Sports Column

Films make it a festival for Blazer fans

By kerry eggers

The Portland Tribune, Nov 11, 2008, Updated Oct 30, 2009

Dave Twardzik (left) and Bill Walton celebrate a Blazer victory.

JANELLE SISSON / GETTY IMAGES

There is plenty of good stuff in the film “Mania,” a reflective on the Trail Blazers that premiers at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday at Whitsell Auditorium in the Portland Art Museum as part of the 35th Northwest Film and Video Festival.

Director Dan Schaefer, a Portland native, put together a couple of years of interviews and research as a video narrative of the franchise’s 38-year history and its love (and occasional hate) affair with the city.

It’s an enjoyable piece of work that, in tandem with a film that runs after it at 9 p.m., “Fast Break,” will work well for Blazermaniacs.

“Mania” could have used some tweaking here and there. All that was needed to tidy things up was a project consultant such as ... well, myself.

Schaefer, 43, is a Molalla High grad and life-long Blazer fan who has been involved in movie-making for 22 years.

“I meant this to be a positive documentary about the Blazers,” says Schaefer, who began interviewing for the film in 2006 and didn’t complete the project until last month. “It’s coming from a fan’s point of view.”

Schaefer starts at Day One, when promoter Harry Glickman pushed the envelope with the NBA and landed an expansion franchise in 1970. There are excerpts of interviews with Glickman and the late Stu Inman, the team’s first scout and director of player personnel; with Jack Ramsay, coach of the 1977 championship team, legendary radio voice Bill Schonely and Rick Adelman, a guard on the original Blazer team and later coach of the teams that reached the NBA finals in 1990 and ‘92.

Glickman reveals that the Blazers paid Cleveland $250,000 to take Austin Carr with the first pick in the 1971 draft, leaving Sidney Wicks to Portland — a story I had not heard.

Dozens of ex-players are interviewed, including Maurice Lucas, Lloyd Neal, Dave Twardzik, Lionel Hollins, Larry Steele, Bobby Gross, Clyde Drexler, Jerome Kersey and the late Kevin Duckworth. There is a nice tribute to Inman and Duckworth in the credits at film’s end.

I most enjoyed, though, the insight provided by long-time trainer Ron Culp, who delivers inside stories that true fans will appreciate, such as the psychology of Hall of Fame coaches Lenny Wilkens and Ramsay. Culp was honest when he said of Bill Walton, “He didn’t alienate the city of Portland, but he certainly had people scratching their heads.”

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