I just got off the phone with Rick Adelman. I could have asked him any number of awkward questions about his orchestration of the Blazers' glory days or "what a duck is worth" but I was too timid to even wish him luck after what went down in Sacramento a few weeks ago. He sounded tired.

So my list of over-the-phone important people encounters now grows to three, overlooking a recent internship in a field that needs not be mentioned here. The other two on the list? Chris Dudley and former PPD chief Mark Kroeker.

Is that photo in poor taste? Well, I could have gone with this one.