The NBA star helping protect his opponents’ feet

Even before they even stepped out onto an NBA court as teammates, Portland Trail Blazers point guard Damian Lillard dished out an assist to his backcourt mate Ja Morant. At the start of the team’s preseason training camp, Morant was getting ready to put on his shoes when he mentioned to Lillard that he needed more pairs of the orthotics he was using. “You know that’s my company, right?” Lillard said to Morant, who initially thought Lillard was joking. Lillard hasn’t gone around the NBA evangelizing his own product, but as Morant’s usage showed, it turns out he hasn’t needed to. Move Insoles, the company Lillard co-founded with longtime athlete marketer Nate Jones, has already been widely adopted by athletes across multiple sports.

Jones, who works at Goodwin Sports, the agency that represents Lillard, began working on Move in earnest in 2019. He courted Lillard as a co-founder, and other NBA stars such as Chris Paul and Jamal Crawford as investors. Jones estimates that around 25 NBA teams now use the product, in addition to non-basketball stars such as the Dallas Cowboys’ CeeDee Lamb and five-time WNBA MVP A’Ja Wilson. And like Morant, those teams and players are using the insoles not because of a corporate partnership or at Lillard’s request, but through word of mouth. “I’ve been watching the