The Portland Trail Blazers will enter their new season in about a month. As part of our ramp-up to the upcoming year, we’re asking a series of questions about the rotation and your views on its solidity. We’ve covered the centers and the power forwards so far. Today we take a look at small forwards hoping to crack the regular lineup.
Parsing out forwards and wings in the new NBA is hard, especially with teams like Portland who go with interchangeable–and often small–lineups. But for our purposes,
we’re going to define the Blazers’ small forward corps as: Deni Avdija, Kris Murray, Rayan Rupert. We understand that Rupert is more naturally a guard, that Shaedon Sharpe could swing over in a three-guard lineup, that Toumani Camara also plays small forward, and that Avdija is a wing-forward and not limited to the SF position. But as far as guys starting and subbing in the game, Avdija is at least half point-forward at this point while Murray and Rupert are the easiest replacements for emergency threes. So there we go.
Given that, on a scale of 1-10, with 1 being “nobody suits at all at the position; it needs a complete rework” and 10 being “as set as you could imagine, literally stacked to the moon”, how would you rate the Blazers at small forward? Is Deni enough, with all the other players filling in? Or do they need more to be viable?
Share your rating and the reasoning in the comment section. If possible, tell us what Portland needs to become more solid and/or stacked at the position. Also share whether you think they’re better or worse provisioned now than they were at this time last year. Enjoy!
