The Portland Trail Blazers have made tons of decisions this week regarding their current roster and future direction. They traded for Ja Morant, apparently ended up passing on Boston Celtics star Jaylen Brown (who got traded for a price you have to click through to cart to see), agreed to a single-year deal with center Branden Carlson, and re-signed center Robert Williams III to a contract that is largely non-guaranteed, based on his health and ability to serve.<\/p>\n
The questions pouring into the Blazer\u2019s Edge Mailbag right now are legion, particularly regarding Morant and Brown. Whether they\u2019re favorable or critical, they basically amount to one thing: What, exactly, are the Blazers doing?<\/p>\n
There\u2019s not a firm answer to that, of course. Only the Blazers themselves know. But we can look at the moves of the last few days and follow the pattern. After marinating on this for a bit, I think it\u2019s fair to talk about it.<\/p>\n
One of the linchpin questions\u2014reflected a few times in the Mailbag\u2014is why the Blazers would trade for Morant instead of Brown. Brown is clearly the superior player. He was an All-NBA Team nominee last season. He\u2019s known for defense, not just scoring. He\u2019s been an NBA champion. He carried the Celtics when Jayson Tatum was injured. Meanwhile Morant barely played, isn\u2019t known for defense, and can\u2019t hold a candle to Brown\u2019s accomplishments.<\/p>\n
Two answers come to the forefront.<\/p>\n
First, even though Brown went cheaply (Paul George, a couple of first-rounders, and a couple more second-rounders), he did cost something. Morant cost the Blazers nothing but contracts they wanted to give up anyway. No picks were involved.<\/p>\n
Second, and this is just as critical, Brown\u2019s contract was far more expensive than Morant\u2019s. He\u2019s scheduled to make $60 million per year instead of $40 million. And underline this: Morant\u2019s contract expires in 2028. Brown\u2019s runs through 2029.<\/p>\n
How important is that? If you look at Portland\u2019s salary structure right now, apparently very.<\/p>\n
Real Talk: The Blazers have exactly two fully-guaranteed contracts that extend beyond 2028 right now: Shaedon Sharpe and Toumani Camara. Williams is technically signed through 2029 but the last year of his contract is completely non-guaranteed. If he plays fewer than 50 games in a season, the Blazers can release him and his salary obligation. Yang Hansen has a rookie-scale team option for that year.<\/p>\n
Together, Sharpe and Camara will be owed around $44 million in 2028-29. That\u2019s the only unbreakable salary commitment the team has, against a cap that\u2019s projected to reach $182 million.<\/p>\n
That makes you think. Maybe the theme for this offseason for the Blazers should be: \u201cTake a swing at something, commit to nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Morant is a flashy acquisition. If he regains his early-career form he\u2019ll be a steal. (Side Note: he\u2019ll also need to fit in, not simply leeching production and touches from teammates who otherwise would have excelled.) If that happens, it\u2019s a huge bonus.<\/p>\n
But if it doesn\u2019t work out that way, well, he\u2019s still a huge name and a huge swing. It shows the team and the fan base that the Blazers are trying. They brought in someone during Damian Lillard\u2019s last hurrah, during Deni Avdija\u2019s ascending seasons. They committed to making the team better. And now\u2026? Morant carries an expiring contract next season, opportune to be traded. Or, if not, his contract runs out\u2014along with practically everybody else\u2019s\u2014the year after, leaving the Blazers a fresh start with their own draft picks, one from the Orlando Magic, and the pick and swaps from the Milwaukee Bucks, none of which were lost in any of these deals, including the big swing.<\/p>\n
None of those things would be true with Jaylen Brown. The Blazers would owe him $65 million in salary in 2028-29. They\u2019d be short several draft picks they traded to get him. Future optionality would be far more limited.<\/p>\n
All of this makes sense under a couple conditions. If it\u2019s true, either the Blazers\u2026<\/p>\n
Do not believe that even Jaylen Brown is enough to carry this team, as constructed, into contention in the next 2-3 seasons. They\u2019ll back this roster, but not to the point of selling out for it. Or\u2026Even if contention is theoretically possible, they\u2019re not willing to commit financially to it, including likely exceeding the luxury tax threshold to do so by the time they pay Brown, sweet-talk Avdija into re-signing, and deal with the renewing contracts of their remaining young players.<\/p>\n
Things may change. Maybe we\u2019ll see Portland make another big move over the next year, either of their own volition or because the team ends up better than they thought. They\u2019ve left themselves the flexibility to do so. But that\u2019s the exact point. Above all things, they appear to be prizing flexibility right now. That indicates that their future options are just as important to them as their present ones. If they don\u2019t move to augment or lock in this roster, in two years they\u2019re looking at cherry-picking whatever current members they want to retain, trading or releasing the rest, and then exercising a bunch of draft picks to start the next generation.<\/p>\n
In the end, you can probably look at Portland\u2019s roster moves this summer as a timeline shift more than a roster shift. Yes, they are improving the current outlook as they can. They\u2019re also buying time for the next two seasons before those draft picks start kicking in, shifting the real evolution towards those assets rather than the ones in front of them right now. Until further notice\u2014money spent beyond 2028 and\/or picks traded for help now\u2014it appears that Portland\u2019s answers lie ahead of them, not in the moves they\u2019ve already made or the players on the court as we speak.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Portland Trail Blazers have made tons of decisions this week regarding their current roster and future direction.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":616802,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[47228,355,99],"class_list":["post-740699","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-blazers-analysis","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740699","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=740699"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740699\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/616802"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=740699"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=740699"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=740699"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}