One week from today, the Portland Trail Blazers will have chosen a direction for their future.
They have two options: Option one would see them continue on their current course, which recently got them a four-game winning streak, and hope they can build a mid-tier team with their current assets. Option two would be to trade several of the players that helped them that win streak, fall back down the standings, and hope for some luck with the draft lottery ping-pong balls.
Only one of those is a legitimate plan, and for the sake of the franchise’s future, the Trail Blazers need to choose the second option.
If they pick the first choice, it’s further proof that the current regime has no plan, and Blazers fans have no hope that it will change.
If the Blazers were in the Eastern Conference, you could probably be forgiven for looking at their roster and thinking they were competitive. During the recent winning streak, the Blazers beat a bad Chicago Bulls team, a middling Miami team, an injury-depleted Charlotte squad, and a middling Orlando Magic team. Both Miami and Orlando have a decent chance of finishing as top six seeds in the East, which isn’t saying much as they both sit at .500, and the 19-27 Bulls currently occupy a spot in the play-in tournament.
When the Blazers returned to facing actual competition against Oklahoma City, the Thunder promptly etherized them. Portland only made the game look respectable by closing the gap in garbage time. Yes, the Blazers have played well in a pair of wins against the Milwaukee Bucks this season, but they seem to have Milwaukee’s number since the Lillard trade, and two games do not make a trend.
When given the opportunity to either develop younger players or pick up a win by playing veterans, coach Chauncey Billups has consistently chosen the latter this season. Often, that strategy doesn’t even result in a win and only adds another loss to the tally while also not developing the team’s young talent.
The Blazers are in no position to compete for the playoffs, sitting six games out of the final play-in spot. They are also not bad enough to get decent lottery odds, with the league’s seventh-worst record.
To get where they need to be, the Blazers need to decide what moves to make and where they would be better off standing pat.
Do trade: Jerami Grant. At 30, Grant is the oldest player on the team’s roster. He also has the longest and largest contract, and all the statistics you want a power forward to contribute are trending incorrectly. Hanging on to him even one day more does not benefit the team in any way. If he can convince a team to give up a first-round draft pick for him, Joe Cronin should do it immediately. Failing that, he should be willing to move him for second-round picks and an expiring contract. Grant was signed several plans ago in the incredibly brief “maybe Damien Lillard will want to stay if we resign one of his running mates” era of Blazers basketball. That door has long since closed.
Do trade: Anfernee Simons: Similar to Grant, Simons being in Portland any longer makes zero sense. Yes, he’s still young at 25, but he’s a high-volume shooter who has seen his shooting percentage drop each of the last two seasons. He’ll be on an expiring contract next season, and with the Blazers flush with guards who need to be on the floor, he doesn’t factor into the team’s future plans. On a team that needs to drop in the standings, Simons is just good enough to cost them a draft position but also not good enough to command a decent trade haul. If the Blazers keep him, they are either sacrificing Shaedon Sharpe’s or Scoot Henderson’s development to get Simons his minutes or further diminishing his trade value by stashing him on the bench. None of those are good options, so the team must be willing to take whatever it can get in a trade.
Do trade: Deandre Ayton. Once in a blue moon, Ayton puts out a monster game. Unfortunately, the rest of the time, the effort just isn’t there. The team’s defense improves dramatically when Ayton is not on the floor, and he has just never made the consistent offensive impact the team hoped he would when they acquired him as the centerpiece of the Damien Lillard trade. Tounami Camara has long since seized the mantle of best piece acquired in that deal and has also surpassed Ayton in his offensive and defensive contributions. Even more so than Simons and Grant, Ayton holds little to no trade value. He will be on an expiring deal next season and could potentially be thrown into a deal then. There is little point in showcasing Ayton now, and if the team can’t find a taker for him at the deadline, it’s best if he’s just stashed on the bench.
Don’t have to trade but probably should: Robert Williams III. This one is a hard call. Williams is often hurt but is also the best all-around center on the team’s roster. He also probably has the highest trade value of any potential trade candidate. If the Blazers can get a first-round pick or two or some young talent and a pick for him, it’s going to be hard to resist pulling the trigger. However, if the offers are not there, Williams and Donovan Clingan make an excellent 1-2 punch at the post, and the Blazers should not feel any qualms about keeping him around or asking for the moon to deal him.
Do move on from: Coach Chauncey Billups. This offseason, the Blazers did nothing to clarify Billups’s future. They didn’t pick up his 2025-26 option, and they didn’t fire him. That essentially left Billups coaching for his job this season. At almost every opportunity, he has leaned on veterans like Simons and Grant to help milk a few more wins and has yo-yod younger players from the floor to the bench. The strategy would make sense if the Blazers were a team close to contention. But there are not. If the Blazers were going to keep Billups around, they would have signaled that move already. They haven’t, so it’s time to move on. Give Nate Bjorkgren a chance with the young players after the trade deadline. In the best-case scenario for the team, they already have their future coach on the bench. In the worst-case scenario, they are looking for a new coach in the offseason, precisely what they would have been doing anyway.
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