I happened to be watching some of the Blazers/Heat game Friday night on ESPN that Portland won, handing Miami it’s 12th straight loss. At one point, they cut to Ric Bucher who was working the sidelines for a report. Bucher proceeded to tell us about one of the best promotion efforts by a team that I’ve ever seen. According to Bucher, the Blazers are sending out an iPod with Brandon Roy’s face on it — the iRoy — to promote his case for the All-Star game. They have sent the iRoy out to all the NBA coaches, and I believe Bucher added that they’ll be sending it out to other people voting for the game as well.
While Roy certainly has competition in the Western Conference to make the All-Star team, he certainly deserves it. He might not command the same attention in terms of name value as Kobe, Iverson, Nash, and T-Mac, but he certainly has proved to be every bit as valuable as any of them. The Blazers are leading their division — one that has Denver and Utah in it — and that’s without Greg Oden. What they’ve done this year has been nothing short of astonishing, and Roy has been a huge catalyst for them. His numbers don’t speak as loudly as his competitors, but his team is leading most of them in the category that counts — wins — and he’s a big reason why. I’d vote for Roy and I don’t even need an iRoy to be convinced. (though it wouldn’t hurt).
