It’s been Dame time all season long in Portland.

The All-Star point guard has led the Blazers to the No. 3 seed in a competitive Western Conference, averaging 26.8 points, 6.6 assists, and 4.5 rebounds per game.

In his mind, Lillard deserves to make the All-NBA first team, via SB Nation‘s Paul Flannery:

Dame hasn’t entirely stopped fighting for validation, even if that pursuit isn’t his sole drive. At the all-star break he declared he was as good as any point guard in the league and he has not backed off that stance. “I should be first team All-NBA,” he says. “That’s how I feel. But I also feel like, this is how it’s going to be.”

As Dame told Flannery, his success has partially stemmed from a revelation he had before the 2017-18 campaign began:

“It’s funny, because coming into this season, I kind of just relaxed,” Lillard tells me following a mid-March practice. “I was like man, I’m not going to kill myself over people not recognizing what I’m doing. I don’t need validation. I just let it go.”

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