Let's Get It On

Our season starts tonight in Portland, at 9 p.m. Central. For those of you wondering at home, that's 10 p.m. Eastern, 8 p.m. Mountain. And I believe around 2 in the afternoon for our fans in Vanuatu. Tomorrow. In any case, this is going to be one hell of a game. There's the obvious reasons: it's the first game of a new season, this is the most unpredictable Rockets team in recent memory and because it's the 155th anniversary of the day Swedish writer/pacifist Klas Pontus Arnoldson was born. (In a semi-related note, while searching on Wikipedia for that last event I noticed that today is Andrew Bynum's birthday. I also noticed that today is also Yi Jianlin's birthday, except nobody is sure because his birth date is "disputed." So there's that.) In any case, tonight's game is more than just a season opener. It's a season opener against a team we ousted in the playoffs last season, only we've gotten a lot worse and they've gotten better. So it's safe to say they're going to want to come out and destroy us. So my only request for the Rockets tonight is to attack. To play with no mercy, to play like this game decides whether or not we win a championship. I know it's just a single game, but there's a real possibility that we're not going to have many meaningful games come March and April. So that's why we need to take advantage of the ones we do have. And tonight, with everyone already counting out the Rockets, would be a great time to prove them wrong once again. Even if it's just for a day, beating the Blazers on the road without our three leading scorers from last season would be something. So if nothing else, I want the Rockets to fight today. I want us to come out swinging and let the Blazers, and the rest of the NBA, know that nothing is going to come easy against this team. We're going to be scrappy, we're going to be impossible to keep down and we're going to give nothing away. And Portland, just know that it all starts with you. Tonight we're coming for you. You were probably expecting a nice, vindictive blowout to announce to the NBA world that you're ready for the big time, but that's not happening today. Today we're going to look like the team that's supposed to contend for the title, today we're going to be the only ones enjoying a blowout. And, as Ice Cube would say, "You run up with that bullshit I'll [mess] your ass up." It really doesn't relate to this exact situation, but those are some fighting words and I thought they went with the general mood of the post. I should stop. In any case, go Rockets.