Greg Oden 'Topps' with kids — and 'getting there' as he trains for rookie season

Someday, he wants to ski and ski dive, but first comes leading Blazers to playoffs

By kerry eggers

The Portland Tribune, Sep 21, 2008, Updated Oct 30, 2009 (1 Reader comment)

Greg Oden mans the Ohio State sidelines with the Buckeyes' Chris Wells at Saturday's USC game in Los Angeles.

HARRY HOW / GETTY IMAGES

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Ready or not, here comes Greg Oden.

The start of training camp for the Trail Blazers is less than two weeks away, and the 7-foot rookie is taking sort of a veteran’s approach to what will be his first camp.

“I’m ready,” says Oden, who missed the entire 2007-08 season after undergoing microfracture knee surgery last September. “But the good thing about last year, it got me to calm down. I’m not crazy.

“I’m excited, but I’m not like, ‘It’s coming up! It’s coming up!’ I’m like (and here he softens his voice), ‘It’s coming. Let’s get it on.’ "

Oden, who won’t turn 21 until January, looked in shape Sunday as he moved from station to station on the final day of the two-day “Topps Basketball Camp, featuring Greg Oden,” at the Beaverton Hoop.

Five weeks of workouts with trainer Jay Jensen and strength and conditioning coach Bobby Medina have dropped Oden’s weight from about 300 to 285. Oden looked fit and quick as he moved about the six courts at The Hoop, playfully blocking shots in post-up drills, dunking and kibitzing with the 150 campers aged seven to 14.

“I’m getting there,” Oden says. “I’m not going to say I’m in the best shape of my life, but it’s getting a lot better. I can tell the difference the past two weeks.”

There is no pain in the knee, Oden says. The past five weeks, he has paced himself, working gradually into five-on-five pickup games at the Blazers’ training facility but taking part only every other day. This week, Oden will play all four days, “but only three or four games a day,” he says.

Once camp starts and the Blazers move into the preseason, will Oden have restrictions on what he can do?

“I don’t know yet,” he says. “There might be some, to make sure I get through camp without getting hurt. They might not be that strenuous on me.”

Oden and Dwyane Wade are the national basketball spokesmen for Topps, the trading card company that conducts clinics in football, basketball and baseball. It’s the second camp Oden has participated in this summer.

“I did the Buckeye Superstar Camp (in Columbus, Ohio) with Mike Conley (Jr.),” says Oden, who helped Ohio State to the national championship game in his only season there. “It’s fun to get out here with the kids. You walk in, you see them, they all try to look mean. Then you interact and do the same drills they’re doing — and they’re smiling.

“I think back to when I did those drills at that age. That was a long time ago.”

Oden seems to understand how important it is to give a few seconds of attention to each youngster. He offers hugs, handshakes and autographs to all of the campers.

“He’s great with the kids,” says Gary Gatewood, the ex-Oregon guard who served as one of the coaches at the camp. “He steps right in, talks to them and plays with them. A lot of guys are shy around kids. They don’t interact that well. But he’s just a natural.”

Oden is entertaining in a question-and-answer session with the kids. A very large 11-year-old, who says he is 6-feet tall, stands up and asks how tall Oden was at that age. “I was 6-6,” Oden says, and the youngsters murmur in awe. Asked how tall he is now, Oden reveals, “6-11 1/2.”

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