The Portland Trail Blazers entered the offseason looking to offload some of their veteran pieces on the roster. So far, they have just traded veteran guard Malcolm Brogdon to the Washington WMalcolmizards but still have a few players that could be moved.
One of those is veteran forward Jerami Grant, who has garnered a ton of interest around the league. The biggest issue with Grant isn’t his play but rather his hefty contract.
He is owed $29.7 million for the upcoming season and is on the books for four more seasons, with his salary increasing each year. His final year will have him making $36.4 million as a 33-year-old.
Zach Buckley of Bleacher Report proposed a few trade ideas for some of the worst contracts around the NBA. Grant was included in this and within his idea, Portland gained a massive haul back for the veteran forward.
The deal is between the Trail Blazers and the Los Angeles Lakers, one of the main teams that has been linked with Grant this summer. Portland would receive guard D’Angelo Russell, forward Jarred Vanderbilt, forward Maxwell Lewis, and a 2029 first-round pick from Los Angeles.
While this package may not seem overly great for the Trail Blazers, it actually would be quite the haul. Landing an expiring contract like Russell’s could help Portland at the trade deadline or even next offseason when the contract ends.
It would help free up some needed cap space for this team or net them some assets. Vanderbilt just signed a new contract extension with the Lakers last offseason so he would be on the books for a few more seasons.
He has shown massive progression with Los Angeles, especially on the defensive end of the floor. He could be an energy piece off the bench for this Trail Blazers team.
Lewis is an up-and-coming young forward that the Lakers have a lot of belief in. The team traded up in the 2023 NBA Draft to land him so he could be an interesting piece for Portland to get back.
And finally, the grand prize piece of this deal would be the 2029 first-round pick. With the Lakers stars being older, nobody knows where Los Angeles will be in five years from now. This could end up being a highly valuable draft pick for the Trail Blazers if the Lakers were to fizzle out.
The rumors of a Grant trade won’t be going away anytime soon, especially with the Lakers. There is still time for the team to move him with training camp still weeks away.
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