Portland has blazed quite a trail to first place

[tlongII]

http://www.sacbee.com/100/story/630153.html

Another season, another set of expectations gone hopelessly wrong.

At what point the Portland Trail Blazers decided to ignore the plans others laid out is not clear, but nearly midway through a season set aside for dreaming of the future, the Portland Trail Blazers are in first place, and it's everyone else's turn to consider what comes next.

Think nightmare scenario more than dream.

The blueprint designed by common sense – show promise, endure the absence of injured No. 1 pick Greg Oden, take off when he debuts next season – lasted five weeks into the season. Then the Blazers won 13 in a row and 17 of 18, all with Oden a spectator and some with LaMarcus Aldridge shelved as well, and they were suddenly playing with house money.

They're 22-13, after finishing 32-50 last season, even if it has been with a home-heavy schedule. Portland is tied with the Denver Nuggets for the lead in the Northwest Division standings and for the sixth-best record in the West entering Saturday night's games. In the real headline, the time travel to 2008-09 or beyond makes the Blazers the only team in the conference that can stumble to the finish and still consider the current campaign a success. If the goal coming in was to build on potential and show what could be, mission accomplished, even if they do not sustain this level of success.

And if they do? Brandon Roy will be a leading contender for MVP, Nate McMillan will be a leading contender for Coach of the Year, Kevin Pritchard will be a leading contender for Executive of the Year, and Aldridge will be a leading contender for Most Improved Player is all. Meanwhile, Portland might get the homecourt advantage in the first round of the playoffs, an unspeakable thought a couple months back, and woe be the visiting team that must contend with that city fully behind its Blazers again.

They used to be annual disappointments, or an annual frustration, or an annual punch line, or all of the above, a historically undisciplined roster with the likes of Isaiah Rider and Rasheed Wallace. Now, suddenly, the Trail Blazers are ridiculously ahead of the other West teams plotting a course to the future – the Kings, SuperSonics, Timberwolves, Clippers and Grizzlies – and have the best outlook of any roster for the next 10 years.

Roy, the shooting guard who also plays the point, is 23 years old and pushing for an All-Star spot. Aldridge, the power forward, is 22 and averaging 18.1 points and 7.5 rebounds.

Martell Webster, the 2005 lottery pick on the come, is 21 and averaging 11.3 points and shooting an encouraging 39 percent on three-pointers.

Oden, the center recovering from knee surgery that is expected to cost him the season, is about to turn 20 and projected to become a defensive star.

And Portland still has two 2007 first-round picks, Rudy Fernandez and Petteri Koponen, more arriving depth and more potential or more trade options for a general manager who orchestrated much of the maneuvering that accelerated the recovery from the dark days of the "Jail Blazers." Just in case they all didn't have enough to look forward to, dreamers no more and already living the new reality.

[m33p0]

Brandon Roy will be a leading contender for MVP, Nate McMillan will be a leading contender for Coach of the Year, Kevin Pritchard will be a leading contender for Executive of the Year, and Aldridge will be a leading contender for Most Improved Player is all.

if they can reach the playoffs as a top seed, noone would begrudge them of it.