Musing on Blazers-Nuggets Game 3
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Soobum Im-USA TODAY Sports
The Portland Trail Blazers played a spirited, but ultimately futile, Game 3 against the Denver Nuggets in their best-of-seven playoffs series on Thursday night. Blazer’s Edge had our usual quarter-by-quarter recap and extended analysis, but as a special treat, Steve Dewald and Dave Deckard also chatted during the game, taking a more casual, but hopefully also insightful, look at the evening.
If you ever wanted to know how Steve and Dave think during games like this, here’s your chance. Feel free to read their musings from tip-off to the final horn and beyond!
Photo by Bart Young/NBAE via Getty Images
Once the 2021 NBA Playoffs conclude, the Portland Trail Blazers will have a considerable to-do list to work through in the offseason. Pending free agents, extensions and potential trades are just a few items that the Blazers must address.
When it comes to free agency, Bleacher Report’s Grant Hughes explained that Portland should keep it simple and focus on retaining Norman Powell.
The Portland Trail Blazers project to be well over the 2021-22 cap, which means their avenues for adding outside talent in free agency are limited. That’s probably why they swung a deal for Norman Powell, a player who can and should decline his player option for next year, but whom the Blazers can re-sign using Bird rights.
Reasons for 14 non-playoff teams to look forward to the future
The offseason offers plenty of perspective and opportunity for non-playoff teams to take a step forward.
Michael C. Wright
May 25, 2021 1:09 PM
LaMelo Ball (left) and Stephen Curry are out of the playoffs, but their teams have a bright future.
It’s gratifying to bask in every single moment over the course of a best-of-seven series for fans of the 16 teams currently fighting through the opening round of the 2021 playoffs.
Fans of the 14 lottery-bound teams, meanwhile, can’t help but ponder the future.
Fortunes change fast, though.
Case in point: the current playoff field features five teams Washington, New York, Atlanta, Memphis and Phoenix that weren’t playoff teams in 2020.
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David Zalubowski/Associated Press
The NBA offseason has already begun for nearly half the league, with other franchises soon to join them as the playoffs march on.
With a free-agent class lacking in star power, the most exciting part of the offseason may end up being the trade market.
While it s important to aim high with your trade target list, teams have to be realistic as well. For this exercise, we re looking at high-impact deals teams can make, while still being grounded in reality.
These are the swaps every NBA team should be calling about this offseason.
Atlanta Hawks
May 24, 2021
With the playoffs underway, offseason preparation has begun in earnest around the NBA, with the draft and free agency looming. Here’s a look at what’s to come for the 14 teams that missed the playoffs.
Houston Rockets (17–55)
Key free agents: None
2021 draft picks: Own first (if 1–4) OR Miami first via swap; Portland first; Milwaukee first
The post–James Harden Rockets became what one might have expected: a fast-sinking experimental testing ground for young talent that finished with the league’s worst record. There were multiple silver linings for the franchise, which we can start with Christian Wood immediately delivering on what looks like a bargain contract, Jae’Sean Tate emerging as a legit rotation player and the acquisition of 20-year-old Kevin Porter Jr. as a valid reclamation project but there was mostly a ton of losing. This was the organization’s worst season since 1982–83, when the Rockets went 14–68.