The Trail Blazers have found themselves on a surprisingly impressive run of late, observes Sean Highkin of The Rose Garden Report. After cleaning the clock of the star-studded Suns on Saturday, Portland claimed its seventh win across its last eight contests.
As Highkin notes, Portland’s recent success has likely damaged its chances of nabbing the top talent in this summer’s impending draft.
Sporting a 20-29 record, the Trail Blazers are now just one victory away from matching their 2023/24 total of 21 wins. The strong play of forwards Toumani Camara and Deni Avdija, the intriguing defense of rookie center Donovan Clingan, and improved play from backcourt standouts Shaedon Sharpe and Scoot Henderson has helped boost the club’s record.
There’s more out of the Northwest Division:
- The Trail Blazers assigned center Duop Reath, wing Rayan Rupert and forward Jabari Walker to their G League affiliate, the Rip City Remix, the team announced on Sunday (Twitter link). Reath, who was assigned to Rip City on Saturday for the first time this season, enjoyed a standout rookie year in 2023/24 before falling to a fourth-string role this year following the arrival of Clingan and the return of Robert Williams. Thanks to this surplus of centers in Portland, Reath has been viewed as an intriguing trade candidate for rival clubs this year.
- Portland is now just 4.5 games away from the Western Conference’s No. 10 seed, but the Trail Blazers are taking a measured approach to their postseason prospects, writes Aaron Fentress of The Oregonian. “I don’t even think we think about none of that stuff,” center Deandre Ayton said. “We’re just taking it one game at a time. We’re not even there yet … We’ve still got to take care of these fundamentals and be known for that, despite how these games go.”
- In case you missed it, Henderson has been developing as a player and a leader of late after an up-and-down start to his NBA career.
TrailBlazers’ rise has lottery implications. They’d been projected as a bottom 5 team, which is now unlikely.
The 2025 draft’s talent is packed at the top, with a big fall-off after. (For example, GSW reportedly has little interest in picks greater than #10.)
As Blazers move out of a favored lottery position, other teams may be more motivated to tank by the greater odds of a high pick.
Add: Portland could lose their draft pick to Chicago if they finish higher than 14th, which seems unlikely. In either case, by not finishing as close to the bottom as expected, some other team(s) will have better draft odds.
Portland talking about 10th and a play in spot but it’s not going to happen, they are just on a little run and it’ll soon come to and end and a year of trying to get a top 5 pick they will end up with the 10th pick or something and watch there be an absolute stud drop to 6 or something and become an all star.
Happens every year with these mediocre teams that have to much pride to tank for a high draft pick.