Yesterday news broke that the NBA is moving towards expansion in Seattle and Las Vegas. This will be welcome news to neighbors to the north of the Portland Trail Blazers, who have been languishing without an NBA franchise since 2008. It’ll bring back an interesting regional rivalry for Portland as well.
But before these prospective new teams begin playing, the league will hold an expansion draft. If they both enter during the same season, presumably they’d participate in that draft together. If it’s
staggered, the drafts would be held prior to the entry season for each team. Either way, the new franchises will get to raid the pantry of their neighbors, scooping up players to stock their own teams.
That brings up a tantalizing question, covered in today’s Blazer’s Edge Mailbag.
Hi Dave!
In a way-too-soon exploration of the eventual expansion draft, who would you protect and who would you be saddest to not protect?
Noah
First, let’s take a look at how expansion drafts work. The league is able to alter rules, of course, but if the next expansion drafts resemble prior ones, the basics look like this:
- Each franchise is able to protect up to 8 players from being chosen by expansion teams.
- Only players currently under contract or restricted free agents may be protected or selected in expansion drafts. Unrestricted free agents are not part of the process. (However, restricted free agents become unrestricted free agents once the expansion team selects them. The expansion team does not have an inherent right to keep them.)
- Each NBA franchise must leave at least one player unprotected. That holds true even if a team has fewer than 8 players under contract or restricted free agency at the time of the expansion draft.
- No NBA team can lose more than one player via the expansion draft.
You can see how the timing of team entry—and thus expansion drafts—matters here. If two teams enter together, participating in a simultaneous expansion draft, 28 players will be selected from the 30 incumbent franchises. That leaves a high probability of a given team losing a player. If the two teams enter the league in staggered years with staggered drafts, only 14 teams will lose a player in each draft.
Also of interest in the real world (as opposed to our original question), here are the players scheduled to be under contract to Portland in 2028, the target year for entry for at least one of the new teams:
- Shaedon Sharpe
- Toumani Camara
- Yang Hansen
- Donovan Clingan (Restricted Free Agent)
Scoot Henderson and Kris Murray have restricted free agent and/or extension possibilities before 2028. It’s quite possible that they will also be on that list.
If he does not sign an extension prior, Deni Avdija will become an unrestricted free agent in the exact summer of 2028. That is also the year the contracts of Jerami Grant, Jrue Holiday, Damian Lillard, and Vit Krejci expire. Krejci has a team option on his contract in 2027, Lillard a player option.
Even if we tuck Avdija in the fold, you can see that the Blazers have room to keep their core players, plus Henderson and a couple of draft picks ensuing before the expansion draft date. They don’t have a ton of extra room. If Avdija hits unrestricted free agency, that will clear an extra slot for Portland to use protecting someone, but Deni would be out on the open market, able to return or sign with another team.
In other words, this protection thing is doable, but it could get a little tight depending on draft picks and contract negotiations between now and 2028. The later the draft happens, the worse it’s going to get for the Blazers. They have extra draft picks and important swaps coming between 2028-2030. They’ll be looking to fully stock the cupboards. An expansion draft in 2029 or 2030 would pinch them far more than one in 2028.
Returning now to the hypothetical of an immediate expansion draft, here’s the list of Portland players currently:
- Jrue Holiday
- Jerami Grant
- Deni Avdija
- Damian Lillard
- Robert Williams III
- Matisse Thybulle
- Scoot Henderson
- Shaedon Sharpe
- Donovan Clingan
- Yang Hansen
- Kris Murray
- Toumani Camara
- Vit Krejci
- Sidi Cissoko
- Blake Wesley
The first question to ask is whether this imaginary draft is being held right this second or this summer. If it’s the latter, Robert Williams, Matisse Thybulle, and Blake Wesley would be excluded, as they’ll be unrestricted free agents. But let’s leave them in for now.
If the draft were being held today, I think the following six players would be protected nearly automatically:
Deni Avdija, Shaedon Sharpe, Toumani Camara, Donovan Clingan, Scoot Henderson, Yang Hansen
Avdija and Camara are no-brainers, providing production beyond their contract amount. Sharpe, Clingan, Henderson, and Hansen are investments, draft capital coming good with relatively low cost. As such, the Blazers won’t want to give them up freely.
That leaves two slots for protected players. In my estimation, Holiday is the most likely player to be protected outside of the Top 6. The Blazers seem to really like him. He might also have value in trade around the league.
Jerami Grant would be the next selection if we’re judging by talent and production. But Grant’s contract is fairly large. Given his age and cost, an expansion team is unlikely to choose him. If they do, Portland gets salary cap relief. For that reason, he might stay unprotected.
I’m assuming an expansion team doesn’t have the guts to take Damian Lillard, given his age and affinity to Portland at this point. If that’s not true, the Blazers have to protect him. (They also have to wonder, at least mildly, if not protecting him would be an insult, given his status and prominence in town.)
Robert Williams III is a key part of Portland’s attack when healthy. But the Blazers are already protecting two centers. Williams’ contract expires this summer anyway. If he were under a longer, modest contract he could be an easy candidate for that last protection spot.
Matisse Thybulle matches Williams’ desirability in that he’s young, skilled, and inexpensive. He’d be the other clear candidate to protect if we assume his contract runs longer than just the next few weeks.
Therefore I’d use the last spot on Williams or Thybulle, whichever one the Blazers intend to keep. Unless I fear that someone will take Dame. Then I’ve got to protect him to avoid a PR disaster, even if it means leaving the younger, cheaper Williams and Thybulle unprotected.
That leaves my unprotected list at:
- Two of the following: Williams, Thybulle, Lillard
- Grant
- Murray
- Krejci
- Cissoko
- Wesley
Do I think an expansion team will take one of those players? Probably. Thybulle and Williams are good candidates.
Am I going to scream if I lose one of these guys? Probably not, unless it’s Dame. Then I’d stick my hands in my pockets, start whistling, and stare hard at the ceiling every time he came to town with the opponent. And I’d figure he wouldn’t show up for the jersey retirement until sometime in the next millennium.
What about you? Do you agree with the reasoning here or would you make different choices? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
Thanks for the question too! You can always send yours to blazersub@gmail.com and we’ll try to answer as many as possible!
