tune of $80 mil over 5 years. Grosssss. Yay for Martell though.

I was looking through Martell's stats for this year. Obviously the starter/bench roles show a big disparity in playing time and FG%. Well, I noticed something even more drastic: Martell shoots around 45% at home and 34% on the road. Games played and started, minutes, FGA, and rebounds are all fairly consistent, but his FG% drops like an anvil on a certain coyote away from the Rose Garden.

Thoughts? Somebody tell Nate?