Recovering from serious knee surgery and with his Portland Trailblazers out of the race for the playoffs, Greg Oden did the sensible thing, and played pickup basketball earlier this week at a Portland gym.

How do we know this? From a post on BaseketballForum.com. Lest you think it’s isn’t true, the Blazers apparently were alerted to the internet rumor, and it turned out to be correct.

Now Greg Oden is, as you might expect, in some hot water with the team.

The PORTLAND OREGONIAN reports that the Blazers were alerted to the web forum post Wednesday, checked it out, and found it to be true. Coach Nate McMillan has since admonished Oden, who has only been cleared by team doctors for light drills at Blazers’ practices.

Interesting to note, ESPN.com has a report on the situation, from “ESPN.com news services.” The ESPN report neither mentions the message board or the Oregonian’s original report. Of course.