Damian Lillard Is On His Way To Being A Household Name

Damian Lillard has gone from a two-star high school recruit to the favorite for NBA Rookie of the Year. (bleacherreport.com)

Damian Lillard is a NBA gem in the making hidden in plain sight.

It's as if the basketball gods were for the right time to unleash Lillard on the basketball world outside of committed NBA junkies. If this season is any indication, Lillard will be a household name very soon.

Geography played a factor. The profile of team did as well. Lillard has played his college and pro career so far on the west coast, where the games are ending as most of the country is in bed. Lillard was a star at Weber State in Utah, a mid-major program with virtually no national recognition outside of the experts talking about him a few months before the draft. Now the 6-foot-3 point guard starts for a struggling Portland Trail Blazers squad that is 15 games below .500. That doesn't give national analysts much to chew on.




Even before college Lillard was overlooked. Good luck finding his name on the Rivals Top 150 list as Lillard was only a two-star recruit coming out of Oakland, Calif., leading him to Weber State. 


Regardless of the team, Lillard has excelled, averaging 24.5 points per game his senior year in college before wowing scouts enough to be trusted as the No. 6 pick in the 2012 NBA Draft. Now Lillard is in position to win Rookie of the Year, averaging 19 ppg and 6.5 apg. He's proven he can score at will and take over games, tallying five games of more than 30 points, and two of those coming in the last 10 games. Next will come consistency where he doesn't bounce back from those 30-point games with 10 and 12 respectively like April 12 against Oklahoma City and Tuesday against the Los Angeles Clippers.  Lillard has also proven to be durable, logging the second most minutes among rookies this season.

A mid-major point guard putting up this kind of rookie campaign was sure to draw heads, as it has from those who follow the league closely. The question also must be asked if Lillard has this season with a team east of the Mississippi River, even in a city like Detroit, Cleveland or New Orleans and especially at a place like Washington D.C. or Philadelphia, would he be talked about more? Fellow rookie Anthony Davis has had a successful, yet injury riddled, season in which he's averaging five and a half fewer points per game and he's been talked about as much or more than Lillard. He also plays in New Orleans, which has a worse record but gives Davis more national airtime in primetime because of the time zone.



Maybe it was best for Lillard to fly under the radar for so long. The story has been told over and over of highly rated high school and college players not living up to the mountain of expectations laid in front of them. Lillard knows what it is like to be overlooked, and instead of being told he was going to be a future NBA All-Star, he worked on his game away from the limelight to prove it.

The basketball gods have kept Lillard out of the spotlight so far but now he has proven he's ready for the bright lights that come with being a star in the NBA. Lillard is more likely to improve as his years in the NBA continue and when that happens, even geography and team records won't be able to keep causal fans on both coasts from knowing his name.

Fixing College Basketball: What Rules Need To Be Changed For Next Season

Freshmen Marcus Smart (left), Ben McLemore and Anthony Bennett are all expected to be in this June's NBA Draft, but should the one-and-done rule be changed? (espn.com)

Reputations are powerful, especially bad ones, and right now college basketball's reputation is heading south. This reputation isn't about cheating or steroids. It's about the on-court product, although the NCAA does have its own issues to work out in terms of "amateurism."

A brilliant and entertaining national championship game wasn't enough to mask months of low scoring and poor officiating. Now that college basketball has entered the offseason, it's time to make the changes necessary to improve the game. If the NCAA needs some suggestions, how about starting with these:

One-and-done rule
This should be first and foremost on the NCAA's to-do list. It is difficult for the casual fan to become attached to the game when the teams go through complete overhauls each season because the star players sprint to the NBA Draft just as the country gets to know them. Imagine this – Kyrie Irving, Austin Rivers, Bradley Beal, Anthony Davis, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, Tristan Thompson, Brandon Knight and others all entered the draft as freshman and if not for the rule, they could all still be playing college basketball. What a March this could have been.

