Greg Oden gave a very candid interview to former Ohio State bench warmer and current Grantland college basketball writer Mark Titus earlier this year. It was disheartening and empathetic watching a man begrudgingly describe his fall from grace, and you couldn’t help but pull for Oden and hope that he finds his way back into an NBA jersey one day. Well, that day may come as soon as next season, according to his agent Mike Conley Sr., father of Memphis Grizzlies’ point guard Mike Conley Jr.
“‘Obviously, if the Heat wanted him, who wouldn’t want to play for the Heat?’ Conley said of the defending champions. “That goes without saying. They have roster spots and a need (at center). But it’s too early to say about where he might play.’
For now, Conley said Oden is as excited as he’s been in a long time. He pointed out it was Oden who called him unsolicited to express a willingness to play this season.
‘He’s going to sign somewhere,’ Conley said. ‘He’s going to get healthy and be coming back.'”
We hope so.
Everyone once assumed Kevin Durant and Greg Oden’s NBA fate would be forever linked, or at the very least a point of comparison for hindsight specialists. One great, one less great, even bad. Durant was a can’t miss prospect, even if he couldn’t bench 185 pounds and looked as if he could use a hearty meal or three. But Oden was the consensus No. 1, even if that consensus came with nagging what-if-Durant-is-better concerns. And somehow, even after numerous knee surgeries and a total of 82 NBA games played since 2007, Oden and his memory still generates that enduring pipe dream, detached from Durant’s legacy, that he’ll rise from the netherworld of basketball woe and rejuvenate his once promising career. Even Kevin Pritchard, the GM who selected Oden, has bounced around too, a once masterful puppeteer orchestrating a dynasty with Roy, Aldridge and Oden, an original and organic Big Three.
But to call Oden a bust feels insulting and inflammatory. He did “bust” in the typical sense of the word, in that he was a high draft pick who failed to reach his promise. But mosts busts buy into their own inadequacy, re-purposing their NBA careers to that of a role player. Only on occasion do they entirely dissipate from our memory.
There were the unfortunate cell phone pics, the injuries, and the alcoholism, which we learned of in the Titus interview, and all of it mostly points towards an immature guy saddled with overbearing expectations and money to ease the suffering. Maybe it’s that he looks older, or detests the limelight like older players, but his plight is inviting, the big dopey underdog just trying to make it in this tough world.
But there’s just something compellingly endearing about Greg Oden as well. Maybe it’s because his career trajectory has been tantalizing – in the short time that he did play, he was the effective rebounder and shot-blocker we knew him to be. It’s funny to think that he’s only 24 years old considering his journey thus far; and I think the Titus interview proves he’s a better man for it, and at the very least mature beyond his years. Maybe being cut from Portland was the best thing that ever happened to him. Now he has no expectations, no contract, no fans to live up to. He can just get healthy and get back to being Greg Oden.
When he does come back, whether it’s in 2012 or 2013, just know that he could still have a long and productive career.
Will Greg Oden ever make it in the NBA?
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