In Kenneth Faried’s first game, he had four rebounds and zero points. In his second, he takes an incredible no-look alley-oop from reserve guard Rudy Fernandez and skies above a defeated Jimmer Fredette to put a f**king exclamation point on the Nuggets 110-83 rout of the Sacramento Kings.

It ranks somewhere between “the first sip of oasis water when you’ve been crawling through the desert” and “losing your virginity to Kate Upton” on the scale of how great the first of something can be. This is the kind of stuff I pretended to be doing when I was 13 and dunking on a seven-foot rim.

Tom Ziller of SB Nation offers further analysis:

I can’t wait until Faried and Nene start appearing together. We won’t know which braided superathlete it is flying through the air!

Most NBA players like to head out after a tough road game to sample whatever local strange might be available. The Portland Trail Blazers Rudy Fernandez, playing with his team in Dallas last night, didn’t have to wait that long.

During a timeout with 41 seconds left in regulation, two women walked onto the court and into the Trail Blazers huddle. One woman wrapped her arms around the waist of Blazers guard Rudy Fernandez from behind. Fernandez, who was not in the game but focused on the plays being diagrammed by coach Nate McMillan, was stunned.

The women were ushered away from the huddle, and amazingly allowed to return to their courtside seats under the basket and watch the remainder of the game, which went to overtime. –The Oregonian, via Inside Hoops.

How could security pass up a chance to tackle a couple of intoxicated women? The safety of the players on the court is paramount. Those women should have been ushered to a private area and searched thoroughly for weapons. Uh, for security purposes. We can’t be too careful, especially when we’re this horny and drunk with power.

Portland’s Rudy Fernandez was carried off the floor in the third quarter of Portland’s win against the Lakers last night after taking an interesting foul from Trevor Ariza. After catching an elbow from behind, the Spaniard flailed and crashed to the floor. Fernandez’s salesmanship started a tussle between both teams, and Ariza was teed up and ejected. And just to ensure his cooter didn’t catch any more sand in it, Fernandez was hauled off on a stretcher wearing a neck brace. Wait, I thought the World Cup was next year.

Fernandez was conscious and alert when he left the court, and he had full movement of his extremities, the team said. But he was experiencing chest pain and was taken to a hospital overnight. X-rays were negative.

Trevor Ariza, who fouled Fernandez, said he hoped the rookie from Spain wasn’t seriously hurt.

“It wasn’t anything I was trying to do,” Ariza said. “I wasn’t trying to hurt him. I was just trying to make a play on the ball.” [Y! Deportes]

It was a tough foul, but hardly a neck-brace-worthy foul. Sparty and Friends dug up some video; Ariza makes contact with the head and possibly grabs the left arm on the way down. See for yourself after the jump. After the game, Fernandez underwent a CT scan, and the verdict was a soft-tissue injury to the upper chest and side. That differs slightly from Dr. Punte’s diagnosis: acute blubbering vaginosis. Sissy. Read the rest of this entry »