Damian Lillard isn’t Stephen Curry. When it comes to a player he should emulate, though, the Portland Trail Blazers star could do far worse than the league’s reigning MVP.
At media day on the eve of training camp, Lillard told reporters what he did to improve his game over the offseason. And while the notorious gym rat spent ample time preparing his body for the rigors of leading the Blazers, it’s his training as a dribbler that could pay off even more – and was seemingly directly inspired by Curry.
Here’s Lillard, courtesy of David MacKay of Blazer’s Edge.
I did a lot of ball handling. I did a lot of passing. You look at the leaps that Steph Curry made over three years, and a lot of it had to do with how well he began to handle the ball, how well he began to pass the ball, and that affects everything. Being able to do that affects how well you shoot the ball and your playmaking ability and your ability to break down defenses. So that’s basically what my summer was based on.
Makes sense.
Like his Golden State Warriors counterpart, Lillard has always been an effortless shooter, capable of raining shots from all across the floor via spot-up and pull-up opportunities. But what propelled Curry from an impact player to a foundational cornerstone more than anything else were his strides as a ball handler – development that leveraged his incredible shooting gifts even further while magnifying his effectiveness as a playmaker.
That’s the next step for Lillard. He improved drastically as a finisher in 2014-15, an advancement that Curry enjoyed one year prior and sustained throughout his run to a NBA title. Could Lillard’s work off the bounce push him to heights reserved for the game’s true elite? It seems possible, especially if it coincides with passing impact that comes less naturally to him than other star floor generals.
Unfortunately, that new prowess won’t culminate in a championship for Lillard the way it did for Curry – at least any time soon. But the Blazers are well positioned to be major free agency players in the future, and a Lillard who’s even better than before will no doubt strengthen his team’s chances at adding the additional star it will take for Portland to compete at the highest level going forward.
[Via Blazer’s Edge]
