Damian Lillard

GM Joe Cronin issued a statement on meeting with Damian Lillard saying I met with Dame and Aaron Goodwin his agent this afternoon we had a great dialogue we remained committed to building a winner around Dame legs I'm going to start with you on this question what is the best place for Dame Dolla well ultimately first I want to start with this I'm not one of those guys that that trashes players for staying in one place right if they make that decision because I think there's something to be said for guys that to feel a certain sense of responsibility to want to win with an organization right a place that he's been his entire career and to me the Mantra all that matters is winning a championship that's not true yeah all kinds of stuff matters to players Money Matters who you play with who you play for right your family situation how you feel in the community your connection to the fan base like all of it matters ultimately so let's just start with that having said that if Damian Lillard really wants to add right to his legacy as a play ultimately you want to see him play on the biggest stage and that's not going to be in Portland in the foreseeable future so therefore I look at a team like Miami and I say the infrastructure is in place assuming it would not mean you know Jimmy Butler's not there or bam out of Bio but if you put Damian Lillard with those two players and what that organization does year after year to reinvent themselves with their Supporting Cast and we know obviously the culture we talk a lot about with Pat Riley and air exposure and what that means to get a chance to play for the guy that I think is the best coach in the NBA to maximize who you are as a player if you're Damian Lillard and you have that opportunity and you can potentially Force Portland's hand to find your way to Miami you have a much better chance to be an NBA champion if you do that so from in that regard and the pressure that is put on these players and from their peers also because you sit back year after year if you Damian Lillard you know you watch jokic on the parade you watch Giannis on the parade you watch Steph Curry on the parade you watch these guys right if you're not not there you can see guys playing the finals maybe come up a little bit short but they're close and now you're Damien Little in Portland year after year been to one Conference Final since he's been there eventually maybe that starts to eat away at you a little bit and you say what is my best opportunity to be one of those guys and do that Miami would be the best place and I think they've got a lot of things in return that they could make that deal potentially happen but it's got to come down to Lillard wanting it first and I think the organization would acquiesce to him so players like Anthony Simons and Jaden sharp aren't ready yet to make a championship run you add scoot Henderson who's even younger and hopefully he's going to be great and the type of player you can build a team around but obviously he's not going to be ready as a rookie to build a championship around him and pairing him with Dame obviously both ball dominant players that might be a mismatch but you made all the points before you said that he should go to Miami you made all the points for why I think the best place for him is right there in Portland okay I think that he what he has meant to that organization and what he's meant to the league as this one guy who's holding on to this old way of doing things and with the new CBA maybe it'll change and guys will stay in places for longer but I like that I like that for Dame I like what he represents and he's given interviews in the past and said that it's not always all about winning championships and I think that's true of a lot of players and it should be true of a lot of players even though they say it it's not true they say it because if they say if they don't say it dummies like us like a good one TV say you don't care about winning Championship but you're gonna do the best that you can I think there's something commendable in putting out an effort to try to win a championship in the place that you want to be and much more important to me than anything is that the players get the control of their life and careers that they want to have and it seems like Damien has had a lot of that so far and it's not to say that it's impossible to win a championship in Portland Damien has a few really really productive years left and as crazy as this sounds scoot Henderson if he comes in and he's outstanding off the off the top I'm not saying that them two together could win a championship but he becomes a really bad valuable piece which you can't be drafting a guy and talk about trading them immediately and let's do a draft day trade but it's a concept that they get to the trade deadline scoot Henderson has demonstrated that he has the potential to be a franchise player there's another team that is giving up on their franchise run and given up on their franchise player I don't know embiid is the guy who might come up uh I mean and towns comes to mind but he's probably not on that level but somebody could be looking at their window and saying our window is closing Portland wants to go all in right now for the next two to three years we want to build for the future that could be a possibility and what would be a better story than Dame Lillard this whole process of us watching player empowerment watching players push to here push to go there Damon Lillard decides I want to be in Portland and then that team responds to his decision by saying that's all right we're going to go all in we're going to mortgage our future which right now is scoot Henderson to give you the the running mate that you need to win a championship and who who knows we see how the NBA Playoffs have worked out the last couple years there have been surprises if you are healthy and you're playing well in the well I guess last year wasn't really that surprising but prior to that you're healthy and you're playing well at the right time different things happen you end up in the finals the heat can attest to that yeah I'm gonna be that knucklehead that you just talked about the TV but the one thing that jumped out to me Tim when you said it and Dominic when you said about Damon stating in Portland the one word that has not come up that people have really criticized them for is loyalty not just to that organization but to that City because when he was drafted out of Weber State people said what is Portland doing who's drafting a kid from Oaktown Oakland California and thinking that guy can be a star and in his Seasons after averaging a career high over 32 points per game last year he has only had