When the National Basketball Association (NBA) put its 2019-20 season on pause because of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) Pandemic, the question was would they be able to finish their season and how? The league in conjunction with the National Basketball Players Association did find a way in the early part of June where 22 teams, 16 above the playoff line and six others teams within striking distance of the postseason will be in one place in Orlando, FL next week to resume the season. One of those teams heading to Disneyworld will be last season’s Western Conference runner-up, and no one is more excited for this chance than was one of the first guest on NBATV’s “#NBATogether” who talked about the early part of his career, fatherhood and the hope of being able to lead his team back to the playoffs after a rough start to this season.
The first question that NBA on TNT studio host and host of “Inside the NBA” on TNT Ernie Johnson touched in his virtual interview with five-time All-Star lead guard Damian Lillard of the Trail Blazers on Apr. 11 was what his routine was like in the beginning of this global pandemic that basically shut down not just the United States but the entire world.
The 2013 Kia Rookie of the Year and four-time All-NBA selection said that the day would start with his two-year-old son Damian, Jr. waking up at around 7, 7:30 a.m. Usually around this time, his dad would still be counting sheep to be as fresh as possible for practice that day.
During this time now, the No. 6 pick in the 2012 NBA Draft out of Weber State is up early to make breakfast for his son, change his diaper, put him back in his bed, turn on the television so he can be entertained by cartoons. He would also take his son outside of the house to interact with him. Lillard after that quality time with his son would put him down for a nap and take that time to work out. After that Lillard fixes his son lunch and then watch some more television.
“It’s like a full-time job,” Lillard said of what he has been doing in the early days of the NBA season being on pause.
In the early part of the interview, a noise was heard in the background, which Lillard said it was his son “doing something he ain’t supposed to be doing,” and his fiancée, Kay’La Hanson is trying to get him back on track, which got a laugh out of Johnson, a father to six kids, which brought back memories of moments just like that.
When Johnson asked Lillard if he could think back to three years ago before fatherhood, Lillard said it is hard to remember.
Now after games, once his media responsibilities are concluded Lillard said he rushes to get back home to see his son before he goes to sleep or after shootaround he tries to catch his son before his nap and before Lillard takes his nap.
“So, its like my world is built around him, and its been like that for the last two years,” Lillard said about fatherhood. “So, I can’t really imagine or think about, you know, what it was like before. But it’s a lot different.”
When it comes to his day job, being the lead guard as mentioned for the “Rip City,” Lillard said he has gotten some shots up on his court outside of his home in Portland, OR. But as far as getting a real workout on the hardwood, going at game speed, Lillard said he has not done that since the league shut down.
The NBA in the early stages of the shutdown, players could not go to their respective team’s training facility or as Lillard said no “third party facility.”
“They pretty much got us on lockdown,” Lillard said. “So, other than shooting outside, on my hoop outside I haven’t been getting shots up. I just got like my fitness center at my house. That fortunate for me I built that out. So, I can do conditioning, lift, and steam room, and all that stuff. So, other than that as far as the ball, I haven’t, we don’t have an option.”
That all changed in the early part of last month when NBA allowed their teams to reopen their facilities even though a restart plan for the season was not official. Lillard said though that following the protocols was a challenge. No one was allowed in their respective team’s locker room. Players could not help out their teammates with long rebounds off missed shots. Players had to use specific towels and drink out of a specified water bottle and they could not use the weight room or showers.”
The last game Lillard and the Trail Blazers (29-37) played a game was on Mar. 10, a 121-105 win versus the Phoenix Suns (26-39). When Johnson interviewed Lillard marked a month and a day since the Trail Blazers played a game.
Lillard said that “it feels more like a year” since he and his team played their last game. For him specifically it feels a lot longer because he strained his right groined in the Trail Blazers last game before the All-Star break, a 111-104 loss at the Memphis Grizzlies on Feb. 12, which put him on the shelf for the team’s first six games post All-Star break. The Trail Blazers went 2-4 in his absence and are 2-6 overall without Lillard in the lineup this season.
“I still felt like, you know, time was passing but not a lot because I was still going in and working out, getting treatment, following the team. I was at practice, I just had stuff to do,” Lillard said. “Now its been a month of just nothing. Like, I’m in the house every day. I’m on daddy daycare time every day. It’s two completely different things, but both times it was a month off for me.”
This time not just for Lillard and Johnson but for all of us we have had to develop in the early part of this global pandemic a new rhythm to your day.
In a conversation that Johnson had with his wife of 38 years Cheryl two days prior to his interview with Lillard that their day seemed to have a regular flow because they time was being occupied and they found a rhythm to where they did not feel stagnant.
