There seems to be little doubt about the future of the Portland Trailblazers.  Many NBA observers were excited about their nucleus before they won the Greg Oden lottery in 2007.  Since winning that lottery they've added Jerryd Bayless in this past NBA draft and Rudy Fernandez decided to come over from Europe.  Marc Stein has already ranked the Blazers as the 13th best team in the NBA, right behind the Suns, who won 55 game last year, and ahead of the Magic, winners of 52 games last year.  The scary thing is that this team is still incredibly young.  Brandon Roy is considered the "veteran" leader and he is only entering his third year in the league.  Basically, this team has the looks of the dynasty.  

If David Stern is smart, he might rig a few games for these guys along the way to ensure it (and move them to Los Angeles.)  This team has great potential to reach out beyond the typical NBA fan.  Television ratings for the NBA, especially the NBA Finals, have fallen off since His Airness retired for a second time in 1998.  In Jordan's final year the Finals drew a 18.7 Nielson rating.  The very next year that rating fell to a 11.3.  It hasn't gotten much better since then as last year's "dream" match up of the Celtics and Lakers only drew a 9.3, less than half of MJ's final Finals.  A well marketed Blazers dynasty, despite their market, has a chance to change this for four reasons : their team concept, Rudy Fernandez, Brandon Roy, and Greg Oden.

Team Concept
It turns out a lot of people complain about the lack of team basketball in the NBA.  The basketball "purists" claim that the Pistons and Spurs are the way basketball should be.  Regardless of whether those purists are right or not, its not what the casual fan wants to see.  They want to see college basketball, but with better athletes.  With the Blazers, they can get that.  The Blazers leading scoring last year was Brandon Roy, and he put up a rather mundane 19 points a game.  Portland had seven different guys that averaged at least 8 points a game last year. To contrast, the Celtics only had 4 guys do that.  The basketball becomes the town bike - everyone gets a ride - in Portland.  There figures to be an even greater distribution of points this year with Greg Oden and Rudy Fernandez added to the mix.

Rudy Fernandez
Most of the basketball diehards already know Mr. Fernandez from his ownage of Dwight Howard in the Gold Medal game this past August.  That dunk however was only a small highlight of an incredibly efficient 22 points in only 18 minutes of play against the world's finest basketball players.  For those of you who don't know Rudy Fernandez he is an extremely athletic shooting guard from Spain.  He has already competed in the 2004 and 2008 Olympics as well as the 2006 FIBA World Championships.  Every exciting dynasty needs an athletic wingman and Fernandez will easily fill this role.  The two most popular recent dynasties had Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan to fill up the highlight reels.  Fernandez won't come close to being as good as those two, but he will fill up the highlight reels.
    
Brandon Roy 
Entering his third year in the NBA, Roy has already established himself as a star in the NBA.  He won the 2006 Rookie of the Year award and was elected an All-Star last year. Roy is the All-American good ol' boy that Americans want to see. He went to college for all 4 years.  He went back to school to finish up his degree.  He has even started his own charity to help those with learning disabilities.   He is the guy that casual fans want to cheer for.  A healthy dose of Roy in the media, will intrigue those fans that NBA has lost since Jordan left.
  
Greg Oden 
Greg Oden has the potential to become the most popular player in the NBA some day.  He has a great sense of humor as evidenced by his ESPN the Magazine commercial, his spot on the ESPYs, and his blog.  He's the next Shaq when it comes to funny NBA players.  Despite not playing a single second in the NBA last year, he managed to stay in the news and talked about on the blogs.  Why? His humor. And he just might be good.  Greg Oden would've been drafted 1st overall had he been eligible after his junior year of high school and has been compared to the great Bill Russell.  That Russell guy won 5 MVPs and has so many championship rings (11) that he can't wear them all at the same time.  America loves a winner, which is Greg Oden in a nutshell.  Dynasties have always been more popular (and more hated) which increases attention amongst fans. If Oden is in any way similar to Russell, he'll have fans talking about the NBA all the time.
  
If David Stern knows what his good for his sport, you'll be hearing a lot about these Blazers in the next few years on their rise to awesomeness.  Stern is already off to a solid start putting the Blazers on national TV 13 times including their first game of the year against the rating giant Los Angeles Lakers.  Get ready for these guys and be ready to hear about their great team basketball, that highlight reel wingman of theirs, the All-American All-Star, and the Bill Russell/Shaq hybrid center.  Most of all, get ready to see these guys take the NBA back to a place it hasn't been in  a while - your TV.