Six freshmen from this past season have already put their names in the draft, two of which, Ricky Ledo and Norvel Pelle never even played a game in college. Some players are talented enough to be ready for the NBA out of high school. That's fine, let them go. LeBron James, Kobe Bryant and Dwight Howard did not need college. But most do. Josh Selby left Kansas as a freshman and now has been jumping back and forth from the D-league. So let those leave out of high school if they are projected lottery picks. Otherwise make them stay in college for three years. The players will develop their games, mature and the fans get players and teams they can look forward to watching for more than one season.

Charge/block rule
The addition of the charge arc under the hoop, as seen in the NBA, is meant to protect offensive players from defenders laying out for a charge under the basket. If the defender is on or inside the arc, it can't be a charge. The problem lies in the focus on the arc. Officials are paying more attention to the defender's feet in relation to the arch that they are missing crucial factors such as if the defender is shuffling his feet or leaning into the play or if the offensive player was out of control.

The charge/block call is the focal point on an overall issue of officiating as the game has become more physical. The whistles constantly blowing breaks up the flow of the game. Part of this is poor defensive principles by the players, but too often are officials the story of the game and eventually players need to be able to make plays when the game is on the line.

Shot clock
Those 35 seconds on the shot clock in the college game can feel like an eternity, especially when teams like Wisconsin slow the game down and play a low-scoring, grind-out game. You could make dinner and do your taxes in the time Wisconsin has the ball for one possession when they grab offensive rebounds and throw the ball back out to start again.

There is no reason why college offenses should need 11 more seconds to hit the rim than NBA teams get with a 24-second clock. Take the college clock down to 24 seconds, or 30 even if 24 is a little too extreme. This will speed up the game, increase scoring and keep fans from falling asleep when those teams that play at the pace of a geriatric league don't bore people into turning the channel.

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Will Calipari's System Be Questioned Again After Kentucky's Slow Start?

Is Kentucky's rough start leading to questions about John Calipari's freshman strategy? (yahoo.com)

The system of coaching in college basketball changed after John Calipari and Kentucky won a national title last season. Or at least that's what we thought.

The idea of senior leadership and building players has been exchanged in Lexington for the year's best recruits (and maybe a few old sophomores and juniors). And before last season, the formula had proven to produce positive results, but never the ultimate result, which made it easier for people to dismiss Cal's methods.

Anthony Davis, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist and the rest of the young Wildcats proved what raw ability can do with a season of preparation. Naturally, the same was expected of this year's group. UK has highly touted freshmen in Nerlens Noel, Alex Poythress, Archie Goodwin and Willie Cauley-Stein, who have even higher expectations and more pressure on them than last year's squad.

Kentucky just lost its second game in a row and third of the season, which is more losses than the 2011-12 team had all season and keeping them barely above .500 at 4-3. The 2011-12 team's first loss was on Dec. 10 to Indiana and then it didn't lose again until the SEC Tournament Championship game against Vanderbilt.

Freshmen are supposed to go through growing pains, and that's exactly what is happening to UK this year. The talent is there, but adjusting to the pace of the college game and facing hostile environments, not to mention building team chemistry, takes time.

This season's start is making last year look more and more like a once-in-a-decade group, rather than the new norm in the college game. Who else has found a team, led by freshmen, that only lost one game in the regular season (on a buzzer-beater 3-pointer in a loud Assembly Hall), go perfect in conference play and win a national title, all while looking like it was the best team in the country? If there were growing pains, they didn't show up in the final score. The starters rarely looked like the stage was too big for them and the chemistry was as good as it could be for players working together for the first year.

It was just assumed that since Cal pulled this feat off last year, of course he could do it again this year. That's what the system entails; come in for one year, be one of the best teams in the country, compete for a title and then go make money in the NBA. The most difficult part is the recruiting, and Cal has succeeded with flying colors.

But now we're seeing why coaches and analysts preach senior leadership and chemistry. Trust me, any coach would take the most talented freshmen if he could get them, and Cal shouldn't be faulted for that. There just also happens to be a down side to the approach, and we're witnessing it as Kentucky will most likely drop out of the top 25 this week.

This doesn't mean Kentucky is going to flop or remain in neutral all season. They'll be a dangerous team to face in the NCAA Tournament because a lot can be learned in four months. This is more about how special last year's team was, and that Cal hasn't discovered a fool-proof secret to the game, he has just crafted another way compete.

