The Portland Trail Blazers are bound to look much different when Damian Lillard returns from the longest absence of his career for the 2022-23 season opener. Unfortunately for the best player in franchise history, though, the re-tooled Blazers also won't be as talented or experienced as the now-defunct team he left after the New Year, either.
So much for Portland's truly transformative trade deadline upping its championship equity—on paper, at least.
The Blazers' hopes of competing at the top of the Western Conference next season don't rely on outright replacing the likes of C.J. McCollum, Norman Powell, Robert Covington and Larry Nance Jr. All four of those guys are good enough when healthy to earn regular rotation minutes for a real title contender right now. Cutting ties with McCollum, Powell, Covington and Nance at the deadline wasn't about improving Portland's base of proven playoff performers, but getting younger and more flexible while building out a roster that has a prospective whole bigger than the sum of its parts.
The Blazers were never going to coalesce into that type of overachieving team with more than 70% of the salary cap allotted to undersized, offense-first guards, even if Covington and Nance—aging and ever-creaky—were capable of sustaining their bygone peaks defensively. Two plus two didn't quite add up to four in Portland before the trade deadline, let alone five. The latter, remember, is a prerequisite for any team chasing a championship that's absent the trump card of multiple superstars.
Jerami Grant, in the thick of his prime at 28, has never even been an All-Star. Every indication suggests his ceiling has already been reached. Just because his overall resumé is similar to that of a player like McCollum's, though, hardly means Grant wouldn't be a more optimal running mate for Lillard, a reality the front office no doubt knew at the deadline.
RUMOR: Blazers gunning for Jerami Grant trade after breaking up Damian Lillard, CJ McCollum #RipCityhttps://t.co/D6Z7xYG0Zk
— Blazers Nation (@BlazersNationCP) February 8, 2022
Just over six weeks later, the Blazers' interest in Grant persists.
Shams Charania of The Athletic recently reported that Portland is “expected to seriously pursue” trading for Grant this summer. On the latest edition of The HoopsHype Podcast with Michael Scotto, James L. Edwards of The Athletic went a step further, clarifying the Blazers are “still the front-runner” to land Grant assuming they offer Detroit a lottery pick.
Conventional wisdom is the Pistons won't be able to net a more valuable single asset in any Grant trade than a 2022 Portland first-rounder. The Blazers' own pick is poised to fall in the middle of the lottery, and there's a chance they get another lottery selection depending on where the New Orleans Pelicans finish this season. If the Pelicans miss the playoffs and their first-round pick lands between Nos. 5-14 on lottery night, it will be conveyed to Portland as part of the trade for McCollum.
All reporting on the Blazers' interest in Grant indicates New Orleans' pick is the one interim general manager Joe Cronin and company hope to send to Detroit for Grant. What's less certain is how they'd proceed if McCollum, Brandon Ingram and the Pelicans—now ninth in the West after Sunday's comeback win over the fading Los Angeles Lakers—advance past the play-in tournament, leaving Portland with just one opportunity to add an elite young talent whose contract would be team controlled for more than a half-decade.
Looming over that potential dilemma, of course, is Lillard's status entering his 11th season. Fully re-committed to the Blazers and feeling healthier than he has in years, Lillard expects 2022-23 to be among the best campaigns of his career—the type that could vault his team to heights that currently seem unreachable.
No matter how well Lillard plays, that won't come to pass unless Portland adds Grant and another impact player via trade, the draft or free agency over the offseason. Go ahead and dispense with the notion of the Blazers using cap space this summer, by the way. Lillard forecasted them operating as an over-the-cap team in an interview with Chris Haynes of Yahoo! Sports last week, implicitly acknowledging expenses of a pricey new contract for Simons as well as Nurkic's cap hold.
An imminent extension for Grant—at $112 million over four years—if Portland acquires him factors in there, too. At best, the Blazers will have the full mid-level or taxpayer's mid-level exception to sign outside free agents this summer.
That would be the case even if they didn't trade for Grant, adding more justification for Cronin to pull that trigger. There are just no surefire means for Portland to meaningfully improve its roster next season beyond a trade for him or another player of his caliber. A pair of lottery rookies would give the Blazers a strong, enviable foundation for the long-term future, but Lillard's presence keeps them on a more pressing timeline to level back up toward real contention—no matter how dominant he is at age 32 and beyond.
https://twitter.com/BlazersNationCP/status/1507417804554702849
In a vacuum, Portland's best path forward is obvious.
Simons' meteoric rise to stardom affords the front office latitude to move on from Lillard, trading him for a massive haul and initiating a full-scale rebuild behind Chauncey Billups, a budding incumbent core and plethora of additional draft picks. But Rip City remains Lillard's town, and will until the moment he approaches management about seeking a trade. The Blazers just couldn't stomach the public relations hit of moving a local icon against his will after the most tumultuous, controversial year in franchise history.
Where that leaves them, unfortunately, probably isn't far from the same place they were before Cronin began tearing down the roster in February.
Portland will surely make the playoffs if it trades for Grant, but expecting anything more than a hard-fought, first-round performance is setting yourself up for disappointment. It's safe to say the same would apply going forward as long as Lillard remains in tow, pushing the Blazers toward more win-now moves that won't be enough to put them over the top as championship hopefuls.
The opportunity cost of that approach is theoretical, too, but would at least give Portland more time and flexibility to build a lasting contender as Lillard plays out his prime elsewhere. Sacrificing the present for the future at a crossroads is almost always the most prudent approach to team-building.
The Blazers aren't quite headed that way now, trying to live in the best of both worlds between maximizing Lillard's prime and looking beyond it. Here's hoping New Orleans cooperates by missing the playoffs. Otherwise, even Portland's fraught, best-laid plans of accomplishing both those goals won't be an option.
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