Lillard said in the early part of this pandemic that he has not had a regular day. He said usually at around 9 a.m. West Coast time he is up heading out for practice. After practice, he is fulfilling all of his media responsibilities. That would be followed by working out in the weight room and then get treatment for his body.
Lillard’s day would conclude at around 2 p.m. by the time he returns home when his son is in the middle of his nap and he would wake up.
“It’s like, the day goes by much faster because you are more active,” Lillard said of his normal routine prior to this pandemic. “I haven’t had one of those days. Me and my fiancée, we work out together. We take our son with us sometimes. So, it’s like we haven’t that break from each other.”
Lillard added the times he and his fiancée have had time a part is when Kay’La would go out to get coffee and he would watch a show on Netflix.
He referred to this time as being a “stay-at-home day, a trust-fund kid.”
When it comes to keeping in contact with his Trail Blazers teammates and the coaching staff, Lillard said that he and head coach Terry Stotts and his coaching staff of John McCullough, Jim Moran, Dale Osbourne, Jannero Pargo and Associate head coach Nate Tibbetts have texted each other very often during this pandemic. Specifically, Lillard said that he texted Coach Stotts between four and five times in the early part of this pandemic.
Lillard said that he and his teammates have a team group chat that is constant. Lillard also said that he has been in constant communication, specifically via FaceTime during this time with his fellow backcourt teammate CJ McCollum, and Hassan Whiteside, Jusuf Nurkic, and Zach Collins.
Collins, who has played just three games this season after having shoulder surgery and Nurkic, who has been out all season recovering from a serious broken leg sustained in March 2019 are expected to return when the league restarts in Orlando.
When those conversations have been targeted about if the NBA season would come back and have a chance to finish where a champion would be crowned Lillard said that some of his teammates are optimistic and others are very concerned like Whiteside because they were entering the offseason as an unrestricted free agent looking for a major pay day.
“Some people worry, some people are optimistic, some people are like ‘I miss the game.’ It’s been a little bit of everything,” Lillard said. “It’s a weird situation, you know, it’s different, and for me I’m even like, ‘Man, are we going to play?’”
“I’m training and doing all of this stuff, and in my mind I’m almost like I’m going to use this as a head start for possibly next season, and just get into good shape, and just be training, and try to be in the best shape in my life for that. I mean, we really don’t know what’s going to happen.”
That training and constant work Lillard has put in during this pandemic will be put to good use as “The Association” last month has made a decision of what is going to happen where as mentioned they will be sending 22 teams to Orlando, FL where each team will play eight games to finish out their regular season, which will decide how playoff seedings will be sorted out in the Eastern Conference and Western Conference starting on July 30.
One of those teams coming to Orland as mentioned is the Trail Blazers, who will have a chance to compete for that No. 8 and final playoff spot in the West, which is currently occupied by the Memphis Grizzlies, who have a 3.5-game lead on the boys from “Rip City” for that spot.
Back on May 24, Lillard told Yahoo Sports that if the league was going to resume and that his team was not going to have a legitimate chance to compete for that final playoff spot in the West that he would go to be with his teammates and coaching staff but not play in games that did not have any meaning.
Right now, the league is in Phase 3 of their six-phase plan to restart the season at the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex in Orlando, FL where players are working out individually in their team’s respective facilities, although the Brooklyn Nets, Miami Heat and Los Angeles Clippers in recent days have had to close their facilities because of positive Coronavirus test amongst their respective players and team officials.
Phase three, which began on July 1 where each of the 22 teams had to send to the NBA office in New York their final roster and those who will entering the bubble setting in Orlando.
Phase 4 will have all the teams fly to Orlando from July 7-21, where they will be quarantined for 14 days, which is the current law in Florida for people traveling in from other states like New York and practice.
Phase 5 will have the teams conduct three scrimmages against teams from the same hotel from July 22-29.
Phase 6 covers time where the teams will play for playoff seeding and then the postseason will follow, with everything beginning as mentioned on July 30.
For the Trail Blazers to have a chance of reaching the playoffs for a seventh straight season under the revamped league format, they would have to be four games or less behind the Grizzlies at the end of this eight-game schedule. That would get them into a play-in tournament where they would have to win both games in a best-of-two scenario to overtake the Grizzlies for that final playoff spot. If that lead is more than four games, the Trail Blazers season would conclude, and so would their streak of consecutive playoff appearances at six.