Other teams still have a fighting chance and the college basketball apocalypse can be put on hold until the next super-frosh team makes all of us rethink our team's strategy.


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Anthony Davis Met Another Formidable Unibrow at the Olympics

Anthony Davis poses with his brother in 'brow. (via Kobe Bryant's Facebook)

To no one's surprise, the USA-Spain gold-medal game was tightly contested. New Orleans Hornets rookie-in-waiting Anthony Davis saw playing time late in the game after sitting for a majority of Team USA's Olympic run, and can claim some contribution to the Americans' 107-100 victory. It is not something he will soon forget.

Ever the worker of back channels, though, Kobe Bryant — Team USA's veteran of veterans — organized something else for his young counterpart. In lieu of snapping photos of his gold medal, Bryant introduced Davis to Armenian wrestler Gadzhimurad Nurmagomedov, another world-class athlete clad with one eyebrow.

Bryant allegedly spotted Nurmagomedov during Team USA's celebration and, thinking quickly, united the Armenian with Davis and uploaded the picture to his Facebook account.

Solid work by Kobe, who is going an unusual route by vying for an after-basketball job as a photographer rather than a coach or broadcaster. If he really wanted to make a name for himself, though, he would have found a way to include Mexican diver Ivan Garcia and complete the unibrow trifecta. It's not often that one can snap a flick of three eyebrows — on three faces — at once.

Kudos to Dan Devine at Ball Don't Lie and Trey Kerby at The Basketball Jones for jumping on this.


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LeBron James: Handballer, High Jumper, Gymnast?

If you’ve been paying any attention to handball, you probably know that America is terrible. That probably shouldn’t surprise you; if you’re like me, you barely knew about the sport before the Olympics started. But if you actually watch the sport, it immediately becomes clear that America should dominate. It involves a lot of running, throwing, dribbling, passing and everything else that America loves and is really good at. What’s even more surprising is the fact that the USSR won more gold medals in the event than anyone else. At the very least, you would think that Richard Nixon would feel that national security was being threatened and personally handpick his own team.

(fnt-usa.org)

Anyway, while I was watching the sport the other day, I couldn’t stop thinking about how great the U.S. basketball team would fair at the sport. It wouldn’t even be hard — they would probably only need three or four practices to learn the game and be great at it. LeBron James seems to be specifically tailor made for this game, but that’s mostly because he is such an insane athlete, and you could put him in almost any Olympic event and he could compete. So just for fun, I decided to speculate on how LeBron and the rest of Team USA would compete in other events.

Beach Volleyball

This is a sport where tall guys with long wingspans can excel. The movements aren’t that dissimilar to basketball so it wouldn’t take long to pick up. While watching the American men play volleyball, I couldn’t help but think that Anthony Davis would completely dominate the game. Don’t get me wrong: the thought of having The 'Brow represent America like a foreign diplomat scares me, but shot blockers are really important in the game. Miraculously, while I was writing this piece, I found a video which might prove my theory right, if someone would teach Kevin Durant the rules.

Swimming

Again, this is a sport where long wingspans can give athletes a huge advantage. I don’t know how good Team USA is at swimming, but I think they could pick it up with time. The only exception would be James Harden, whose beard would cause way to much drag in the pool.

100m Dash

I doubt LeBron could ever medal, but if there was a heavyweight division (and who wouldn’t want to see 250 lb. guys racing each other?) I would expect him to take the gold.

High Jump

Again, he might not be one of the best in the world, but if you add a heavyweight division (which might be even more entertaining than big guys running), I expect another gold for LBJ.

Gymnastics

This would take LeBron a lot longer to train for than the rest of the competitions, but if he wanted to, I doubt anyone could stop him. He’s a great jumper, which would help on the floor routine, and has great upper body strength for the rings.


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Don't Confuse Team USA's Great Performance with Running Up the Score

Team USA was accused of running up the score in a 156-73 win against Nigeria (Bleacher Report)

Lopsided was an understatement.

It was domination, a clinic or whatever colorful phrase you wish to call it.

