Damian Lillard Talkin’ A’s Baseball (Cespedes Trade) While We Discover #SplashBrothers Are Red Sox Fans (Photo: @letsgowarriors Instagram account)
MENDENHALL CENTER, LAS VEGAS, NV — Day Four of USA Basketball Men’s National Team (#USABMNT) training camp was subdued, with the Select Team being sent home, confirmed by a morning tweet by Draymond Green, stating he was “wheels up” on a flight back to his hometown of Saginaw, Michigan.
However, big news out from Major League Baseball this morning had the Oakland Athletics with a blockbuster trade with the Boston Red Sox, that sent outfielder/slugger Yoenis Cespedes to Boston for pitcher Jon Lester. It was a move described by Marcus Thompson of the Bay Area News Group as the A’s general manager Billy Beane going “all in” for a World Series ring.
Naturally, with Oakland native and Portland Trail Blazers point guard Damian Lillard in the building here at #TeamUSA camp, we had to get his take. As it turns out, he hadn’t heard of the news yet.
“So we actually got action? We had action before,” Lillard told LetsGoWarriors, “Man, that’s big. I mean, that was tough, but I think we got better. We were doing great before, but I think we got better. It’s kind of like this might be our year. This might be it.”
“That reminds me of when we had Tim Hudson, Mark Mulder, Barry Zito,” said Lillard, “When we had all those guys at the same time.”
Lillard proceeded to rattle off names from the Art Howe era: Jermaine Dye, Jason Giambi, Jeremy Giambi, Ray Durham, Eric Chavez, Eric Byrnes, Matt Stairs.
After a long pause, Lillard even threw in Terrence Long.
“We had a nice squad,” Lillard reminisced.
Meanwhile, Stephen Curry, who’s been known to don an A’s cap in the Golden State Warriors locker room on occasion, seemed overly happy to hear that Cespedes would be headed to Boston.
“Helps my Red Sox out, getting some hitting in there to help Big Papi out,” Curry said, in reference to David Ortiz.
Red Sox?
Well, at least the Bay Area — especially those opposite the Bay from Oakland — can rest assured that Warriors backcourt teammate and Southern California native Klay Thompson is not a Los Angeles Dodgers fan.
“I played shortstop and I loved Nomar Garciaparra. He was a Southern California kid and I just love Nomar,” Thompson explained.
“Growing up it was the Red Sox,” Thompson said, “because I used to love Pedro (Martinez), Nomar Garciaparra, Manny Ramirez, David Ortiz, Kevin Millar, Jason Varitek, Tim Wakefield, that whole team, man. I loved their uni’s.”
Wait, both of the #SplashBrothers are Red Sox fans?
“Is he really? No. Why’s he? That’s wild,” Curry said when he learned of Thompson’s similar allegiance.
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