“I feel like a play-in tournament would be perfect, just because we actually were in striking distance and also had enough games to get in the playoffs,” Lillard said to Jalen Rose and David Jacoby on their May 27 edition of ESPN’s “Jalen & Jacoby.” “But to that point, if they decided that we’re just gonna go straight to the playoffs, obviously, we would all be disappointed.”
When Lillard was asked by Johnson how long it take for him to be ready to play an actual NBA game, he said a week.
That said, Lillard despite being able to stay in close to peak condition because of having the advantage of having the equipment at his home to keep in as much game shape as possible that it will be “tough” for all the players because until recently they have as mentioned not been allowed to work out in their team’s facilities or access to some kind of training.
Lillard said that he feels a lot of players in the NBA are just “adlibbing” in what they are doing to stay in some kind of condition like running outside but that he feels is not “good enough or accurate enough” for the player to be able to perform at their best on the floor and that “it’s going to be tough” to produce the kind of basketball that the fans are used to seeing on a nightly basis when the season does restart at the end of this month.
Along with the challenge of being in peak shape for the restart of this season, Lillard and the rest of the players when they get to the bubble in Orlando will have to follow a list of mandated rules the league gave in a 113-page document outlining all the protocols and rules they will have to follow from not being able to leave the bubble at their choosing and if they do will have to be in quarantine for at least 10 days and undergo deep-nasal testing. The players cannot go into each other’s rooms but will be allowed to socialize eventually by playing video games, golf, and one-on-one Ping-Pong.
There will be no fans at the games in Orlando, and the players will not be allowed to bring their families until the Conference Semifinals.
Lillard said that his plan when he gets to the bubble in Orlando is to play basketball and chill.
“I know there’s going to be activities for us and all that stuff, but I mean, I’m gonna be chilling,” he said. “I feel like there’s still a possibility for something to spread within that bubble, just with so many people doing so many different things that we’ve got to follow to be safe, even though we’re not exposed to the public. So, for me, it’s going to be: What time is practice, what time can I get in the weight room, what time can I get some shots up, what’s the plan for game day. And then I’m gonna be in the room. I’m gonna have my studio equipment, my mic, my laptop, I’m gonna have all my books. That’s it, man. I’m gonna be in the room, chilling.”
Along with being one of the best players in “The Association,” Lillard is also a rising Hip-Hop artist and rapper who goes by the name Dame D.O.L.L.A., which stands for “Different On Levels the Lord Allows.”
Lillard’s musical journey started when he mainly rapped to have a chance to hang out in the car of his cousin Eugene “Baby” Vasquez, who moved from New York, NY to Oakland, CA in the early 1990s.
The journey then led him to do a social media trend that he announced on his Twitter page @Dame_Lillard on Sept. 13, 2013 called “Four Bar Friday,” where Lillard and anyone that wanted to participate would submit content of themselves rapping a small verse on Instagram with the hastag #4BarFriday.
“And it’s just taken off, more and more, you know?” Lillard said of this specific venture. “We get hundreds and hundreds of artists participating each week. We’ve had competitions at All-Star Weekend. We fly them out, get them to All-Star Saturday, some to the All-Star Game.”
Lillard also said that this venture has led to a partnership with Rap Genius, one of the more popular pages on Instagram, where back on April 3 Lillard put out on his Twitter page that he was hosting a cypher on @genius Instagram live with some of the top artists from Lillard’s “Four Bar Friday” community that was an eight MC tournament that he was going to host every week during this pandemic where they would battle over the same beat.
Five years ago, this month, Lillard released his first full length single via the steaming site SoundCloud entitled “Soldier in the Game.” On Oct. 21, 2016, Lillard’s debut album was released titled, “The Letter O,” which Trail Blazers play-by-play commentator Kevin Calabro often calls Lillard during game broadcast for NBC Sports Northwest. On Oct. 6, 2017, Lillard released his second album, “Confirmed.” The third album, “Big D.O.L.L.A.,” which featured five-time Grammy winner Lil Wayne, Oak Park, Sacramento, CA native Timothy “Mozzy” Patterson, and five-time Chicago Music Award winner Jeremih.
Back in February, Lillard performed at All-Star Weekend in Chicago, IL and he told Johnson that he had a mixtape that was about to be put out in the next week or two.
He was writing a bunch of music and while Lillard said he wanted to record it he did not want to be in someone’s recording studio that was not really cleaned and safe in the times we are living in. So, he decided to build out a recording studio in his home. When it is finished, Lillard said that he will be able to put out his music pretty quickly because he got all the main particulars done, like writing the songs.