The USA basketball team defeated Nigeria 156-73 in the fourth game of pool play, which some called unsportsmanlike. Team USA was accused of running up the score, embarrassing their opponent. When the U.S. began to run away from Argentina, ultimately winning 126-97 in the final game of pool play, Argentina showed their anger in the form of cheap fouls.

This topic is popular mainly in high school and college sports. Overmatched teams getting overrun until the final whistle saves them from the torture.

But in the Olympics?

These are the world’s best athletes who have earned the rights to be there. For some it’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and for a lucky few, they will return with multiple chances for gold.

The Olympics ask for the best of the athletes competing. This competition isn’t for those who don’t give their full effort. Olympic and world records hang over athletes like pinatas, waiting to be broken. With the 156-73 stomping of Nigeria, Team USA broke the Olympic record for points in a game, win margin, 3-point shots made in a game and, individually, Carmelo Anthony scored the most points in an Olympic game by an American. Yes, it was a night to forget for Nigeria, but isn’t that the kind of performance we want to see from Team USA?

This wasn’t running up the score. It was a just a good game where every player was on. Team USA wasn’t running a full-court press, trying to steal every pass and get easy fast-break points. They were shooting 3s and long 2-point shots, which were supposed to be lower-percentage shots, but they just happened to go in. Was Anthony Davis just not supposed to dunk when he was on the receiving end of multiple wide-open alley-oops? Was Anthony supposed to aim his open 3s at side of the backboard? The Americans shot 71 percent from the field and 63 percent from 3-point range. It was just their night.  

Michael Phelps doesn’t slow down from world-record pace just because the swimmer in second is 50m behind. Usain Bolt doesn’t care how far back his fellow racers are, and has even been known to turn around before the finish line to taunt his competition. That’s what we love. We love watching great athletes do great things.

The opposite end of the topic includes the news of the Olympic badminton scandal, where teams were losing on purpose to get a better seeding. Kids are taught to do their best and try their hardest, and it is disappointing to the fans and opposing team to know a team won only because the competition blew the game on purpose. So couldn’t this be worse? Should we be worried about a team breaking an Olympic record when teams are showing much less sportsmanship and class by throwing matches?

I understand the Olympics continue to push sportsmanship and integrity in the sporting events, which it should. But sportsmanship wasn’t in question with Team USA. Maybe the USA was running up the score if Kobe Bryant, LeBron James and Kevin Durant would have played the entire game, but LeBron and Kobe played just 11 minutes a piece, a no starter played more than Chris Paul's 22 minutes.

Why wouldn’t this team want to break an Olympic record when given the chance, not knowing if that opportunity will again become available? Team USA wasn’t taunting or keeping starters in the game. The USA didn’t pressure on defense or try to draw fouls. They simply made shots, which they should not be faulted for.

Team USA just happened to have a great game where every shot was going in. Let’s not blame them for this as if it is a bad thing, because I know viewers around the world enjoyed watching the performance, and instead appreciate the spectacle that no other team in Olympic history has accomplished.


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NBA Free Agency - The Association's Christmas Morning

New Laker teammates Steve Nash and Kobe Bryant - bleacherreport.com

The NBA holiday season is in full swing as the hangover of promise from the NBA Draft is starting to wear off as the free agency period has taken off.

It has been a busy first week of free agency, with an already blockbuster move consisting of a former MVP and a dynasty-rich NBA juggernaut. Yes, you may have heard about Steve Nash accepting a deal to play for the Los Angeles Lakers next season, giving LA a much-needed passer and floor general to make sure Kobe Bryant gets the ball, while also having the ability to create shots.

The draft and free agency are both very exciting times for NBA fans, but in very different ways. The excitement around the draft is all about hope and optimism. This is where the future is born and general managers pray the big-time talent transfers from college to pros.

The draft is the bigger spectacle, with both college basketball and NBA fans alike glued to the coverage, listening to the results of every workout, combine and interview. NBA fans want to know who to welcome to their team, and college fans want to see the player they helped grow make his dream come true. Analysts break down every aspect of a player’s game and personality for months until the player becomes transparent. Mock drafts flood the Internet with lofty predictions (I’m expecting the 2018 mock draft to be released next week) as everyone wants to play detective and determine who will make it and who will crumble.

