Breaking News! Oden Out!

Just heard on The Fan that Yahoo Sports is reporting that Trail Blazers center Greg Oden is out for the season. The story is here.

Of course, the surgery was just this morning, so this seems like an awfully quick announcement to me. In the current environment of press folk trying to scoop eachother, I'd rather wait to hear something official before I buy this one. Once there's some confirmation, I'll discuss it more.

UPDATE: Okay, it's official. Oden's arthroscopic surgery turned into microfracture surgery to repair some cartilage damage to his knee.

What does this mean? Well, first of all, the rest of his knee looks good, which is a good thing, I guess.

Second, Oden doesn't seem to be a Darius. I'd suspect that his work ethic exceeds that of Mr. Miles, so I don't think we'll see a guy packing on 30 pounds and (allegedly) pounding multiple beers in short periods of time out of sheer boredom.

Third, this was a rebuilding season, anyway. Fans who expected the playoffs (me included) were probably setting our sights a bit too high.

What's next? Well, we have Przybilla, McRoberts and LaFrentz who can all put time in at center. This will clear up some of the jam at PF, and Aldridge and Frye will be able to share more minutes there. I don't think we're screwed or anything, but this is a disappointment.

Your thoughts?