No, Dame is a HOFer. Get your mind right.
LILLARD ON TALLYING 8K POINTS, 2K ASSISTS: 'THEY CAN SAY WHAT THEY WANT BUT ONLY A FEW PEOPLE HAVE ACCOMPLISHED SOMETHING LIKE THIS'
It seems like a few times a season, Trail Blazers point guard Damian Lillard puts up a stat line or reaches a milestone that puts him in the company of some of the NBA’s all-time great players. Whether it’s joining Artis Gilmore as one of the few players to start the first 250 games of his career, being the first player since Allen Iverson to score at least 50 points, hand out at least five assists and tally at least five steals in a game or being the first player since Michael Jordan to put up at least 39 points, nine rebounds and six assists in a season opener, Lillard has made a habit of turning in historic performances during his four and a half NBA seasons.
But of all of his individual statistical accomplishments, becoming just the 10th player in NBA history to score at least 8,000 points and hand out at least 2,000 assists in his first five seasons might be his most impressive milestone, or at least that’s the way he sees it.
“I think this is probably the most significant,” said Lillard of the milestone, which he passed with his 12th point in Sunday’s 113-111 loss to the Warriors at the Moda Center. “I think it just speaks to what I’ve been able to do over the early part of my career, though I would have liked to do it in a win. I’m thankful to the Trail Blazers’ organization and Coach Stotts for giving me the opportunity and the freedom to go out there and accomplish something like this. Just looking at it being a list of Hall of Famers and LeBron (James) being the only active player to accomplish something like that, obviously it’s great company.”
That company includes eight Hall of Famers, including Jordan, Larry Bird, Oscar Robertson, Isiah Thomas and Pete Maravich, and one eventually Hall of Famer in James, making the accomplishment the most difficult of his career thus far to attain. Unlike some impressive statistical performances of note, surpassing 8,000 points and 2,000 assists in under five seasons wasn’t the product of one great game or a function of being a good player on a bad team, but of a long-term commitment to playing hard and continually seeking improvement.
“The other nine guys who have done what (Lillard) has done in his career so far, eight of them are Hall of Fame guys,” said Terry Stotts. “He’s had a great career so far and I don’t think any of us should take for granted what he’s done for the previous four years and what he’s doing for us now.”
While Lillard’s talent as a basketball player is the first and foremost reasons that he was able to join such elite company, two other factors are almost requirements to log 8,000 points and 2,000 assists in a players’ first five seasons.
The first is NBA readiness. One needs to average 19.5 points and 4.8 assists per game over the course of five 82-game seasons in order to score 8,000 points and hand out 2,000 assists in five years, so if a player isn’t ready to average something near those numbers during their rookie season it’s unlikely he will have a chance to make up the difference in subsequent seasons. So if Lillard had not been ready to play a large role his in his first year out of Weber State, he wouldn’t have been able to average the 19.0 points and 6.5 assists during his rookie season that gave him the opportunity to get to 8,000 and 2,000 well before the end of his fifth year.
“I came into the league 21 years old,” said Lillard. “It worked out for me so I think just being able to mature and become a man, have to lead a team and be away from home and kind of grow up and develop like that, I think it prepared me for that next step of playing against grown men and having expectations, playing against the best players every night. That definitely plays a part, just being ready.”
Outside of raw talent and NBA readiness, durability is all but a requirement to log the kind of numbers in five seasons that Lillard, Jordan, James, Bird, Robertson and the others have. While it is possible to miss a significant number of games and still hit 8k points and 2k assists in five years — Jordan managed to do so despite playing in just 18 games his sophomore season — the overwhelming majority of players who have passed that specific milestone did so thanks in part to their ability and willingness to play nearly all 82 game every season. In Lillard’s case, he’s played in 365 of a possible 377 regular season games through his first four-plus seasons, which is a testament to his genes, rigorous training regiment and Portland’s health and performance staff.
“How you prepare yourself and how you train yourself and how well you take care of yourself, I think I’ve always done a great job of that,” said Lillard. “That’s something else that could be considered a skill, how well you take care of yourself, because there’s a lot of things that you have to make a priority — getting your rest and being hydrated and getting treatment and not doing a lot of activities off the court that allow you to be at your best, more consistent than other people. That’s something that I’ve been committed to and that definitely plays a part in me being able to do (reach 8,000 points and 2,000 assists).”
While individual accomplishments are nice, Lillard is always quick to point out that it’s only due to the relative success of the team that he’s been able to enter the rarefied air inhabited by the likes of Jordan, James and Bird. But while the Trail Blazers nor Lillard haven’t performed to the level they would have liked to so far this season, being one of the few players to put up 8,000 points and 2,000 assists in his first five seasons does give the him and the team something positive to reflect upon.
“It gives me a lot of feelings, a lot to be proud of, just thinking about where I started and the growth, the strides I’ve made in my career,” said Lillard. “It also gives me something to take solace in when I see the way some people speak on my name, when they try to discredit what I do or who I am as a player. That’s something that I take solace in. They can say what they want but only a few people have accomplished something like this. I feel good about that, it’s something I’m proud of.”