The mixtape that Lillard said he has coming out has a track that features Johnson’s co-worker with Turner Sports and NBATV in Hall of Famer and four-time NBA champion Shaquille O’Neal, which was born from a rap battle where Lillard and O’Neal from back in late 2019 where the two put diss tracks out, which was all in good fun.
One of the things that this pandemic has made a lot of people do is reflect on their life where they have gone and where they hope to be going when we are on the other side of this.
In ten days from now, Lillard will turn 30 years old when asked by Johnson about the message he would want to convey to a kid out there playing basketball in high school and they want to reach the level he did without going to a big time college or university that is well known is that there are a lot more athletes that are more in his boat that have to go out there and really prove to someone they deserve a chance.
Lillard said that there are very few people that will travel the road of LeBron James who had a stellar career in high school for St. Vincent, St. Mary’s high school and was his ticket to the league and we have seen that story glamorously unfold into a first ballot Hall of Fame career, like the late Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan.
Lillard feels that a lot of kids need to see the “power and strength” in who he is, and that his amazing character, work ethic is what got him to the NBA and what has allowed him to perform at such a high level for nearly a decade in the league is that he treats everyone from the fans to those that work for the Trail Blazers and the league with respect and dignity.
“I think all of those things allow me to be the sixth pick [2012 NBA Draft] and give me the opportunity that I got,” Lillard, the 2019 J. Walter Kennedy Citizenship recipient said of his journey to the NBA. “And once I got here, being consistent at that all the time allowed me to just keep getting better.”
“And that’s a lot to commit to, and I had a lot of people in my life tell me these things like my dad, m A.A.U. [Amateur Athletic Union] coach Raymond Young, the assistant coach on my A.A.U. team Phil Taylor, Dame Jones, Bill Beckner, the guy I played for in college and he trains me to this day,” Lillard said of the impact these people had in his life. “A lot of these lessons and things that I learned pushed me into this direction.”
Even today, Lillard said that he talks to these individuals who had a major impact on his life. When he goes home to Oakland, these are the people he visits, especially now where he has been successful as an individual.
Along those amazing folks, Lillard said that his father, his uncle Richard, his grandmother, grandfather, and mother have played a pivotal role in shaping who he is. Too, keep them always in his thoughts, Lillard has a tattoos of those important individuals on his left arm, which he calls a “Rushmore” of the most important people in his life, which he also calls the “most meaningful” of his many tattoos that he has on his body.
Lillard added that when he arrives in Oakland, a car service does not pick him up and take him where he needs to go, it is one of his friends or one of his friends parents that is there to meet him or someone that just pulls up to curb of the airport to pick him up.
When asked by Johnson about how much he knew about Ogden, UT before he got to Weber State to play, Lillard said he did not know much about the first school that recruited him out of St. Joseph Notre Dame High School in Alameda, CA.
In a game where Lillard’s A.A.U. team played in Dallas, TX, right before tipoff, a man who happened to be the head coach at Weber State came up to him and Coach Young told Lillard that is the head coach from Weber State.
At that time, Lillard knew who the Wildcats were because he used to create a player on the college video game called “March Madness” and put him on Weber State’s roster because they were the lowest level schools on the game.
So, on the game, Lillard would lead that small school to a national title on the game, which was the only way he knew who Weber State was.
After the A.A.U. game where Lillard played well in, the coach of Randy Rahe offered him a scholarship and began the process of recruiting him to attend their school.
“I just developed a relationship with them,” Lillard said of Weber State’s recruiting of him. “We all got really tight and every other coach started to sound like they were blowing smoke.”
As Lillard was learning about Ogden, UT from Weber State, Johnny Bryant, who is now an assistant coach on head coach Bill Snyder’s staff of the Utah Jazz, who Lillard said he grew up under in Oakland and trained with from a young age. It was the former University of Utah Ute that sold him on going to the school, even though it is a Mormon state, but he can thrive here and that he would be there for him if he needed anything.
This was also Lillard’s first moment that he had to make an adult decision because his grandmother was not up for him going to school in a Mormon state like Utah.
“I had to really make a decision for myself and I trusted Johnny’s word, I trusted Coach Ray, Coach Gardner, Coach Duff. I trusted all their word and I ended up making a great decision.”
To show how great a decision that was for Lillard to attend Weber State, they retired his No. 1 jersey as part of their Men’s Basketball Alumni Classic back on Aug. 26, 2017 at halftime of their alumni game.
When asked by Johnson the best advice Lillard would give to his younger self, he said that it would be to “stay present” in the journey.
