The Portland Trail Blazers had a very disappointing 2021-22 season. Everything seemed to go wrong for the longtime Western Conference playoff contenders, and it resulted in them missing the playoffs for the first time since 2013.
Damian Lillard missed most of the season with injuries, and his longtime partner-in-crime, CJ McCollum, was traded to the New Orleans Pelicans midway through the season. With Lillard's future in Portland very much up in the air, the Trail Blazers were seemingly set for a pivotal offseason that would determine the future of the franchise.
Rather than sit around and wait for the offseason to come to them, the Trail Blazers front office took matters into their own hands. They swung a big trade in the buildup to the 2022 NBA Draft that helped set the tone for the offseason while also landing them a new star to pair up alongside Lillard. This big move helped influence Portland's offseason proceedings, and reestablished them as playoff contenders in the Western Conference.
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Portland Trail Blazers best offseason move: trading for Jerami Grant
It may be tough to remember now, but a month ago, it seemed like Portland's offseason could take a much different path than it has. Lillard was non-committal to Portland, McCollum was gone, and another key contributor, Jusuf Nurkic, was potentially heading out the door too. The Trail Blazers were staring down the barrel of a potential rebuild.
Instead, they managed to pull off a trade for Detroit Pistons star Jerami Grant before the 2022 NBA Draft that changed everything. Portland sent a 2025 first round pick and three second round picks to Detroit in return for Grant and the Pistons 2022 second round pick. The Trail Blazers got Lillard his new partner-in-crime, and showed they had no plans of rebuilding this offseason.
Grant's two seasons with Detroit changed the outlook of his career. During his initial stints with the Philadelphia 76ers, Oklahoma City Thunder, and Denver Nuggets, Grant looked like a solid rotation piece who could be a helpful player off the bench. But with the Pistons, Grant took a massive step forward and asserted himself as one of the better players in the league.
The 2020-21 season was Grant's breakout year, as he increased his scoring average from 12 points per game the year before with Denver to 22.3 with Detroit. He was a bit less efficient this past season, averaging 19.2 points per game, but that's stil quite good, especially considering he was dealing with several injuries and only played in 47 games.
But Grant should be good to go for Portland, and should be a nice fit alongside Lillard on offense. Grant can score from all over the floor, which makes him a great scoring option behind Lillard. Lillard can conduct the offense and find shots for himself whenever he pleases, but when defenses give him more attention, he will have Grant alongside him to help take the burden off his shoulders.
The concern with Jerami Grant is that he isn't particularly great at anything other than scoring. His rebounding and assist numbers are fairly pedestrian, and his defensive impact is not what it once was. He will help open up Portland's offfense, but he's going to have to make more of an impact in other areas of the game if Portland wants to make a deep playoff run.
Even if Grant's on court production aside from his scoring is a bit murky at best, Portland trading for him was the best thing they could have done, because it let the league know they meant business this offseason. That included their own players, who may have potentially been considering their future in Portland.
After the Grant trade, everything began to fall back into place for Portland. They selected Shaedon Sharpe with the 7th overall pick of the 2022 NBA Draft, giving the Trail Blazers an extremely talented young player who should make an impact this season. They went to work in free agency shortly thereafter, re-siging their starting center Nurkic to a long-term deal, and stealing Gary Payton II away from the Golden State Warriors.
They then went to work on extending their current core. They handed Anfernee Simons a new four-year deal after his breakout 2021-22 campaign saw him average 17.3 points per game. They then shut down any rumors of a Lillard trade by handing him a massive two-year, $122 million extension. With that, it was clear Portland is setting themselves up to win now.
The Grant trade helped the Trail Blazers front office accomplish all of that. Not only is he a solid fit on the court alongside the rest of Portland's current core, but it helped set up all the other big moves that they managed to pull off shortly thereafter. Acquiring Jerami Grant gave the Trail Blazers another shot to win a title during the Lillard era; now it's time for them to go out and put the work in.
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