Damian Lillard Drops 71
In the shadow of the NBA's GOAT talk, Dame DOLLA turns out a masterpiece for the ages.
In sports today, unless you are stacking multiple championships, it’s hard to have a discussion about legacy. Skill, competitive fire and insane accomplishments are thrown under the bus unless you are in the extremely biased GOAT debate. But as our focus has narrowed to value only a handful of names, what happens to all that greatness that we are ignoring?
Damian Lillard is a prime example.
Through his outspoken loyalty to Portland, he has been dragged through the mud. Go run to Bron. Recruit Embid to Portland. The word in the feeds is that his talent is wasted unless, until, he hoists the Larry O’Brien trophy. It’s the podcast, hot-take death spiral that has robbed a generation of truly appreciating world-class talent.
Charles Barkley, one of the greatest, most dominant legends to ever bounce a basketball, has his name instantly crossed out for not having won a title. He’s self-deprecating and cool about it, even as Shaq carries on his decades long, single note, cheap joke trump card to negate Barkley’s elite status in the game.
The arguments on the other side: Basketball is a team sport. Outside factors. Not being surrounded by supporting players. They all fall on tone-deaf ears as the loud media voices bleat out their GOAT proclemations.
I’m on a mission to tune it all out.
I want to turn to sports and be radically inspired. I love sports for the competitive urgency and wild imagination. My personal head canon Hall of Fame looks different from the multi-title only GOAT conversation and Hoops Mt. Rushmore. I respect a wide range of basketball insanity. I’d rather the game be polytheistic than blindly follow a single deity.
So for me, I find greatness and inspiration scattered far and wide. There is genius to be found in entire careers, but also in single, focused stretches from certain players.
Like Brandon Roy, who was robbed of the career that might have been by injury, but who showed a fearlessness and ease on the court that earned him multiple All Star appearances and Kobe Bryant paying him the ultimate respect.
Or Jeremy Lin, who cracked open the basketball heavens from MSG, with a short but potent run of “Chosen One” level heroics. It didn’t last, but what happened during that stretch was indelible and enduring in basketball culture.
Or Reggie Miller, who goes down in clutch and trash talk heaven for his late game theatrics. He gave MJ all he could handle and pushed him to the brink, while ultimately never winning a title. But if I needed to pick five ringers to win a fantasy pick up game to save the world from a Space Jam style alien invasion, I’m taking a hard look at Miller-Time.
Or Penny Hardaway, another legend on the rise when injury struck. But if you look at the mixtape and body of work in those first four cosmic seasons, who is to say, frozen in time, that Penny is not a GOAT? Hell, he jostled the basketball world so much that MJ hastily rushed back from “retirement” to try to stop the kid.
Or D-Wade when he willed the Heat to their first title. That was some create-a-player black magic going on. It was an astonishing triumph that still shakes me over a decade later. Same with what Dirk did powering the Mavs to that title. In isolation, these runs are HOF, museum worthy bouts of greatness.
Even within the established GOATs, there are certain seasons or versions that stand alone. Like non-championship contending Kobe. Years that “felt wasted” by usual banter, but that ending up yielding incredible runs of personal greatness and strings of 40+ outbursts.
When a player is in the mythic zone, it’s best you take notice and acknowledge the greatness. This is the magic of sports. And who wants to only feel inspired or a rush of excitement every 20 years. If you look, the insanity is all around us. Lightning in a bottle can happen at any time.
Like Dame’s 71 point masterpiece the other night. The Blazers are far from contention, the narrative of “another wasted season” is getting retweeted all over the place. Yet, a rare and magical thing happened when Dame caught fire and didn’t let up for 39 minutes. Yeah, he left chips on the table by not playing more time. It was the most points ever for sub 40 played. This is crown jewel type stuff. This is living legend territory. And I’m not about to throw shade at it because it happened in a wasteland of a season. Just as I was all in on Kobe’s scoring binges in the mid 2000’s when the Lakers weren’t going anywhere.
Also, if you do want to talk about longevity, Dame has been doing this since 2012. He’s effectively non-title contending Kobe. Show me another player with the same mix of killer instinct and willingness to be the face of a franchise. A lot of those other top guys duck the spotlight and make excuses when the questions come. Dame is a rock. Dame is a killer. His 71-point night was just another diamond on his resume. The dude has been doing this. His game is already in my personal rafters of greatness.
Andrew “Oyl” Miller is an advertising Creative Director and Copywriter. He spent 15 years working at Wieden+Kennedy on brands like Nike, PlayStation and IKEA. You can check out his work on his website.