National Basketball Association

Is Damian Lillard the best shooter in NBA history?

Updated Feb. 27, 2023 6:15 p.m. ET

Damian Lillard added to his list of accomplishments on Sunday night, injecting more juice into his argument as one of the game's greatest shooters.

The Portland Trail Blazers star scored 71 points to help lead his team to a 131-114 win over the Houston Rockets. He scored 41 points in the first half, including 16 points in the final 4:15 before the break.

On Monday's "Undisputed," Shannon Sharpe was asked how impressed he was by the performance on a scale of 1-10. He responded by saying, "A hundred? One thousand?" before making an even bolder claim about Lillard.

"I'm probably going to say something that you're going to disagree with," Sharpe said to his co-host, Skip Bayless. "But of all the great shooters — Steph Curry, Klay Thompson, Larry Bird, Reggie Miller — if you ask me, ‘Shannon, you need one shot to win the game, [who are you picking?' I'm going to take [Lillard]."

Sharpe explained that Lillard doesn't get his fair share of respect because he's playing in the shadow of another all-time great marksman, comparing it to other quarterbacks not getting respect in recent years because of Tom Brady's dominance.

"He's unbelievable, [especially] for a man of his size," Sharpe said. "Because of the era he played in … he's not going to get the credit he deserves as a shooter because he happens to be in the same era as who? Stephen Wardell Curry. This young man can flat-out shoot the basketball. [Sunday] night, it was on full display.

" … The way he can shoot, catch-and-shoot, shoot off the dribble, put it on the floor, and get to the midrange — we saw him [Sunday] night finish at the rim. He dunked [on someone]. Of the eight players to score at least 70 in a game, he had the highest true shooting percentage out of all of them. He had an 80.4 true shooting percentage. … He might have gotten 80 [points] had they not started to double-team him coming out of the break."

As for Bayless, he said he wasn't as impressed by Lillard's performance. He noted how it came against a Rockets team that holds the worst record in the league at 13-47 and allows the most made 3-pointers per game (15), adding that the Trail Blazers haven't been great this season either with a 29-31 record.

Nonetheless, Bayless gave Lillard his due as an all-time great shooter.

"I'm going to give you one great, all-time point here: Damian Lillard is the greatest deep shooter I've ever seen," Bayless said. "I'm talking about deep 3s, logo 3s — they're effortlessly shot. They're shot like they're free throws, and he slightly has more range than Steph Curry does because he's a little stronger than Steph is."

Sunday's game indeed featured some legendary deep shot-making from Lillard. He made five of eight attempts from 30 feet and beyond, adding more clips to his already memorable highlight package of all the deep 3s.

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