one season where he's averaged less than 20 points per game and that was his rookie season that city has never not supported Damian Lillard that organization has never not supported Damian Lillard so I can't even imagine if you're Damian Lillard you know the best place in my opinion is to go to the Miami Heat you can have to part with players and Tyler hero Kyle Lowry maybe Duncan Robinson multiple draft picks are going to be a part of that decision making part of that trade to match up the salary because he's going to make over 45 million dollars over the next couple of years so you got a lot of sticky things that you got to unglue if you're the Miami Heat to make that work but I can't even imagine that if you're Damian Lillard you know that's the best possible place Tim like you said to play on that stage where you're tired of seeing other people's parades on TV and you'll get saying this parade thing man I love this parade think and he didn't want to go to serve you that quickly be around his horses and his family I'm sure he is a competitor of course and you guys know the Tim in the NBA Dominic in the NFL when you see your competition and they're celebrating you thinking man that should be me you can't wait and wait and wait for young guys to get out of tick tock and get out of Twitter and get out of Facebook and get with the program to be what you've been all about for the 11 Seasons so to me the best place for him is the Miami Heat but I can't even imagine if I'm Damian Lillard you don't want to feel disloyal to that organization but you may have no choice after giving you all for 11 years and there are no young people on Facebook and we just got it yeah I mean well look here's the thing right now it actually things could be aligning uh for this to work for both parties Damian Lillard and and the Blazers because you're talking about scoot Henderson scoot Henderson is going to be a star in this league I have no doubt it about it whatsoever he's got the explosive athletic ability he's got the IQ he's got the toughness he's got the drive and the want to been watching him for a long time he is to me I can't miss okay he's going to be a star so now if you're Portland you're sitting there you know it's not going to happen anytime soon because of the ages of this Supporting Cast around it's just not and you look at the landscape in the west it's just not going to happen you're not penetrating that and getting to the finals anytime in the next two to three years minimum so now where is Damien Little at the end of that point so if you're the Blazer and you're Lillard and not only does you have to watch these guys do what we just said with the parades and popping his champagne he had to listen to Michael Malone give the fastest let's run it back in history the game hadn't ended yet Mike Malone's a whispering to his staff let's run it back and a little and little to say run it back I just want to run it one time so all that stuff adds up to him potentially finally getting to that place and look to your point about like the criticism that guys get when they quote Chase or whatever word you want to use to it he's guess what he's past that point 11 years there's not a person on a planet that is going to hold Damian Lillard responsible if he makes that fish not anymore I guess he's past that we all want to see him play when the lights are by and I think now he's got enough cash shape built up people will get it we understand and looking at just the future the next few years for the Blazers it's not going to happen there Portland might be in good hands with scoot Henderson taking over so maybe the timing is perfect for the Blazers because they got that right player to be the next guy and perfect for Damian Lillard but he has to come to that conclusion so I mean nobody rebutted my potential idea of maybe you moved scoot Henderson I know it sounds crazy but if Damian Lillard has shown all this loyalty to this franchise all this time and you get to the point where you get to the trade deadline I guess the real question is do you think Portland is a superstar away because I think they probably are if they bring a superstar in there with the young pieces that they have who's that Superstar that's the question I mean I I don't know I use them beat as an example because he's another player who we're looking at that's like the window could be closing in Philadelphia maybe that's a player that they think about packaging up enough people to make the salaries match and move them to so that the the 76ers can restart because it seems like they are at the end of their window and that the Trailblazers could go all in because championships while no it's going to like criticize Damian Lillard for going somewhere else different championships have different value whether we want to admit it or not I'm a big one on that they all have different weights LeBron coming back against the 73 when when Warriors has a huge value no doubt Damian Lillard going to another team and winning a championship I'm sure it'll feel great it'll be all good to him but it's not a legendary moment Damian Lillard sticking with this franchise the entire time and them finding a way to pull in some other player at the trade deadline and then making a run and somebody gets injured in the playoffs something happens they find themselves in the championship we didn't think the heat could get there the last few seasons but they've been on the doorstep or in the championship every year I could see the Blazers with one move doing that and that to me is a story that we haven't really seen the the um all-time great movement at the end of his career the ring Chase we've seen it before it feels a little different I'm sure Damien would love the championship no matter how he gets it but I guarantee you'll feel a lot better if he brings it to Portland you meant to call Anthony towns that should be a guy they should think about because you're going to have two guards in the back court and you don't have with scoot Henderson or if you have to a guy like Carl Anthony towns who may be sick and tired and let's be honest that's not Anthony Everett's team yeah with the Minnesota Timberwolves because that's a bad mother shut your mouth that kid from Georgia he's taking over that franchise if you call Anthony towns and you pair with a Damian Lillard now you got an inside outside force that can do some kind of damage in the Western Conference yeah all right so if Damian Lillard does leave he averaged 32.2 points this season which will be the most by a player to start the next season on a new team in NBA history thanks for watching ESPN on YouTube for live streaming Sports and premium content subscribe to ESPN Plus