Trade Larry Nance Jr traded to Portland

the model franchise

 

That's a fair take, considering your opinion of Markkanen.

 

I'd just have a tailor emboss "Bernstein" below Leonard...would be a cool move...

 

screw it. Im a rocker. Im changing leanard to lynard. And im adding skynard below it.

 

#simpleman

 

Cohen. Every made shot is a Hallelujah.

 

Dead 31 years.

Dead six years.

Plane crashed 44 years ago.

Dead five years.

Meyers Leonard: Good as dead from a career standpoint.

Live solution: Put Kawhi above Leonard and tell people Olshey is on the verge of making the deal.

 

“AS WELL”?!?!
Fuck outta’ here SABONIS IS #11!!! Nobody can touch him.

 

Put some respect on his name FAMS!!

 

Mi Amigo!

 

Sixers fans love RoCo too. Would be a feel good trade for them.

 

Has anyone posted that we signed Nance Jr.?

 

How much does Larry Nance Jr. move the needle in Portland?
Nance should help in Portland. He’s a smart, disruptive defender who ranked sixth in the NBA in deflections per game last season, and who’s tied for the second-highest steal rate among frontcourt players since entering the league in 2015, according to Basketball-Reference. He’s versatile, too: The 6-foot-7, 245-pound Nance spent most of his floor time guarding opposing power forwards, but he also dealt with point guards, shooting guards, small forwards, and centers on at least 10 percent of his defensive possessions, according to The BBall Index’s charting data.

With his strength and length, Nance could slide up to work as a 5, helping Portland find more stable paths to small-ball lineups that can leverage all of its shooting and playmaking prowess. With his quickness and athleticism, he could also bump down to serve (albeit somewhat awkwardly) as a jumbo 3—something he did quite a bit in kludged-together Cleveland lineups over the past couple of seasons—to give the Blazers a bit more brawn on the wing. Units featuring Nance, Robert Covington, and new backup center Cody Zeller should be able to capably switch across the frontcourt. Nance won’t lock up an opponent’s no. 1 scorer, but he can hold his own against threats of varying shapes and sizes, giving incoming head coach Chauncey Billups a quality option as he looks for answers to shake up last season’s second-worst defense. (Not that the Blazers needed any roster modifications to produce better defensive results; just ask Neil Olshey!)

Nance should prove a snug fit on the other end, too, as a low-usage engine-room type. He can work as a screen-and-dive big man with the hops to rise up above the defense and finish at the rim. He’s become a more viable shooting threat, hitting 35 percent of his 3s on about three attempts per 36 minutes of floor time over the past three seasons. Most importantly, though, Nance is a canny passer, dishing assists on just over 15 percent of his teammates’ baskets in that three-season span; only a dozen bigs have boasted a higher assist rate in that stretch. He’s a ball mover with good touch and vision, capable of finding shooters in transition, making high-low feeds to the paint, feeding the post, operating as a dribble-handoff hub from the elbows, and acting as a release-valve option on the short roll in the screen game:

That last bit might be the most important in Portland, where opponents love to dial up the pressure on Damian Lillard with blitzes and traps, in hopes of forcing the ball out of Dame’s hands and making his teammates beat them. The Blazers have struggled to win in those situations over the years—a big reason why so many have called for roster-rebalancing trades aimed at importing frontcourt playmakers like Draymond Green, Aaron Gordon, or Pascal Siakam who could alleviate the pressure on Lillard and CJ McCollum at the point of attack, keep the ball moving, and create scoring chances for others.

Nance isn’t quite on their level (PERSONAL INTERJECTION, NANCE IS BETTER THAN GORDON) and he’s also not quite as reliable; he’s never played more than 67 games in a season, and he missed 37 games last season with a variety of injuries. He’s that type of player, though: a useful one on both ends of the court, imported at the cost of Derrick Jones Jr. (signed last summer, a starter for more than half the season, and out of the rotation by the playoffs) and a first-round pick that’s lottery-protected from now until 2028. If he’s healthy, he’ll help, and he didn’t cost Olshey any part of the starting five in which he believes so strongly. (Though if protecting the pick that far out winds up encumbering Portland from trading other future firsts in deals that could help improve this year’s team even further, Olshey might regret it.)

It’s unlikely, though, that adding Nance on its own represents the sort of “urgent” big swing that Lillard’s been looking for all summer. Shy of moving McCollum—something Olshey’s long seemed wholly unwilling to even consider—or shopping every draft pick in the cupboard in pursuit of some other higher-end target, it’s hard to find the serious ceiling-raiser that Portland could pluck at this stage in the game. Perfect shouldn’t necessarily be the enemy of good, and the Blazers got better on Friday. Whether they’re better enough to convince the franchise player to stick around, though, remains in question.
https://www.theringer.com/nba/2021/...-nance-derrick-jones-trade-cavs-bulls-blazers

 

Excellent analysis.

 

Great stuff and glad to see there is finally a thread on the Nance trade!

 

https://www.basketballnews.com/stories/what-larry-nance-jr-brings-to-the-portland-trail-blazers