Portland Trail Blazers All-Star point guard Damian Lillard stole the show on Friday night when he took center stage at Staples Center in the Los Angeles Lakers' first game following the tragic death of the great Kobe Bryant. Lillard honored his fallen hero the best way he knew how — by playing at his very best on Bryant's former home floor. The Blazers guard led his team to an impressive 127-119 victory, finishing with 48 points, seven triples, nine rebounds, 10 assists, and two steals.

Lillard then followed up that gem with another fantastic showing on Saturday — the second night of an extremely tough back-to-back set — helping his side to a win against yet another Western Conference contender in the Utah Jazz. The five-time All-Star torched the Jazz for 51 points, nine 3-pointers, two rebounds, 12 assists, and a steal en route to a 124-107 victory.

At this point, it's safe to say that Damian Lillard has been playing on an MVP-caliber level of late, and he certainly has the numbers to prove it. Over the past six contests, the 29-year-old has been on a jaw-dropping scoring spree, averaging 48.8 points (on 54.8 percent shooting), 7.2 rebounds, 10.2 assists, 1.2 steals, and an almost unimaginable 8.2 3-pointers on a 57.0 percent clip. Yup, you read that right.

The Blazers have won five out of their past six games, and are slowly inching their way toward the playoff picture in the West. Following a slow start to the season, they're now 23-27 and are just a game and a half behind the eighth-seeded Memphis Grizzlies. There's no doubt that this has been thanks in large part to Lillard's out of this world play.

Damian Lillard has been the best player in the league over the past few weeks, and if we were going to award the MVP title this season based on this stretch alone, the Portland superstar would be the runaway winner of this highly coveted individual award. Nonetheless, Lillard has certainly earned his way to legitimate contention for the MVP award and should at least be in the conversation.

The one thing Lillard has going against him is the fact that the Blazers had been underperforming this season before this recent stretch. The league will be hard-pressed to award the MVP title to a player whose team barely made it to the postseason unless said player has had a truly phenomenal season. Reigning MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo is having an even better season than last on a Milwaukee Bucks squad that is 41-7, so it's going to be hard to wrestle away the title away from The Greek Freak.

Then again, if Damian Lillard is able to somehow maintain his current level of play for the next couple of months, he might at least make things interesting in the MVP race.