Just to restate: Lillard, by contrast, once again has the Blazers -- always everyone's favorite preseason pick to fall out of the playoffs -- in the top half of the Western Conference. Lillard scores more than Irving. From an off-the-dribble-threat and range standpoint, he affects the game more with his 3-point shot. He's nearly as good a finisher. Again, Irving is great, but he's not nearly as much better than Lillard as the conversation around those two would suggest. Not even close. I'd call them pretty damn even.
While we're at it, let's take a look at
Anthony Davis, who has reportedly
requested a trade from the Pelicans (side note: If you're the Blazers, you could throw a pretty sweet offer at the Pels built around
CJ McCollum and maybe a
Zach Collins to take a two-year run with Lillard and Davis, but that's another story for another day). For now, Davis is still on the Pelicans, where he has
Jrue Holiday (better than McCollum) and
Julius Randle, who's having a great season and is arguably better than Portland's third-best player,
Jusuf Nurkic.
There is no way you can objectively look at the Blazers and Pelicans' respective rosters and not conclude they're pretty even, if New Orleans isn't actually a bit more talented on paper. Yet New Orleans isn't sniffing the playoffs and has spent much of the season as the worst team in the West outside of the
Suns, who barely count as an
NBA team.
Let me tell you something: You will never see a prime-Damian Lillard-led team at the bottom of any conference. Ever. You certainly would never see Lillard registering basically a .500 record with a healthy and dominant DeMarcus Cousins next to him, which is all Davis was able to do during their tenure together. Yet Davis is basically talked about like a superhero -- which he is, but again, that's not the point. The point is that Lillard is a superhero, too. This should not be an argument.
The funny thing is, earlier this season I was
doing a piece on Kemba Walker and probably asked 10 or 15 players to name some of their most underrated stars in the league, and EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM named Lillard. And then they go out and vote Derrick Rose ahead of him? Frankly, it's kind of ridiculous that they voted
Russell Westbrook ahead of Lillard, too, but I suppose I can at least listen to that logo. But Derrick Rose? Come on, fellas. If you're going to constantly tell these nerdy reporters that you're the ones who "know better" then actually be better than that.
