Anthony Davis sat out the New Orleans Pelicans’ game on Thursday night against the Portland Trail Blazers. Davis is in the midst of returning from a sprained elbow, and seeing as how he played on Wednesday night against the Golden State Warriors, the decision was made to let him use the second game of the back-to-back to continue getting back to 100 percent.
The issue is that the Pelicans aren’t as good when Davis is off the floor, which is unsurprising, because he is one of the best basketball players on earth. As such, New Orleans put up a fight before faltering down the stretch, falling to Portland, 132-119.
It was evident that the Pelicans could have used Davis in a big way, and it made something that Davis said to Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports following the loss to the Warriors all the more prescient. In Davis’ eyes, he needs to be near-perfect if his team wants to win games.
“Of course, I know that in order to win games, a lot of pressure is going to be on me,” Davis told Yahoo Sports while sitting at his locker stall Wednesday night. “If we lose, it’s on me. If we win, they give my team the credit and I’m fine with that.
“A perfect example [was against the Warriors]. I don’t have a good game and we lose. So, I got to play almost perfect every night to give us a chance to win. But my teammates do a great job. Even the games I didn’t play, those guys have been battling night in and night out to get victories. … I don’t try to put too much pressure on myself, but I know it’s there.”
On one hand, watching a superstar be so open about their willingness to shoulder the load is cool, especially when they’re as good and versatile as Davis. Watching Davis when he goes off is as unique an experience as there is in the NBA, and hearing that his intention is to do that every single night is terrifying if you’re on any of the other 29 teams in the league.
Of course, this is an … let’s say interesting quote considering Davis is up for a max extension from the Pelicans this summer — one that could be the largest in league history — and if he decides to turn that down, he can opt out of his deal following the 2019-20 campaign and become an unrestricted free agent. The good news, if you want to call it that, is Davis also addressed this to Yahoo Sports.
“I really don’t listen to [the noise] to be honest,” Davis said. “I hear it from everywhere from social media, to people around you. But my biggest thing is focusing on playing basketball. That’s all I can do. I can’t do nothing else but play basketball to the best of my ability to help my team. … We have one goal and that’s winning a championship, and my job is to try to help them reach that goal.”
That’s an awfully ambitious goal in the loaded Western Conference, but if Davis is playing near-perfect basketball every night, perhaps New Orleans will be able to make some noise once the postseason rolls around. As for what happens after? Well, it seems like everyone else is prepared to cross that bridge when they get to it.
(Via Yahoo Sports)
