The Portland Trail Blazers had an interesting season. Not much was expected of them when it began – especially after they lost several key pieces in the 2015 offseason like LaMarcus Aldridge and Nicolas Batum. But they quickly established that they were playoff worthy and hid out in the middle of the Western Conference the rest of the way. Damian Lillard took the reigns as the team’s leader and franchise player, a young cast around him started to gel and head coach Terry Stotts made it all work.
They beat the Los Angeles Clippers in the playoffs, which is something nobody would have expected – even if the Clippers were hampered by injuries. For a team that looked like they were hitting the reset button last year, they seem to have made solid progress very quickly. So where does that leave them? Portland has a lot of things they need to do this offseason if they want to keep climbing the ladder in the West. Here are their main offseason priorities.
Balance The Offense With Frontcourt Scoring
The Blazers were pleased with the production they got from guards Damian Lillard and C.J. McCollum. It’s clear that they are now the foundation of the team. Those two do take a lot of shots, but part of the reason that they do is that they don’t have anybody that is an effective scorer up front to give the ball to. Amongst frontcourt players, forward Al-Farouq Aminu led the team in scoring, but he has a limited offensive arsenal. On top of that, one of their offseason priorities is to figure out what to do with him because he’s a free agent. He gets most of his points due to athleticism and the Blazers ability to speed up the game. Center Mason Plumlee is similar, he gets his point production from being active – especially on the offensive glass. While those are two key players on the team, they’d be better served as role players up front rather than being vital starters. Whether it is a veteran or a draft pick, this team would really benefit from having a big man who can play with his back to basket to diversify the attack. One of their crucial offseason priorities is that they need to find a consistent scoring presence on the inside that attracts defensive attention and opens things up for McCollum and Lillard.
Bolster The Defense
Nobody can totally base their performance in the series against Golden State (they allowed 118.6 points per game in that series), but this team needs to play some defense if they have any chance of getting to the next level. Defensive metrics may not be the truest measures just yet, but essentially there is nobody on the roster who is really a standout defensive player. They don’t really have a rim protector up front, even though guys like Plumlee and Ed Davis are solid rebounders. On the perimeter, they don’t have a shutdown, grind-it-out type of player that will slow down the opponent’s best player. One of their offseason priorities is to import somebody like a Tony Allen or Bismack Biyombo. They’ll bring a brand of toughness and defense that this team doesn’t have right now.
Winning Experience
This stuff is sometimes overrated, but the Blazers need one of those guys who has been on winning teams in the past to help get them over the hump. Lillard is an All-Star caliber player and you can see how some of the other pieces will fit around him, but nobody on the current has that background of being a part of some true winning situations in the NBA to set the example. Even though they extended coach Terry Stotts, even he doesn’t have a significant winning pedigree as a head coach.
We saw what happened when the Golden State Warriors hired head coach Steve Kerr. We saw what Paul Pierce did for the Washington Wizards. We’ve seen this example play out many times. The Blazers had a successful season and did much better than anyone thought they would do. However, they need to keep adding foundational pieces to get to that next level. That’s one of their major offseason priorities.
