Trail Blazers guard Damian Lillard tends to draw a lot of attention when he's on the court. He's been getting a fair amount off the court lately as well.
First, Lillard picked up 187,910 votes in the last week of fan voting for starters at the 2023 All-Star Game, scheduled to be held February 19 in Salt Lake City. But Lillard still remains in seventh among Western Conference guards in the latest round of returns. He's got considerably more votes that Lakers guard Austin Reaves, who is averaging 10.8 points, 3.1 rebounds and 2.2 assists as a part-time starter this season, in eighth but is well behind another Lakers guard, Russell Westbrook, in sixth.
It’s mostly academic at this point anyway, as Golden State’s Stephen Curry at over five million votes and Dallas’ Luka Doncic at nearly five million votes are far ahead of the rest of the Western Conference guards, but if nothing else, you should continue voting if for no other reason than to keep him from falling below Reaves, Devin Booker and De’Aaron Fox, all of whom who trail Lillard with a few more days of fan voting left to go. Voting ends on Saturday, with the starters announced a few days later on TNT.
One also assumes that Lillard, who is averaging 29.2 points on 45 percent shooting from the field and 36 percent shooting from three, 7.2 assists, 3.9 rebounds and nearly a steal per game this season, will do better in player and media voting -- fan ballots comprise 50 percent of the vote, while players and media vote split the other fifty percent -- than in fan voting, which favors players in larger markets and with significant international presences. So while he’s almost certain to not be named a starter, it’s very possible he finishes the voting for All-Star starters up few spots (for as much as that matters).
And of course, that doesn’t mean Lillard won’t make the All-Star team, as the rest of the rosters after the starters are determined by coaches vote. He’s not a lock to be named to the NBA midseason exhibition, but it would be rather surprising at this point if he wasn’t selected by the coaches. They know.
Then we come to the fans who vote with their wallets. According to the NBA, Lillard ranks tenth this season in jersey sales, at least based on numbers from NBAStore.com. The 6-3 guard out of Weber State slots in behind Joel Embiid in ninth and ahead of Trae Young in 11th. Lillard is one of only two players in the most recent top-selling jersey list whose team isn’t in the Top 10 of NBA Merchandise sales (Ja Morant is the other). Just another example of Lillard out-performing his stock.