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Damian Lillard’s love of boxing, CJ McCollum ‘too good to trade,’ Minnesota coaching drama, the players who can’t dunk: NBA news and notes
Updated Feb 22, 2021;
Posted Feb 22, 2021
Damian Lillard #0 of the Portland Trail Blazers reacts in the second quarter against the Washington Wizards at Moda Center on February 20, 2021 in Portland, Oregon. (Photo by Abbie Parr/Getty Images)Getty Images
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It’s hard to believe, but the first half of the coronavirus-shortened NBA season is nearing a close. After the Portland Trail Blazers visit the Phoenix Suns Monday night, they will have just five games and less than two weeks remaining before the All-Star break.
Feb 22, 2021
Every so often, at one of the camps he runs for kids in his native Australia, Patty Mills will be approached by one of his lifelong fans with a request:
Can you dunk for me?
For most NBA players it’d be a breeze. He’d clear out a path, measure his steps and drive the ball through the rim with authority. He’d land and his admirers would celebrate because they’d just seen something unfathomably cool.
Illustration by Davide Barco
Unfathomable is the right word for it, too, because there is a problem with this scenario: Patty Mills doesn’t dunk. Of all the choices he could make with the ball, dunking, he says, isn’t even an afterthought. “I want to say it’s at the bottom of the list, but to be honest, it’s probably not even on the list,” Mills says. On being unable to show off for the kids: “That’s a little bit of a deflating moment when I’m like, ‘Oh, I don’t think I can get there right now, mate,’” Mills says. “‘But I’ll keep