The Portland Trail Blazers finally have a new head coach. Following a search that ran right up to the 2026 NBA draft, longtime assistant coach Micah Nori will be taking over the Portland bench next season. He’ll become the team’s third coach in three years and be tasked with getting the Trail Blazers back to the playoffs following their loss in the first round to San Antonio this season.
The Trail Blazers will not only be trying to get back to the playoffs but will also be facing a Western Conference stacked with talent. The Oklahoma City Thunder went wire-to-wire in the regular season as the No. 1 seed in the conference, only to be dethroned by San Antonio in the Western Conference finals. The road to an NBA finals berth runs through one of those two teams. How far up the pack the Trail Blazers can climb will likely determine how long Nori gets to stick around.
He signed a highly unusual contract in taking the Portland job. Only the first season is guaranteed, with the second and third years both being team options. This appears to be a compromise deal on multiple levels. Trail Blazers owner Tom Dundon did not want to break the bank on a new coach, and bringing in a coach with only one guaranteed year on his contract is certainly a way to do that.
The contract also keeps the team’s coach and general manager on the same timeline. Both general manager Joe Cronin and former coach Chauncey Billups were given three-year contract extensions near the end of the 2024-25 season by the previous ownership group. Those contract extensions, in theory, allowed the team to maintain continuity during the ownership changeover, while not tying new ownership to either long-term. However, Billups was then arrested on illegal gambling charges after the first game of the 2025-26 season, and the timeline fell apart. The team’s new ownership was faced with a choice: Let the previous regime’s general manager bring in a new coach while only having two years left on his contract, or fire (and pay two dead contract years) the guy who just assembled the team’s first playoff roster in five years and start from scratch with a new general manager and coach.
Instead, with Nori’s unique contract, Dundon bought himself more time to evaluate the new coach, the general manager, and the state of the roster.
That time could be important while the Trail Blazers figure out their place in the Western Conference.
Portland will have Damian Lillard back, a rising star in Deni Avdija to partner with him, and a roster that oozes with potential. However, if Portland doesn’t bring in another big gun, the question is, do the Trail Blazers have enough to compete in the West?
Portland has never been a big player in free agency, and now that Miami has won the Giannis Antetokounmpo sweepstakes, Portland probably will not be able to leverage Milwaukee’s draft assets to jump in as a third team in a deal and grab a player from another contender.
They had no picks in this week’s NBA draft, and even if they wanted to make a big move in free agency, they are currently all but maxed out on cap space.
In all likelihood, the Trail Blazers will run back a very similar roster to last season, with the addition of Lillard, of course, and see where that puts them. If it’s good enough to finish in the top four or five teams in the West and put up a fight against San Antonio or OKC in the playoffs, Dundon may look to improve the roster and give Cronin and Nori extensions. However, if they can only manage another play-in spot appearance and a quick exit, Nori’s stay in Portland may not be a long one, and Cronin’s will probably end simultaneously.
Whether the Trail Blazers now have the right coach and the right roster to make a move in the West, or are destined to launch into another rebuild, they can build their own future. They have a new owner, a hungry new coach, a general manager who has built up a roster that carries his stamp from top to bottom, and they still have a rebuilding Milwaukee team’s future draft assets.
Nori has spent most of the past two decades working to earn a chance at a top job in the NBA. The Trail Blazers have spent most of the last decade trying to turn themselves back into serious contenders. With the Trail Blazers new coach now on the job, he’s going to have a short turnaround time to prove that he deserves to keep it, and to show that his new team deserves to be in the conversation for best in the West.
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