The Portland Trailblazers made a heart-warming gesture to a person in need this month when they provided a $8.9 million grant to the Greg Oden Relief Fund to benefit the frail seven-footer who is the charity’s namesake.
“We had a lot of extra money lying around so we asked different charity cases to submit letters stating why they could use a little extra cabbage around the holidays,” said acting Trailblazers GM Chad Buchanan. “This guy Greg Oden completely won over our hearts. We gave him the whole $8.9 million from the gift fund.”
Once a top physical specimen, Oden has fallen upon on hard times with bad knees, bad feet and extreme halitosis. Anytime he moves, something in his frail body chips or breaks. For the last several months he has been afraid to get up out of a chair in his living room.
When he does leave the house he can hardly drive his scooter around Portland without bullies calling him Benjamin Button.
The Blazers had already contributed more than $21 million over four years to the Oden Fund, but Buchanan asked his staff to research the situation and see if there was more the organization could do. Buchanan was shocked to learn that Oden had actually played in a handful of games for the Trailblazers several years ago.
“I had no idea! We just thought he was some needy young man with a broken-down body who liked to hang out with real-life basketball players,” said Buchanan. “Maybe we’ll let him sit with the team again this season. He would probably really enjoy that.”
When asked to comment Oden remained mum but hand-wrote a response a notepad, fearing his jaw would shatter if he attempted to speak.
“I’m so thankful to the Portland Trailblazers organization for taking care of someone as frail as me,” said Oden. “Their kindness and compassion to a person in need will never be forgotten.”
