Portland Trail Blazers: 3 players facing the most pressure in 2019-20
By Amaar Burton
2. C.J. McCollum
The shortlist of the best active NBA players to have not yet made an All-Star Game has to include C.J. McCollum.
Since winning the league’s Most Improved Player award in 2016, McCollum has been a consistent 20-points-per-game scorer. He led the league in free-throw accuracy when he made 91.2 percent from the line in 2016-17. Last season he averaged 21.0 points per game on 45.9 percent field-goal shooting.
McCollum had a couple of monster performances in the 2019 playoffs, pouring in 41 points in Portland’s four-overtime win over the Denver Nuggets in Game 3 of their second-round series. He followed that up by dropping 37 points in Game 7 of that series to put the Blazers in the conference finals.
After signing his lucrative extension, McCollum is under pressure to not only continue improving individually but also to help the Blazers continue an upward trajectory toward legitimate title contention.
As good as he’s been, the Blazers may need him to be a little bit better.