Everything Trail Blazers Fans Need to Know About Scoot Henderson

Back in December of 2022, before Scoot Henderson made his way to thePortland Trail Blazers’ white board underlined in red ink, Mirin Fader of The Ringer pennedan extensive biographical articleof the up-and-coming star. Now that Scoot is securely in the Blazers’ fold. reviewing that piece might be a good idea for fans and all concerned.

The multi-thousand-word piece covers Henderson’s approach to the game, his time with Ignite of the G League, even some of his day-to-day existence.

Fader described Henderson as incessantly dedicated, painting him outside a practice venue on a cold day, running through imaginary on-court scenarios with an invisible ball:

Henderson is a perfectionist with an insatiable drive; he’ll pick himself and his shortcomings apart quicker than any coach can. On this morning, he’s eager to devour tape of his errors from the team’s loss the night before. “I love watching me mess up,” he says.

I gotta be great,he often thinks to himself. But he wants to be more than that; he wants to become one of the best to ever play.

She doubles down, describing Henderson’s personal credo:

“ODD” is a motto he created: “Overly Determined to Dominate”; and “odd,” as in unique. “My path isn’t the generic path. It’s an odd path,” he says.

“You’re not following anybody’s footsteps,” he says. “You’re being the leader of yourself, whether anybody follows you or not, you’re still being who you really want to be.”

Most significantly, Henderson was impressing one major audience even back then, and apparently as far back as 2021: Trail Blazers superstar Damian Lillard.

Around midnight the night before, unwinding after the Ignite’s game, he received an Instagram direct message from one of his favorite players: Damian Lillard. “Crazy,” Scoot says, beaming. He had originally reached out to the Trail Blazers star in 2021 asking for advice: “Yo, Damian Lillard. I’m Scoot Henderson. I was just wondering if you can give me some free game on shooting the next shot, and not worry about the last one?” Scoot was struggling to let mistakes go, berating himself, trying so hard to be perfect. Trying to be great.

Scoot tries to play it cool when he reads Lillard’s response. “He was telling me that he messes with my game,” Scoot says. “He’s like, ‘I seen you play’!” Lillard told him to not get caught up in missed shots: “Shoot that shit like you know it’s going in.”

The article also covers Henderson’s thoughts on first-overall pick Victor Wembanyama, team leadership, academics, and more. If you haven’tread it already, don’t miss it.