Trail Blazers Could Be Walking A Fine Line With Damian Lillard

The Portland Trail Blazers have plenty of questions to answer as they navigate the early portion of their season, but one of the biggest could revolve around Damian Lillard's availability on back-to-back nights. After managing to play in both games of a difficult back-to-back against the Los Angeles Lakers and San Antonio Spurs, Lillard gave Portland another reason to feel optimistic about what this team could accomplish.

The Athletic's Law Murray highlighted the importance of Lillard's availability while discussing Portland's challenging week, "The Trail Blazers wound up splitting a tough week, getting bombarded at the end by MVP candidates Luka Dončic and Victor Wembanyama on back-to-back nights with that notorious LAX to PDX flight in between. But what was encouraging is that Damian Lillard was able to play both games of that back-to-back. Do you believe that Lillard can keep doing that, as well as maintain his elite free-throw attempt rate (6.3 free throws per game)? That is a big swing factor in Portland’s season."

Murray makes an important point. Lillard's ability to stay on the floor could have a massive impact on Portland's ceiling, especially with the team looking to establish itself as a legitimate playoff contender in the Western Conference.

Even at this stage of his career, Lillard remains one of the most important pieces of Portland's offense. His ability to create shots, draw fouls and take over games gives the Blazers a level of offensive firepower that is difficult to replace. Maintaining his current free-throw rate is particularly important, as getting to the line consistently gives Portland a reliable way to generate points even when the offense struggles.

There is also an interesting wrinkle involving Ja Morant's absence. With Morant sidelined, Portland has needed Lillard to shoulder an even greater portion of the responsibility in the backcourt. It is fair to wonder whether Lillard would have played both games of the back-to-back if Morant were healthy and available to handle some of those minutes.

Having another All-Star-caliber guard available would give Portland considerably more flexibility with its rotations and allow the coaching staff to be more cautious with Lillard's workload. Instead, the Blazers have had to lean heavily on their veteran guard while trying to remain competitive without Morant.

That makes Lillard's availability even more important in the short term. Portland cannot afford to lose another key contributor, particularly with the schedule offering very little room for recovery.

The encouraging part is that Lillard has shown he can still handle a demanding workload. Whether that continues throughout the season remains to be seen, but his ability to stay available could ultimately be one of the biggest factors determining how far the Trail Blazers can go. It will be interesting to see how the team handles back to backs for him throughout the rest of the season.