Snake Under Locker Greets Trail Blazers Before Game 2

Before Game 2 between the Spurs and Blazers at the AT&T Center in San Antonio tonight, Portland’s forward Thomas Robinson discovered an unusual site under his locker: a hissing snake.

Per Blazers reporter Casey Holdahl, comes the story of the snake from the perspective of Robinson and the teammate adjacent to him at the time of its discovery, Will Barton:

“Man, me and Thomas at our lockers as usual,” explained Trail Blazers guard Will Barton. “We’re changing and he goes to put his shoes down and he’s like ‘What the …?’ You know what he said. He’s like ‘There’s a snake under my locker dog!’ And I’m like ‘Stop playing.’ He’s like ‘No for real! A real snake!’ And we just looked under there and there was a snake. I was scared!”

“I just put my shoes down and once I put my shoes down I double looked and I seen a snake sitting there,” said Robinson. “After that, I got away from it. I just seen something curled up and I looked again and it was a snake. No one believed me until they looked in there. It hissed, I backed up.”

We’d back up if it hissed, too. Scratch that, we’d probably jump back regardless of a hiss.

Mo Williams snapped a pic of the slithering reptile for his IG:

Blazers coach Terry Stotts had the line of the night after the snake’s discovery (particularly if you’ve ever read Terry Pluto’s epic ABA oral history: Loose Balls):

"It's bizarre to have a venomous snake in your locker room. … It sounds like an ABA thing." Terry Stotts

— Ben Golliver (@BenGolliver) May 9, 2014

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A spokesperson for the Spurs told Holdahl it was not a rattlesnake as was originally reported. We’re sure that was a big relief for Portland.

The Red Auerbach era Celtics used to turn off the air conditioning in the visitor’s locker room during sauna conditions in the playoffs. They’d turn off the hot water in the winter months and sometimes the water fountain would mysteriously stop working. They never put a snake in the locker room though.