{"id":1624,"date":"2021-06-02T20:27:51","date_gmt":"2021-06-02T20:27:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wordpress-583903-1890774.cloudwaysapps.com\/?p=1624"},"modified":"2021-08-23T17:55:12","modified_gmt":"2021-08-23T21:55:12","slug":"how-damian-lillard-became-basketballs-best-clutch-shooter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.inspirationpost.com\/2021\/06\/02\/how-damian-lillard-became-basketballs-best-clutch-shooter\/","title":{"rendered":"How Damian Lillard Became Basketball\u2019s Best Clutch Shooter"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>There are few plays in sports as exciting as a buzzer-beater in basketball. And there are few players in basketball who have hit as many buzzer-beaters as Damian Lillard.<\/p>\n<p>Lillard\u2019s late-game heroics are already the stuff of legend. There\u2019s even a phrase for it:<a href=\"https:\/\/www.blazersedge.com\/2018\/4\/6\/17204202\/portland-trail-blazers-damian-lillard-dame-time\"><strong> Dame Time<\/strong><\/a>. Time and again, Lillard is able to bend the last minutes of the fourth quarter to his will.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/mejFtEY5faU\" width=\"870\" height=\"490\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><span data-mce-type=\"bookmark\" style=\"display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;\" class=\"mce_SELRES_start\">\ufeff<\/span><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>This season alone, Lillard has seven (seven!) shots that either tied the game or gave his team the lead in the final minute. And when it comes to clutch scoring (points scored in the last 5 minutes of a five-point game), he leads the league with 162 points.<\/p>\n<p>Any discussion about clutch players tends to sound almost mystical: like scoring with the game on the line is possible because of some innate, unknowable energy. So credit to Paolo Uggetti at The Ringer, who <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theringer.com\/nba\/2021\/5\/27\/22454891\/damian-lillard-buzzer-beaters-portland-trail-blazers\">dissected exactly how<\/a><\/strong> Lillard is able to hit those game-changing daggers.<\/p>\n<p>In short: he puts in the work. Not only does Dame shoot up to 300 3-pointers at every practice, he also shoots them in every way imaginable &#8212; including with his feet planted on the floor, to improve his core strength. He also works every offseason to expand his range. \u201cThe best way to prepare for [those clutch moments] is to know that you\u2019re giving yourself the best chance to be successful,\u201d Lillard told The Ringer. \u201cWhen it comes to the end of the game, I feel like I can lean on my training more than most people.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Maybe putting up 300 3s &#8212; and doing so multiple times a week &#8212; isn\u2019t doable for everybody. But what you <em>can<\/em> replicate is Lillard\u2019s mentality on the practice court. His coach at Oakland High, Orlando Watkins, summarizes it like this: \u201cThere\u2019s no need to be in here for three hours and only do 20 minutes of real work. Just go hard for an hour, go hard for 30 minutes, and then get up out of here, because there\u2019s no need to fake it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; There are few plays in sports as exciting as a buzzer-beater in basketball. And there are few players in basketball who have hit as many buzzer-beaters as Damian Lillard. Lillard\u2019s late-game heroics are already the stuff of legend. There\u2019s even a phrase for it: Dame Time. Time and again, Lillard is able to bend [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3303,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.inspirationpost.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1624"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.inspirationpost.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.inspirationpost.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inspirationpost.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inspirationpost.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1624"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.inspirationpost.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1624\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3304,"href":"https:\/\/www.inspirationpost.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1624\/revisions\/3304"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inspirationpost.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.inspirationpost.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1624"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inspirationpost.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1624"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inspirationpost.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1624"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}