Portland Trail Blazers center Jusuf Nurkic will plan to aim for restricted free agency next summer, as only three days after left prior to the Oct. 16 deadline for a contract extension, according to Shams Charania of The Vertical.
The big man was acquired from the Denver Nuggets last season prior to the trade deadline and put up some fantastic numbers during the latter end of the campaign, asserting himself as the starting center of Terry Stotts' team. The Blazers have yet to extend an offer to the 23-year-old, making an extension a real unlikely scenario moving forward the next few days.
The organization has done its best trying to unload big contracts, as they did by trading away Allen Crabbe and consequently waiving Andrew Nicholson with a stretch provision in a now rare trade-and-waive scenario.
Portland committed oodles of cash into its bench (an underperforming Evan Turner and Meyers Leonard), including triple-digit contracts to its starting backcourt and leftover royalties to be paid to Anderson Varejao and Festus Ezeli, split into the next four seasons.
Nurkic can be a focal point of the low-post as a bruising presence on the block to ease the burden of a dynamic backcourt duo of Damian Lillard and C.J. McCollum, who will need a helping hand if they hope to battle for a higher seed than eighth this time around after two straight defeats at the hands of the Golden State Warriors.
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