As a collegian when Lillard was a starter from his freshmen year to the end at Weber State and his goal was to be MVP, and the focus had to be towards that. The next focus was to be drafted into the NBA.
He said that the focus was always on the next challenge and never took the time to be really presence in the moments where he did accomplish something major individually.
Now being eight years into his NBA career, all with the Trail Blazers, he has taken that same approach where he did not fully appreciate all the great moments that he has authored so far in his NBA career.
One of those moments included his game-winning three-pointer at the buzzer in Game 6 of the opening-round against the Rockets that helped the Trail Blazers win their first playoff series in 14 years, which he said that he watched on the local station in Portland.
Lillard said after hitting that shot and being mobbed by his teammates, including McCollum that his focus was on getting the Trail Blazers to the NBA Finals.
Even after their playoff run ended in the Semifinals in five games against the eventual NBA champion San Antonio Spurs, the focus shifted to getting better for next season.
That was the same approach Lillard he took after hitting the game-winning triple to clinch the opening-round series in Game 5 versus the Thunder five years later, which punched the Trail Blazers ticket to their first playoff series win since 2016.
To put how things changed after that shot for the Thunder that offseason, 2017 Kia MVP and perennial All-Star Russell Westbrook was dealt to the Houston Rockets and fellow perennial All-Star Paul George was traded to the Los Angeles Clippers.
After losing in the Western Conference Finals 4-0 to the five-time defending Western Conference champion and back-to-back NBA champion Golden State Warriors, Lillard’s focus was again on him and his team taking that next step to becoming an NBA champion.
“When I look back at it, I’m just like, ‘I just have a hard time embracing like these moments and like sitting on them for a while,” Lillard said.
Lillard did say what allows him to rise up and deliver in those clutch moments, which he has done a lot in his NBA career is that he has put in the work and not taken shortcuts on his way to greatness.
“I don’t go into those moments thinking about like what a negative outcome could be,” he said. “It just don’t cross my mind. So, I always feel like, “I’m coming up big.’ I don’t fear failure because if I fail, I know it’s not because I didn’t do my work or I didn’t prepare myself. It’s just because that’s part of it.”
That work Lillard has put in has gotten him to the point where he can shoot comfortably from 35 feet, and even from half court. He said the only reason he has not shot from half court consistently is that he does not want to push his ability to shoot that far is really pushing the envelope.
He told Coach Stotts that he would do that and his response was “Well, I used to get mad when you shot those deep threes and now you just make them because you work at. If it’s a good shot for you take it.”
Four months ago, the NBA and the world came to a halt because of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) Pandemic. We have slowly but surely started to open up again and the NBA will be back, all be in one location in Orlando, FL to finish out this season with 22 of the 30 squads. One of those squads will be the Portland Trail Blazers, who will try to overtake the Memphis Grizzlies for that No. 8 and final playoff spot in the Western Conference.
With All-Star guard Damian Lillard leading them and the work he has put in and hopefully the team has put in individually, they hope to have a real shot of getting that last playoff spot in the West and the hope is if they do Lillard will really take that moment in for all it is worth and hopefully add another playoff memory to his resume while keeping in mind all the people that helped him reach the point he has gotten to as an NBA player, as a father and a husband to be.
Information, statistics, and quotations are courtesy 8/03/2017 www.nba.com story via Weber State Athletics, “Weber State To Retire Lillard’s No. 1;” 3/23/2020 www.bleacherreport.com story, “Video: Trail Blazers’ Damian Lillard Announces New Mixtape Featuring Shaq Collab,” by Timothy Rapp; of 5/26/2020 www.espn.com story, “Damian Lillard: I Won’t Play Restarted Season If Blazers Don’t Have ‘True Opportunity’ For Playoffs;” 5/27/2020 www.espn.com story, “Trail Blazers’ Damian Lillard Says Play-In Tourney Plan ‘Would Be Perfect,’” by Nick Friedell; 6/28/2020 at 10 a.m.- 4/11/2020 edition of NBATV’s “#NBATogether With Ernie Johnson: Damian Lillard;” 7/1/2020 www.espn.com story, “Damian Lillard Has Doubts Players Will Strictly Follow ‘Bubble’ Rules,” by Royce Young; https://www.espn.com/nba/team/schedule/_/name/por; https://www.espn.com/nba/player/gamelog/_/id/6606/damian-lillard; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Portland_Trail_Blazers_seasons; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portland_Trail_Blazers#; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damian_Lillard#Music_career; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weber_State_Wildcats_men%27s_basketball; and https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damian_Lillard.
No comments:
Post a Comment