Trade Ideas Thread

CJ would be awesome in Philly! Lol

 

Woj said on his podcast today the magic are looking to make moves ASAP and ideally wouldn’t wait until the deadline.

 

Wasn’t Ross born in Portland? Bring him home.

 

What types of moves? Trying to make the playoffs type of moves?

 

The opposite. They mentioned Ross and Simmons.

 

Listening now, Man New Orleans really screwed up AD's career. They traded picks every damn year

 

These are pretty good moves

 

I'm not totally sold on this idea because giving up two future 1sts is something I loathe but what about combining a couple of rumors out there...



Knicks and Kings have apparently discussed a Kanter for Randolph swap but were looking for a 3rd team. Now I'm not exactly sure what they want the 3rd team to do. It could be to take on another contract from the Kings so they don't waste their cap space on Kanter or it could be that the Knicks wouldn't give up a pick for that cap space since Kanter is the better player and the Kings don't want to use their space without a pick involved. I'm going to guess the latter so:

Knicks get Zach Randolph, Skal Labissiere, least favorable of Sacramento's 2019 2nd round picks (they have 3 of them)

Kings get Meyers Leonard, Maurice Harkless, and Portland 2019 1st (with some protection)

Blazers get Enes Kanter



Next we go back to Atlanta and offer:

Hawks get Evan Turner, Caleb Swanigan, and Portland 2021 1st (with some protection)

Blazers get Jeremy Lin and Taurean Prince



Both trades are similar to the Bucks/Cavs salary cap motivated deal. Lineup this year is pretty dang solid in my opinion:

Starters: Dame, CJ, Prince, Aminu, Nurk

Bench: Lin, Curry, Layman, Collins, Kanter

Deep Bench: Simons, Trent, Stauskas, Baldwin, Open roster spot (Acquire a big)



Where it gets interesting is this summer. The Blazers would be down to just $85,738,986 in guaranteed contracts with 7 guys under contract (Dame, CJ, Prince, Nurk, Collins, Simons, Trent). Layman would be a restricted free agent assuming we'd offer him the qualifying offer. Aminu, Kanter, and Lin would all be unrestricted free agents but we'd have full bird rights to go over the cap to keep them if wanted. Baldwin's situation is a little confusing but I believe at worst we'd have his early bird rights so that wouldn't be an issue keeping him if wanted either. Curry and Stauskas would be unrestricted free agents with no bird rights.

Losing the two future 1sts could be potentially bad though if Olshey didn't make the right moves this summer to capitalize on the much better cap situation or if Prince wasn't the answer at SF. The lineup of Dame, CJ, Prince, Collins, and Nurk could potentially be awesome if Prince and Collins developed though. With about $23 million in cap space and a super deep free agent class this summer or retaining some of our own free agents, Olshey could focus on either landing one big free agent (hopefully way better than Turner) or simply roll with the starters the way they would be and build a good bench with that money on bargain free agents.

PS: Please don't respond by saying free agents never come to Portland. As always with my posts I am aware of the history and think there is a difference between cleaning up cap problems and getting cap space in hopes of signing Kevin Durant or some crazy thing like that.

 

Otto Porter seems to be rejuvenated coming back from an injury layoff (and with Wall out). Shooting .556 from three in his last five games and averaging almost two steals a game.

 

Turner's defense is really frustrating. He plays phenomenal against Harden and then last night he struggles defending Murray. Every game he seems to commit a dumb foul when the other team is in the penalty too or even worse like last night where he fouled Murray before they inbounded the ball and they got a free point (could have been the difference in the game).

 

I'm going all in on Blake.

I can't handle seeing Aminu out there in crunch time anymore.

Turner, Aminu, Simons, and our first for Blake. Then scope the waiver wires to round out the roster.

 

So Woj reported yesterday Dallas is looking to move both Smith Jr. and Wes.

 

Detroit has gone into tank mode. I'm not even sure it would take that much to get him if they decide to trade him.

 

Jesus, that contract.



Even if we get lucky, he probably stays healthy for 60-70 games plus playoffs 2 of the next 4 seasons. Hopefully by then, there will other shit supermax contracts we can trade for and Blake's won't seem AS bad. Or maybe we can trade CJ for salary relief and picks. For all intents and purposes, I'm gonna call his last year (player option) as his injury year unless he drastically changes his game.

This is an incredible risk and has all the likelihood of blowing up in our faces for maybe a 3 yr window, but the potential reward is tremendous. A core of Dame-CJ-Blake-Nurk is a contender in the west to make the WCF. And with GS primed for a breakup next year, we might get into the mix before the Clips/Lakers/etc get their new FA teams acclimated. I think we'd be better than pretty much everyone in the East too.

Ah fuck it. Do it.

 

Also, for how miserable they have been, Detroit is only 1.5 games out of a playoff spot. Fuck the east, man.

 

Alright, Philly is next. Another team that I think could use a shot creator like CJ but unfortunately they are trying to conserve their cap situation this summer before having to pay Ben. It's also hard for them to match CJ's salary after trading for Butler.

CJ for Wilson Chandler, Markelle Fultz, and 2021 1st (via Miami). Chandler has been bad this year and is an expiring contract but he pretty much would have to be part of any CJ trade to make the money work. The 2021 1st has a lot of value and would be a great asset to get. This trade comes down to Fultz though. If you believe he can still be a good player this trade would be alright. If you think his issues are permanent then this is a horrible trade, unless another team is willing to give you something for him. I wasn't that high on Fultz to begin with so I wouldn't want to trade CJ for him but I might consider it if we could flip him. Maybe make this a 3 team trade where Orlando takes on Leonard and Fultz and we get Ross, Simmons, and a 2019 2nd (via Cleveland currently 31st pick).

CJ and Trent for Chandler, Mike Muscala, Furkan Korkmaz, Zhaire Smith, and a Philly 2019 1st. This is one of those type of trades I was hoping to avoid where we take on more players than we send out but it's really hard to make it work with them. This trade completely comes down to Zhaire Smith. He's a rookie who has been out all year with a foot injury but I was pretty high on him in the draft. His value is low because of the injury but both Dame and CJ turned out fine after having foot injuries at the same age so it is a high risk, high reward type situation. The problem with this trade is it really hurts us this year even if Zhaire turns out to be great in the future, so I understand why most people wouldn't like it. With two 1sts this summer we could use them to dump the contracts of Leonard, Harkless, and/or Turner and go all in on free agency for a guy like Khris Middleton this summer or have the ability to take on a lopsided trade for Blake Griffin, Kevin Love, or Otto Porter type guys who's teams will probably be looking to dump. It's super risky given our history but if we get one good player that route and Zhaire develops it could be a huge move. I don't know if I'd do it though.

 

These are all the 30+ mil contracts currently signed for 21-22. Durant/Davis/Kyrie/Butler/Kawhi/Klay/Harris/Middleton will most likely be joining the list this upcoming summer. And more will be joining in the year after. I think a risk on Blake is justified. There might be an out.

 

Considering our “assets” Blake is pretty much the best we could do BECAUSE of that contract. I have no clue whether or not ownership would sign off on it though. Portland would be taking on what, $80m?

 

If going all-in on Blake, then: