The Portland Trail Blazers are 3-5 to start the season, and whispers are already starting to swirl about what the problem with this team might be and if Damian Lillard, who turned 31 in July, has enough patience to see it through.
The funny thing is, Lillard himself has said multiple times he’s committed to the Blazers, no matter what.
But after a tough summer, Lillard found himself re-thinking everything. Despite once scoffing at the notion of joining superteams in the past, it seems even he was thinking about life on the other side.
During an offseason meeting with LeBron James, he was questioning his future.
In the end, it was Giannis Antetokoumpo’s title run that helped remind him of his true desires.
“But when I watched Giannis, he was really looking around like, ‘Damn, what if I really left Milwaukee? This was worth it.’ So for me, I put myself in his shoes,” Damian Lillard told Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports. “Sometimes it seems like this is impossible and it’s never going to happen, and I’m sure he was there before, too.
If I was to get that championship for Portland, I would cry, bruh. Bruh, on the spot. I would really cry, bro. I want to win a championship here. And because of how strongly I feel about that, I don’t know how rewarding it would feel for me at this point if I won somewhere else. Winning it here would be a lifetime achievement for me.”
After everything Lillard has said and done for the Blazers, it just wouldn’t be as rewarding for him to win with another team.
Seeing the Bucks lift that trophy last summer gave him the hope he needed to lee[ pushing.
This season is already proving to be a challenge, but Dame and the Blazers are more than capable of overcoming them together.
