Believe it or Not, The Trail Blazers are on Course in Free Agency

The NBA Summer of 2024 has been a muted affair for the Portland Trail Blazers. General Manager Joe Cronin pulled off a trade sending Malcolm Brogdon and a draft pick to the Washington Wizards for forward Deni Avdija. Other than that, they’ve spent the summer drafting University of Connecticut center Donovan Clingan and ducking.

This lack of activity is making some Trail Blazers fans edgy, as we explore in today’s edition of the Blazer’s Edge Mailbag.

Dave,

What the heck are we doing here? When you finish the season with 21 wins you’re supposed to make some moves to get better. We’ve done nothing. I like Clingan, but dammit. The whole west is getting better by the day and we’re just sitting here twiddling our fingers. What gives?

Bryce

Oh, my sweet Summer Child. I’m not sure exactly what you were expecting.

I empathize with the frustration. I wish the Blazers weren’t in this position either. But here we are. And what are they going to do?

What moves were the Blazers capable of making during free agency? They have no cap space. They were up against the luxury tax threshold. The only avenue for improvement available would have been a trade. But who could they trade for?

Are they, like Houston, able to angle towards a Kevin Durant deal? Nope. He wouldn’t come here to save his life or career. Would Paul George or Klay Thompson have worked a sign-and-trade? Could the Blazers even have gotten DeMar DeRozan? Negative on all of them. Nobody’s clamoring to come to the Rose City and frankly, outside of Durant, none of those players would have made enough of a difference if they did. That’s not even asking who the Blazers would trade back, making that much salary. Deandre Ayton, Jerami Grant, or Anfernee Simons would have been on the way out…likely two of them in half the above scenarios. That would have rendered the move hopelessly lateral.

So what did the Blazers do instead? They got rid of Brogdon’s big contract for a slightly lesser one, giving themselves some breathing space. They drafted Clingan. Then they waited. And they’re still waiting.

That’s going to be the Big Plan for this off-season. Any moves we see are going to fall into two categories:

1. Picking up a cheap, value player or two to take a flyer on for the future, likely cast-offs from other teams.
2. Trading another expensive player away for savings and/or young prospects and/or draft picks.

That’s it. There’s no-one left in the free agent market to get. There’s no miracle trade to catch up to Sacramento, let alone Dallas and Denver. Portland will bide their time, create/preserve flexibility, color around the margins, and take a swing again when it matters.

The next big opportunity will come in the 2025 NBA Draft. Fortunately, the Blazers are poised for another lottery pick. Maybe it’ll finally be the big one. After that, watch for them to try and achieve liftoff between 2026 and 2028, feeding the fires with their draft capital earned in the Damian Lillard trade as the decade closes.

If this were surfing, Portland would be passing on this overcrowded wave, paddling out further to wait for the next one. It’ll come eventually. Not all of the teams making moves this summer are going to succeed. The Blazers will be ready to trade for their veterans the way other teams are poised to trade for Portland’s now. The goal in the meantime is to stay on the board, practice good techniques, and keep an eye out for opportunity.

Thanks for the question! You can send yours to blazersub@gmail.com and we’ll try to get to as many as possible! I’ve been on a little vacation and tending to a last few health issues, but things will pick up next week!