The two players who are locks to start for Portland this year are newly acquired point guard Raymond Felton and “should be an All Star” LaMarcus Aldridge. The rest is up in the air like a jump ball. Option 1 is the best case scenario… option 2 isn’t too bad either!

Option 1
G – Raymond Felton 6-1
G – Brandon Roy 6-6
C – Greg Oden 7-0
F – Gerald Wallace 6-7
F – LaMarcus Aldridge 6-11

Option 2
G – Raymond Felton 6-1
G – Wesley Matthews 6-5
C – Marcus Camby 6-11
F – Nicolas Batum 6-8
F – LaMarcus Aldridge 6-11

Let’s pray the Brandon Roy of the playoffs is the B-Roy of reality! If so, he along with LaMarcus would give Portland the 1-2 it’s been planning on for several years now. A healthy Oden would give them one of the few true centers in all of the NBA.

The Zers have great depth at the wings with Roy, Matthew, Wallace and Batum. Hopefully the bigs can stay healthy and Portland can make a legit playoff run in 2012!

It’s been a fascinating year to talk about the Portland Trailblazers’ starting five. When the Blazers brought in Andre Miller as a free agent point guard and garnered lots of attention for being the “deepest team in the NBA,” talking about who would start for the Blazers was a fun topic. We had a great discussion about our “Favorite Blazer Starting 5″ and also have been looking at “Which Blazer Starting 5 Would Win?” making three teams out of the 15 Blazers on the roster right now. Because the Blazers have been ravaged by injury they have used a lot of different starting lineups this season. The fact that they are playing so well and staying in the playoff race has been awesome to watch… and continues to be fun to talk about!

UPDATE (1/16/10) – The Blazers have used even more starting lineups than I could have ever imagined coming into this season. Who would have guessed that Portland would have great success, beating Orlando last night, with this lineup:
G Andre Miller
G Jerryd Bayless
F Juwan Howard
F LaMarcus Aldridge
F Martell Webster

————————————-

I’ve been a Portland Trailblazer fan for as long as I can remember liking sports. I wasn’t alive with the Blazers won the championship in 1976, so I’m not going to include that lineup in my list of favorite starting 5s.

I’ve got a favorite for sure, no doubt in my mind it’s the lineup of:
PG Terry Porter
SG Clyde Drexler
C Kevin Duckworth
SF Jerome Kersey
PF Buck Williams

The lineup I’d like to see right now:
PG Brandon Roy
SG Rudy Fernandez
C Greg Oden
SF Nicolas Batum
PF LaMarcus Aldridge

Another great lineup:
2000
PG Damon Stoudamire
SG Steve Smith
C Arvydas Sabonis
SF Scottie Pippen
PF Rasheed Wallace