"We tried to attack him," Batum said. "We know that he doesn’t want to play defense." Matthews and Batum were largely responsible for guarding Anthony during his 35 minutes of action. Anthony ended up fouling out on an offensive foul, bowling over Batum. "Every time he goes left, I know he’s going to spin. Almost every time," said Batum, who added, "I was surprised they called it." Nic's great for a quote even if you can't hear the charming accent in print. :)

http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/recap?gid=2010111822

Bill Simmons writes... ------------------------------------ Before the season, the Rip City Soccer Moms bullied me into picking them for 52 wins. I sipped their Kool-Aid, mainly because they were holding my head back and pouring it down my throat, but still. I even spent $1 on Wesley Matthews in my fantasy auction as an olive branch for infuriating Blazers fans by making fun of his absolutely absurd $34 million contract. And you know what? That's what killed their season! They needed my barbs! They needed my unwavering disbelief in their team! They needed me to write things like, "The Celtics passed on Brandon Roy in 2006 because they didn't think his knees would hold up -- maybe they were right," and "If the Blazers had extended Nate McMillan's contract last summer, he would have managed Roy's minutes more carefully instead of running him into the ground," and "I'm fine with calling Nicolas Batum a defensive specialist as long as you add that he also specializes in getting torched by Kevin Durant," and "Aaron Spelling didn't overrate his daughter's acting more than Blazers fans overrated Rudy Fernandez," and "Let's face it: the comparisons of Oden to Sam Bowie are actually an insult to Bowie at this point." Rip City, you'll be lucky to break .500. And you know it. (My work is done here, Blazers fans. Enjoy your 14-game winning streak and your Ewing Theory run without Roy.) ------------------------------------ -- Ben Golliver | benjamin.golliver@gmail.com |Twitter

"Even though everybody changes now, we were all for Oden, and I think 98 percent of the league,’’ Rivers said. "But now I hear it all over our staff, I hear it everywhere, ‘Oh, no, we were Durant guys.’ I don’t believe that. I think we would have drafted Oden.’’

Doc Rivers talking to the Boston GlobeBoston had the second-worst record but dropped to 5 in the 2007 draft lottery, and later was rumored to have offered Pierce to move up to 1 or 2. They ended up trading the draft rights to #5 Jeff Green to Seattle for Ray Allen, as a precursor to the Kevin Garnett trade. Kudos to Rivers for not trying to re-write draft history now.