Damian Lillard, who has requested a trade from the Portland Trail Blazers, was interested in getting traded to the Golden State Warriors before the Dubs acquired Chris Paul from the Washington Wizards, according to NBA insider Ramona Shelburne of ESPN.
The Warriors traded Jordan Poole to the Wizards for Paul before Lillard’s trade request became public.
“They had another choice they could have waited for Dame,” Shelburne said. “Dame is from the Bay Area. I know he was interested.”
Lillard was born and raised in Oakland, California. He’s friends with Warriors stars Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green. It would have been absurd to see Lillard play in Golden State next to Curry, Thompson and Green, as the Dubs would have been nearly unstoppable on offense.
Warriors fans will have to settle for Paul, who is expected to start alongside Curry, Thompson, Green and Andrew Wiggins. CP3 averaged 13.9 points, 4.3 rebounds and 8.9 assists last season for the Phoenix Suns while shooting 44.0% from the field, 37.5% from beyond the arc and 83.1% from the free-throw line. He is 38 years old.
NBA NEWS & TRADE RUMORS: Damian Lillard, Portland Trail Blazers & Golden State Warriors Updates
Green is excited to play with Paul on the Warriors next season. The four-time champion told Los Angeles Clippers forward Paul George on the “Podcast P With Paul George” podcast that Paul is going to make the Warriors’ offense more dynamic.
“I think he brings a couple things,” Green said. “Number one, I thought last year — and Steph said this in his press conference — we ran out of variety. And what I mean about variety is, in a team, you need to have a variety. Our team last year didn’t have a variety of ways to score and I think CP adds another thing to the menu to address the topic of a variety of ways to score. CP plays totally different than Steph, totally different than Klay, totally different than myself.”
NBA NEWS & TRADE RUMORS: Damian Lillard, Portland Trail Blazers & Golden State Warriors Updates
Lillard wants the Blazers to trade him to the Miami Heat. However, since Dame doesn’t have a no-trade clause in his contract, Portland can trade the seven-time All-Star anywhere it wants to.
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