A contingent from the Portland Trail Blazers will visit Roseburg on July 9 to host a free kids’ basketball clinic and visit with fans and broadcast affiliates as part of the Trail Blazers “Make It Better” Statewide Summer Tour.
From 10 a.m. to noon at the Roseburg Boys & Girls Clubs of the Umpqua Valley, the Trail Blazers will host a free Nike basketball clinic for kids ages 7-13. To sign up, call the Boys & Girls Clubs at (541) 440-9505 or visit trailblazers.com.
The group — including Chief Operating Officer Mike Golub, radio analyst Antonio Harvey and Blaze the Trail Cat — will also visit the Brooke Communications studio, the Trail Blazers radio affiliate in Roseburg.
The Trail Blazers “Make It Better”
Statewide Summer Tour, presented by Kia Motors, will visit 19 communities throughout Oregon and Washington, covering more than 2,000 miles in a 2008 Kia Sedona to host free kids’ basketball clinics and visit with fans, broadcast affiliates and corporate partners.
The tour, also supported by Providence Health & Services and Nike, was conceived to connect with fans throughout the state by paying homage to a Trail Blazers tradition started by Bill Schonely, the legendary voice of the Blazers for 26 years ending in 1998.
“In 1970, one of my first assignments from Harry Glickman was ‘Put a radio network together!’
so I went and I begged people to come aboard,” remembered Schonely. “Every summer after — often by myself — I would visit each affiliate, spend the day with their sales people, call on clients, even play a little golf if we were lucky.”
