8. Portland Trail Blazers
The Portland Trail Blazers season is all but lost. They’ve played without their two best players in Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum for the majority of the season. When they do play the team is still struggling. The Blazers need a reboot and if I was making the decisions in Portland, I would consider trading Lillard to kickstart the rebuild.
To be clear, it doesn’t appear that Lillard is going anywhere and that Portland wants to rebuild around the 31-year-old point guard. Still in a world in where the Blazers decide to fully embrace a rebuild, below is a potential trade that could help them with that.
Blazers fans reading this proposed would think that I’m underselling Lillard’s value. However, considering he’s dealing with a major injury and he’s 31 years old it’s not a terrible trade. Lillard is a small guard and those types of players usually don’t age well. With that in mind, keeping Maxey on the roster is essential in case Lillard goes downhill quickly.
On the flip side, the Blazers get an All-Star, an elite defender, and two future first round picks. Considering the type of down year that Lillard has had, this isn’t a bad haul for the aging superstar and one Portland should give consideration.