The Blazers have failed Damian Lillard (Again)

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Anyone who knows me knows pretty well that there are not many bigger Damian Lillard supporters than me. But that is not the point of this post. What is much more important than that is the fact that the Portland Trail Blazers continue to fail Lillard, time and time again.

Let's start by looking at the team he came into. He was drafted onto a talented roster in 2012 that had some holes and he kind of became the missing piece they were looking for. The duo of Dame and LaMarcus Aldridge was one of the better pairings in the league and, with those two both playing at an All-Star level, helped propel the Blazers into a yearly playoff team. To this point, the team around Dame was good and Portland did everything they could to build a good team under reasonable standards.

In 2015, there was a massive roster turnover, as every starter from the previous season had left in some way or another, which included star LaMarcus Aldridge, sharp shooting guard Wesley Matthews, do it all wing Nic Batum, and center Robin Lopez. However, the Blazers made a couple good acquisitions in the offseason and saw a breakout season from two-guard CJ McCollum, so I would say Portland did a good job of building around Dame initially when his older teammates hit the road to go elsewhere. Now, Portland was tasked with building around Lillard and up and comer CJ McCollum. However, the only high-impact player they were able to put with those two was Jusuf Nurkic, and calling him that might even be a bit too generous.

With the core of Dame and CJ, the Blazers were able to make the postseason in each of their eight full seasons playing together. This led to slightly different results each year, ranging from getting bounced in the first round, losing in the second round, or even making it all the way to the Western Conference Finals and losing there. Nonetheless, each of those seasons had one thing in common: zero NBA Finals appearances. On top of that, during those eight seasons, the Blazers made a number of questionable moves when attempting to improve the team, whether it was draft picks that flopped or poor free agent signings. But throughout all of this, Lillard has been as loyal as can be, which is not the popular thing to do in the NBA nowadays with how often stars change teams. It would not be unfair to say that any other star in the NBA of Dame's caliber would have demanded a trade or left in free agency at some point during his tenure with the Blazers, so it shows how loyal Lillard is to them.

Let's look back at the 2017 draft. This is one of the Blazers biggest failures with Dame on the roster, in my opinion. They had the 10th pick that year and took Zach Collins, who has ended up being a complete bust. He has missed a huge amount of time with injuries, and even when he does play he is nothing better than a role player. He is now on the Spurs and is also nothing more than a role player for them. This one hurts even more because there were a bunch of good players taken below Collins. Donavan Mitchell and Bam Adebayo were taken after him and they both have turned into All Stars and are huge difference makers for each of their squads. Jarret Allen was taken below all of those guys and is now playing at a borderline All Star level. Add John Collins to that list, who is playing at a level that is just a tier below an All-Star player, maybe more of a really good role player. Missing out on all of these really solid players hurt the Blazers a lot when it came to trying to get the team to the next level. I should mention that they also took Caleb Swanigan with the 26th pick that year, but he ended up being a player that provided no impact to the team at the NBA level.

Fast forward to 2022 and the Blazers are blowing it up again, as they traded CJ McCollum to the Pelicans for an array of role players and draft picks. They also traded rock-solid role players Norman Powell and Robert Covington for lesser role players and draft picks. Now, Portland apparently intends to build around Dame through the cap space they have created and the draft this offseason. They also have a young up and coming guard named Anfernee Simons who has been playing really good basketball this season and is having a bit of a breakout year, averaging 16.4 points per game. He is still only 22 and has the potential to be an All-Star level player in this league in the future. However,  Damian Lillard is going to be turning 32 this offseason, and he has expressed his desire to be on a team that is contending for championships. However, the Blazers team currently is barely even good enough to make the playoffs with Dame, let alone contend for titles. It is unrealistic for them to expect to be able to build a contending roster this season in my opinion. A lot of things would have to go right: Anfernee Simons needs to develop even more, the Blazers need to hit on their draft pick, and they need to attract really good players to their franchise in free agency, which has never been easy for them to do.

Below, I have attached a little Dame and CJ highlight video from one of their better seasons together in 2017-2018. Even though this duo was never able to make it the Finals, they did so much for the Trail Blazers and were super fun to watch throughout their time together.