Yahoo! Sports' Adrian Wojnarowski is reporting that Oden is lost for the season after undergoing microfracture surgery on his knee today.
Obviously this is very bad news for both Oden and the Portland TrailBlazers. It appears that Portland will be on the receiving end of yet another high lottery pick next offseason which will be the third straight year for them, having drafted Brandon Roy, LaMarcus Aldridge and Oden the past two offseasons. This will do nothing to quell the comparisons to Sam Bowie that have been floating around, which is unfortunate for Oden and the fanbase, as they are completely off base. If anything, he's more like their most recent #1 overall pick -- Bill Walton.
For Grizzlies' fans, this has to be cause for a sigh of relief on two counts. First, that the Blazers won't have that dominant force in the middle in those 3 games this season. Secondly, and more obviously, that the Grizzlies won't be haunted by recollections of players like Bryant "Big Country" Reeves and Michael Dickerson, who came into the league with lots of potential, but whose careers were cut short by injuries.
Since the draft lottery, the question has been hanging over the city like a dark cloud: What If? What if those ping-pong balls had given the #1 overall pick to the Grizzlies instead of Portland? Well, since hindsight is 20/20, we can now say "Thank Goodness" instead of "What If". Even if Oden returns to his pre-injury condition and develops into that dominant center that was his predicted future, at least Grizzlies' fans won't have to spend the next season playing the Waiting Game, as the fanbase in the Pacific Northwest is now forced to do. I wish Oden and that fanbase the best, but I'm glad that I'm not in their shoes right now.
Update: Ron Tillery agrees with me
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