NBA Trade Deadline Portfolio 2018: Portland Trail Blazers
A few weeks before last season’s trade deadline, the slumping Trail Blazers swapped Mason Plumlee for Jusuf Nurkic. A reinvigorated Nurkic helped Portland eek into the playoffs and unsurprisingly receive a drubbing at the hands of the Warriors. The Blazers stood pat during July’s transaction packed bonanza after their early playoff exit, making few major roster moves. Other than trading Allen Crabbe to dodge the luxury tax and adding youngsters through the draft, Portland’s roster has remained remarkably similar.
While last season’s Blazers went 41-41, this iteration of the team is on pace to finish with a few more wins. They’re 26-22 right now, but the journey to that record has been surprising. For most of the Damian Lillard era, the Blazers have been a top offensive team and a bad or average defensive team at best. This season that track record has flipped: Portland has a top-10 defense and a below average offense. The team has struggled to find its identity throughout the season, especially on the offensive side of the ball. The decline in offensive output and the team’s inability to consistently create easy looks is alarming.
Portland has improved substantially on offense over the past month. The Blazers are in solid position to make the playoffs, but something is off with this roster. Portland is dead last in a number of important offensive categories, including assist rate, shooting percentage at the rim and fast break points. The team’s spacing is much tighter than in past seasons. They start out with Evan Turner and Nurkic on the floor, and Al-Farouq Aminu has cooled after opening the season hot from 3-point range. The Blazers have shot a high percentage from beyond the arc all year, but there aren’t many reliable shooters on the team outside of Lillard and McCollum. Even worse, they just don’t get up enough 3-point attempts per game to have an efficient offense given their other weaknesses on that end.
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Portland should have a handful of objectives at the deadline. The Blazers should try to acquire reliable shooting on the wing and at the four, and bolster their rickety bench if possible. Management should also look to unload bad salary in order to duck the tax or at least reduce a potential tax payment. (Remarkably, this team has the sixth highest payroll in the league). In any case, the Trail Blazers project to be active at the deadline.
As far as acquisitions go, there are a few players on the market that could really help them. The first guy that comes to mind is Chicago’s miracle worker, Nikola Mirotic. Reports have peripherally linked Portland to Mirotic since early January, so there seems to be some legit interest here. Mirotic would vastly improve their spacing, which could help unclog what has been a stagnant offense. Playing him mostly in units that feature one of the Lillard and McCollum duo could also give the Blazers some much needed scoring off the bench.
The Trail Blazers might have to give up a first-rounder for Niko, though, which is a high asking price. If they shed some terrible salary and land Mirotic, throwing in a future first could be a worthwhile deal. A combination of Harkless, Vonleh and a first-round pick could do the trick. Although, Chicago might be reluctant to take back the putrefying salary of Harkless.
The three spot has also been an issue for Portland because it has no legit two-way wings in the rotation. After adequately filling that role last year, Moe Harkless has completely fallen apart. Turner, who’s played well in the starting lineup, has limited range on offense and isn’t a good defender. Although he’s definitely not a sexy name, James Ennis could really help this team. Ennis is a tough defender who has shot 36 percent from 3-point land during his two seasons in Memphis. Throwing him into Portland’s rotation for about 25 minutes per game could be huge on both ends of the floor. Also, the Blazers should be able to pry him from the Grizzlies for relatively little. For example, trading Vonleh and some kind of second rounder straight up for Ennis probably works for both sides.
The Blazers have also reportedly expressed interest in Clippers center DeAndre Jordan. That would be a very tricky trade to construct given Portland’s lack of tangible assets beyond Lillard and McCollum. Aside from that duo, the rest of Portland’s big contracts have become bad money. These two teams probably won’t be able to agree on a combination of salaries and assets to get a deal done. The Blazers would have to include a first-rounder and Nurkic in such a trade, as well as a ton of salary flotsam. They would almost certainly have to sprinkle in some more future assets for the Clippers even listen, though.
Next: NBA Trade Deadline Portfolio 2018: Washington Wizards
In terms of shedding salary, Noah Vonleh, Meyers Leonard and Moe Harkless are the guys that the Blazers will likely attempt to move on from. Leonard might be completely untradable at this point and Harkless’ value is plummeting with each passing day. Vonleh makes just a hair above $3 million, but unloading him for nothing would get Portland below the tax. He is probably the most realistic option for Portland to move on from in a cost cutting maneuver at this point.