The Portland Trail Blazers have reached out to the Detroit Pistons about a possible trade for Jerami Grant, Shams Charania of The Athletic reported on Monday morning. Last week, we named Grant as one of three potential targets interim general manager Joe Cronin and the Blazers front office must seek out prior to the trade deadline coming and going on February 10th.

Clearly, there's more to Portland's interest in Grant than hope, speculation and Damian Lillard's reported desire for a wing. Here are three reasons why the veteran forward is a top-tier prospective trade acquisition for the Blazers.

Defensive and positional versatility

Grant is listed at 6'8” and 210 pounds, but those measurables aren't an accurate indicator of his size on the floor. He boasts some of the longest arms in the league, with a 7'3” wingspan, and has worked hard to fill out his frame since entering the league as a lithe second-round pick in 2014.

Grant's natural position is power forward, the one he's played almost exclusively with the Pistons in 2021-22. But Grant proved with the Denver Nuggets during the 2020 playoffs that he has enough quickness and overall dexterity to at least challenge the likes of LeBron James and Kawhi Leonard one-on-one, making life especially tough on the LA Clippers superstar in the Orlando bubble.

He didn't fare as well switching onto Anthony Davis, but the fact Denver coach Michael Malone was comfortable with having Grant check one of basketball's best big men when circumstances called for it speaks volumes all by itself. Before being traded to Denver, Grant even spent some time as a small-ball five in certain lineups with the Oklahoma City Thunder.

Grant isn't an especially instinctive help defender. He's not the vertical athlete he was a few years ago, and seems to have lost a half step sliding his feet on the perimeter. You don't want Grant switching onto cat-quick point guards like Ja Morant or smooth ultra-shooting guards like Devin Booker. The league's truly elite defenders at forward aren't available for a reason, though, and Grant's presence would go a long way toward filling gaps of versatility, size and athleticism in Portland's porous defense.

Three-level scoring ability

Grant's brief heyday as Detroit's foundational offensive alpha dog after last season tipped off proved expectedly short-lived. He finished 2020-21 with a below-average 55.6 true shooting percentage, substandard efficiency that's reared its head again in this season's early going—an especially damning development because Grant is being assisted on more of his scores.

But go ahead and throw out his ugly 29.8% shooting in isolations and .65 points per possession as a pick-and-roll ball-handler, per NBA.com/stats. Grant wouldn't just be closer to a tertiary offensive option than primary one in Portland, but he'd be surrounded by players for more talented and experienced than he currently is with the Pistons. The same positional flexibility and overall dynamism that makes him so attractive to the Blazers on the other end applies offensively, too, albeit to a lesser extent.

Grant is at a disappointing 33.0% clip on catch-and-shoot threes this season, but shot 36.7% on those tries a year ago and scraped 40% on standstill triples each of the two seasons prior. Though moving without the ball was a much bigger part of his game in Denver playing next to Nikola Jokic, Grant's been hyper-efficient scoring off cuts with Detroit in 2021-22. He's averaging 9.0 drives per game, more than everyone with the Blazers but Lillard and C.J. McCollum, and has the size and touch to exploit mismatches in the pinch post as necessary.

Grant doesn't have much room left to improve. At this point, he is who he is as a scorer. But scaling back his responsibilities next to a playmaker like Lillard, who warps defenses coverages from almost the moment he crosses halfcourt, would no doubt make Grant look much better offensively. His ability to score in myriad ways from all three levels of the floor—merely solid as it is—is something Portland's never had next to Lillard.

Timelines and costs

The other team that's reportedly shown interest in Grant is the Los Angeles Lakers. Though many more will no doubt come calling on arguably the league's best available wing, the Blazers' timeline toward contention—as soon as possible and extending as long as Lillard wants, basically—makes them an especially snug fit for Grant.

According to Charania, any team trading for Grant will do so with the expectation of inking him to an extension this summer nearing the maximum $112 million allowed over four seasons. It's unclear how the Lakers, who let Alex Caruso walk this offseason  over further luxury tax payments, could sign Grant to an extension without getting even more expensive.

Portland isn't exactly a spendthrift when it comes to the luxury tax, but the team's overall state of flux basically guarantees trading the rich contract owed to C.J. McCollum should Grant be brought to Rip City. As bad as McCollum's contract may be, it's far more tradable than Russell Westbrook's. Paying up for Grant's prime years is something the Blazers should be willing to do given Lillard's insistence he's fully committed to the only team he's ever known.

Another potential feather in Portland's cap here? Its prospective trade package for Grant. Would Anfernee Simons—the type of elite backcourt shot-maker Detroit needs to maximize Cunningham—and a top-10 protected 2024 first-round pick be enough for the Pistons? Denver paid a similar price for Aaron Gordon at last year's trade deadline, one at which Detroit could very well balk given Grant's superior scoring chops.

Either way, some teams may be scared off by Grant's looming extension and Troy Weaver's demands in trade talks. It would be a mistake if the Blazers were among them.