Hassan Whiteside belongs with the Portland Trail Blazers

The Portland Trail Blazers were one of the Cinderella stories of the NBA in 2015-16, bouncing from losing 80 percent of their starting lineup from the year before to making the second round of the playoffs in the tough Western Conference. Led by guards Damian Lillard and C.J. McCollum, Portland held the sixth-best offense in the league in the regular season. The other end of the floor is where the Trail Blazers will need to improve and that’s where free agent Hassan Whiteside fits perfectly.

Whiteside’s skillset is exactly what Portland needs and he fits a similar timeline to the rest of the Trail Blazers’ important pieces. Whiteside turned 27 in June but hasn’t had a normal NBA career; 2015-16 was really his first full year in the league. Lillard and McCollum will be 26 and 25, respectively, at the start of the season, and assuming McCollum is extended or re-signs when his rookie contract is up, Portland would have all three of these max-level players through the rest of their primes.

Despite their lack of a true rim protector inside and Lillard’s and McCollum’s defensive shortcomings, the Trail Blazers were able to piece together a decent defense in the restricted area. Portland ranked in the top ten in both opponent attempts at the rim and opponent field goal percentage at the rim, using unheralded big men in Mason Plumlee and Ed Davis to anchor their defense inside. However, with their focus on the restricted area intensified, they were unable to get back out to the perimeter to contest opponent’s three-pointers; opponents shot 37.3 percent from deep against the Trail Blazers last season, the fourth-worst three-point percentage defense in the league. Of the other nine teams in the bottom ten in three-point percentage defense, only one, the Toronto Raptors, made the playoffs in 2015-16.

Putting Whiteside inside might not help the Blazers put up better rim protection stats in 2016-17 and beyond, but he’ll certainly help the rest of their defense. Portland’s perimeter players will be able to stay home on shooters more often, allowing Whiteside to man the restricted area all by himself, rather than crashing in and leaving a shooter wide open from beyond the arc.

Of course, Whiteside is not without his faults. He’s not a fantastic rebounder for someone with his size and athleticism. He hunts for blocks, biting at pump-fakes far too often. His pick-and-roll defense is fairly abysmal. On the other hand, he’s really only about a year and a half into his NBA career, so these things can be ironed out, especially now that he’ll get paid his maximum contract and won’t have to worry about putting up gaudy stats in order to increase his value. There also may be some concern that his effort level will tail off once he gets paid, so perhaps the maximum contract is a double-edged sword. Terry Stotts and his staff would certainly have quite a bit of work to do with Whiteside before he became an elite defender, but he has all the physical tools that Stotts could want in a defensive anchor.

Offensively, Whiteside will provide a pick-and-roll threat the likes of which haven’t been seen in Portland in Lillard’s career. LaMarcus Aldridge provided a great pick-and-pop combination with Lillard when he was in Portland and Robin Lopez is a fine finisher around the rim, but neither of those guys has the gravity that Whiteside has when he rolls to the rim. Of players who had at least 175 possessions as the roll man, Whiteside ranked second in points per possession, behind only DeAndre Jordan.

Whiteside’s gravity pulls defenders in toward the rim and will open things up for Lillard and McCollum immensely. It’s very easy to imagine a Lillard-Whiteside pick-and-roll on one side of the floor, Lillard swinging the ball to McCollum on the other side, and McCollum either taking that three, attacking his man as he closes out, or running a second pick-and-roll with Whiteside. The Portland offense was great last season but has room to grow to even greater heights with Whiteside crashing down the lane.

There will be things Whiteside will have to work on in order to become a complete pick-and-roll threat, most noticeably his passing on the short roll. Whiteside famously generates very few assists on his own and teams are going to trap the Lillard-Whiteside pick-and-roll incessantly until Whiteside shows that he can beat them on the short roll. Of all the skills Whiteside will need to develop in order to become an elite big man on both ends, this is the one that seems most out of his reach; he has the tools to become a top-level defender but he’s never even shown flashes of being able to pass the ball effectively.

Portland will be able to fit Whiteside in financially with fairly minimal cap gymnastics required. Lillard’s new contract kicks in this year, but his concession in negotiations last year to only take 27.5 percent of the cap, instead of the full 30 percent he was allowed under the Rose Rule, will aid Portland in either adding Whiteside to the team or signing several lower-cost free agents. The Trail Blazers will have to renounce their rights to Gerald Henderson, Chris Kaman, and Brian Roberts in order to maximize their cap room for Whiteside.

While losing that trio would harm their depth, they will be able to hold onto match rights for restricted free agents Meyers Leonard, Allen Crabbe, and Maurice Harkless, all of whom are quality role players who will absolutely have a place on this Portland team. Neil Olshey and co. will be able to re-sign all three along with adding Whiteside, since Portland holds full Bird rights on all three of their restricted free agents. It’s quite likely that Portland could match any offer those three get, max out Whiteside, and still remain under the tax, but it’s hard to project how large contracts will be for mid-tier rotation players in this new cap environment, where there is more money to go around than quality players on which to spend it. Things could also blow up for Portland if one of those players signs an offer sheet with another team early on; they’ll need to convince those guys to hold off for a few days if they’re going to bring everybody back and bring Whiteside into the fold.

The Portland Trail Blazers are a team on the rise. Hassan Whiteside could be the next piece of the puzzle.

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