Damian Lillard Airs Frustrations With Current NBA, Overvaluing Championship Rings

Portland Trail Blazers star Damian Lillard has never been afraid to keep things honest regardless if the conversation is focused on basketball or about life outside of the court and the Oakland native shared some of his thoughts on the NBA landscape today.

In a teaser clip of his appearance on former NBA sharpshooter JJ Redick's "Old Man and The Three" podcast, Lillard was happy to explain how much the culture and conversation about the NBA has changed.

"I feel like I play for the love of the game. I want the competition, I want to know what it feels like to win, I want to see my teammates do well and [them to] get paid. I enjoy the bonding part of it, like, we spend more time with each other than anybody," Lillard stated.

"But now, it's like that don't count, the regular season doesn't count, get a ring. This guy's the MVP, this guy did this, he's the first pick. What is this stuff?"

Ever since he entered the NBA in 2012, Lillard has always been keeping his head down and focusing on improving his skills as a court without really giving a care in the world about trade talks.

This decision of his has paid off multiple times throughout his career as his efforts garnered him an All-Star nod in just his second season en route to six more selections while also creating some of the most iconic moments in NBA history with his many buzzer-beaters.

Lillard has also become so good at shooting deep-range threes on a consistent basis that basketball fans have called any shot that resembles a jumper from 30 feet and beyond as "Lillard Range"–with the best example of it coming against the Oklahoma City Thunder.

In the summer ahead of the 2021-22 season, rumors were heating up that "Dame Time" was going to leave Rose City and join the Los Angeles Lakers, but Lillard made it clear where his loyalties lie.

Lillard also addressed fans and other talking heads putting too much emphasis on winning rings.

"I don't need to prove to y'all that I want to win a ring. Why the hell do I play? While I understand we play to win championships, we all want to win the championship, we can't keep acting like nothing matters. Like the rest of the stuff, the journey doesn't matter. We can't keep doing that," Lillard noted.

While there remains to be little criticism of Lillard for what he has achieved in his career, him not being able to hoist the Larry O'Brien trophy has been the biggest of them all.

It is not for the lack of trying however as his Blazers teams have had some rotten luck in the postseason as they ran into the San Antonio Spurs in 2014, the Memphis Grizzlies in 2015 and the super-powered Golden State Warriors in 2016, 2017 and 2019.

Lillard knows that his time is running out and their acquisition of Jerami Grant ahead of this season was a widely praised move by the Blazers' front office.

However, Lillard is also aware that basketball is just part of his life and does not define who he is as a person.

"When my career is over, y'all are not about to be talking about me... Why am I going to be sitting over here overly concerned about everything that every person has to say about me when they don't know my life?" Lillard told Redick.

The Blazers are three games behind the Lakers for a play-in spot, and despite the mountain that they have to climb, Lillard remains the constant force that gives Portland hope of reaching the top of the NBA once again.