The draft may have primetime coverage under the bright lights of New York City (or in this year’s case, Newark, New Jersey) but for NBA fans, the draft isn’t Christmas morning, but rather New Years Day.

It gives you the same promise as a new year, where you make goals and strive to get better. But how those goals will play out is far from clear. It is a time to wash away bad draft picks and losing records from the past for a brighter future, but just like New Years Day, the work has just begun.

The real holiday for NBA fans is free agency. Waking up to the glow of your computer while opening up NBA blogs may as well be you under the Christmas tree shredding through wrapping paper. Either you got the toy you had been wanting for months (Steve Nash or Deron Williams), something practical but not exciting (Hasheem Thabeet) or you are Dwight Howard, who might not have any presents to open at all.

wn.com

The point is, the best time for fans is free agency. Turning around a franchise in the draft is a shot in the dark, and usually takes firing multiple shots to work. But in the free-agent market, the immediate future of your fanhood is impacted by every move.

These are not fresh-from-college hopefuls looking to prove themselves. Even the most talented of the college draft class, Anthony Davis, Bradley Beal and Thomas Robinson, will take time to mature into superstars.

But free agency is where a league MVP or top-10 player can wear your jersey, already being a seasoned veteran. In the best cases, there’s no assembly required with this Christmas present.

All it takes is one move to make your team a playoff contender next season.

You’ll plead with your superstar to stay for another three years, entice a former rival player to join forces for the greater good of winning a championship or keep a close eye on that team whose dealings could bring your potential trade crashing to the ground.

You will welcome players with open arms, hate him for leaving and scratch your head when thinking about your GM’s “strategy” this offseason.

You will be ecstatic, furious, content and confused; everything you love about the holidays.

So enjoy your Christmas morning, NBA fans, because outside of your team holding up the trophy, it is the most exciting time of year. 


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A Few Thoughts on the NBA Draft First Round

Anthony Davis and Michael Kidd-Gilcrist were the No. 1 and No. 2 picks in the NBA Draft - ESPN.com

The first round of the NBA draft is in the books and now that the dreams have come true, it's time for reality to kick in.

And still the biggest takeaway is we know nothing and won't know anything until they take the court. We don't know if Dion Waiters jumping up to No. 4 is a good pick or if Perry Jones III, taken at No. 28 and has the talent of a lottery pick, was worth the drop.

Since I cannot see into the future, I don't do much predicting of who will shine, but instead hit you with the big takeaways from the first round, in case you missed it.

According to Plan: Just as I tell you we can't predict the future, the first round picks stayed pretty true to what the experts expected. Some jumped higher than thought and others dropped out of the lottery, but those worries were known heading into the night. Dion Waiters seemed high at No. 4, but other than that, the lottery picks weren't very surprising.

Watching Stocks Plummet: Based on the household-style of the names involved, it would be a shock to see how far in the draft Jared Sullinger, 21st pick, and Perry Jones III, 28th pick, if we were still judging them on the beginning of the college season. Injuries were the question marks for both guys, but both - Perry Jones III especially - have been placed in systems in which to succeed. Jones III had top-10 talent, and Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook should be able to get him to play like a star.

Seas of Blue: The players of the first round had two common themes; teammates traveled in packs and the blue bloods were prominent. For the first time in the modern draft era, two teams, Kentucky and North Carolina, had four players each selected in the first round. Throw in Austin Rivers of Duke and Thomas Robinson of Kansas and the powerhouses of college basketball were well represented.

First Round Winner: 
New Orleans: It's hard to not rule the team who has the No. 1 and No. 10 picks as a winner and nearly impossible when the two picks were Anthony Davis and Austin Rivers. For all we know they could both be busts, but that's not likely. From a potential standpoint, those are two solid picks.

First Round Loser:
Cleveland: With a team still hurting from the loss of a talent like LeBron James, the Cavaliers selected two shooting guards (Dion Waiters and Jared Cunningham) both of which were taken with talent left on the board. Cunningham was projected as the No. 37 pick, while big men like Jones III and Festus Ezeli could have made solid backups for Jamison and Varejao.


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