Portland Trail Blazers Fans Campaign to Keep Brandon Roy: A Fan’s Reaction

As the Portland Trail Blazers get closer to using the NBA's new amnesty clause on Brandon Roy(notes), fans of the team are trying to make their voices are heard. Roy has always been a player that received a lot of support from the Portland fan base, and it has never been clearer than it is now. Fans that have become disgruntled with the news that Paul Allen plans to waive Roy have taken to posting messages on his Twitter account about their disdain for the decision.

I wrote on Monday (Nov. 28) about how close the franchise is to waiving Roy, and how many reports state that it is a done deal. Using the hash tag #KeepRoy has become the popular thing for fans to do on Allen's Twitter account, and many fans are not holding back when sharing their opinions. The following quotes come verbatim from their posts, including any punctuation or syntax errors that may exist.

Taylor Vannice (TheTower51) posted, "the fans are the blazers the players are the blazers Brandon Roy is the blazers together we are Rip City NOT YOU."

Another fan, Mikey Tengco (f0urever), stated that, "i've been a blazer fan since I can remember. this may drive me away if BROY is gone this season."

Those are just a couple of the cleaner comments about Roy and how fans are willing to say anything to keep him in a Blazers uniform. Roy was born just up the road in Seattle, Wash., he played high school basketball at Garfield and then attended the University of Washington. He already had a large following in the area, and by going to the Blazers through a trade at the 2006 NBA Draft, he only increased his fan base in the area. When he became a star that just made him a more prevalent name, and it is clear that many fans still want him around.

The problem for Roy is that he has never been able to stay healthy, and has only played more than 70 games in two of his five NBA seasons. He missed 35 games in 2011 due to knee surgeries, and it is his knees that Allen and the front office at Portland have become concerned about. His production dipped a lot in 2010-11, and he simply couldn't play the numbers of minutes that he used to. At the same time, there were moments of stardom still, including in the playoffs against the Dallas Mavericks, where fans saw the old Roy emerging once again.

Roy has a lot of basketball still in front of him, but whether he is worth the max contract that he got from the Blazers is another question. The Blazers got a chance to remove his contract from the books and while there are a lot of fans that will say anything to keep him in Portland, there are also a lot of fans that see the benefit of clearing his contract from the salary cap. The front office is in a difficult position either way, and hopefully they are making the right call if Roy is indeed waived.

More at sports.yahoo.com

More Basketball Articles

OJ Mayo, Kevin Durant, Jerryd Bayless, Kobe Bryant