¡Pum! ¡Pum!

Here is something unexpected: Since the Ariza/Fernández Conflict, I snore! Inexplicable.

Here is a more understandable change for me. The Trail Blazers employ trainers whose work it is to maximize physical fitness. While my cardiovascularity is to the good, there have been confusions over the weight-lifiting.

Early this season, a trainer saw me kicking a soccer ball with Sergio and asked us, “Why don’t you two hit the free weights?”

“We are Spanish,” Sergio replied.

“Okay, but why don't you lift some weights?”

“Spain is in Europe,” was my rejoinder. “¡Gol!”

Yet perhaps I will rethink this ingrained notion. Could an increase in my muscle massing have prevented a collapse after the Ariza/Fernández Conflict? It is a meal for my thoughts.

Oh, and a note to those inquiring how my family took my injury: The Lakers match was televised in Spain. Because of the time differences, my mother, Maite, had fallen asleep. She opened his eyes just as Brandon Roy delivered me the ball and I began to run toward the rim. So both she and my girlfriend, Cristina, saw me taken out on a stretcher. The two of them wanted to take the first plane to Portland.

Later, Sergio reassured them by phone of my luck, but their shock and relief was great. At the hospital I watched and rewatched the event. ¡Pum! Ariza's blow! ¡Pum! I land! I marveled at how despite my altitude, nothing was destroyed. (I broke my shoulder some time ago in a game of the ULEB Cup. This constituted a re-injury of it.) At the scene of my landing, the doctors asked me if I felt my arms and legs. I said yes, and told them I did not need the neck collar, but they had to put it as a precaution.

Perhaps these same physicians have thoughts on how to deal with my newfound snores!

(Top photo by Ben Golliver, action photo by the Oregonian.)