The next eight months will be telling for the Portland Trail Blazers. Not only is the franchise in the process of changing ownership, the young playing group is working to establish itself as a unit capable of competing beyond April.
Though the front office has added to the roster over the summer, it appears General Manager Joe Cronin is initially betting on internal growth off the back of the team’s strong finish to the 2024-25 season. Moves will be made at the deadline and next offseason, but the Blazers
will enter the season with Jrue Holiday and Yang Hansen as the only real additions to the rotation.
Damian Lillard is likely out for the season and Blake Wesley will spend most of his time on the bench or with the Rip City Remix.
The Blazers ended last season on an overwhelmingly positive note. They ended the campaign owning the league’s best defense, winning eight of their final 15 games. While not all opponents were necessarily fully engaged, the team’s young core played a brand of basketball that, if maintained, should serve them over the long term.
Today we discuss what the best and worst-case scenarios look like for the Blazers during the 2025-26 season.
Best-Case Scenario
Obviously, a championship is the best-case scenario. But we also need to be realistic, this team won’t be holding up the Larry O’Brien trophy any time soon. An achievable best-case scenario should be measured by a combination of the Blazers’ end-of-season seeding and the development of their young talent.
To their postseason aspirations, I don’t see this squad finishing anywhere higher than 9th or 10th. The Western Conference is unsurprisingly stacked so displacing the top seven or eight teams seems be out of reach for this team, right now. If the Blazers manage to snare the final playoff spot, that’s great. But splitting two Play-In games gives this young group a taste of postseason basketball while returning to the NBA lottery and a chance at Dallas Mavericks-type odds at stealing a decent pick.
As for individual players, the success of the season could come down to the output of four young players. Shaedon Sharpe, Scoot Henderson, Donovan Clingan and Yang Hansen.
We’ve done this to death but Sharpe needs to be a presence, ensuring watchers are aware that he’s on the court at all times. The Canadian needs to increase his three point percentage to at least average (up from 31.1 percent last season) and not be a liability on defense. If he does this, he also secures an optimum payday in restricted free agency, 12 months from now.
A successful Henderson season has the young point guard earning the starting one spot this season and beyond, even with Damian Lillard’s return next season. Up until this point Henderson has not earned the role, despite what many might believe. Earning the role means smart decisions, conversion at the rim, reduced turnovers and elite creation.
An optimal Clingan would be able to play as close to 30 minutes a game while developing at least one impactful offensive skill this team can go to when needed. No one should be worried about his defense but he needs to be passable on offense to ensure he can be this team’s starting five for extended periods.
Clingan’s understudy Yang is the hardest of the quartet to predict, simply by the fact that we don’t know what he has at an NBA level. If the Chinese big can show he can be at least an average defender while meeting all our offensive expectations, then we should all be excited.
Worst-Case Scenario
The worst case is basically the conclusion that the form we saw late last season was a mirage. The defense is good but not elite, the young talent is fine but nothing special and Deni Avdija is nothing more than a third or fourth option on a good team. Injuries further hinder sufficient analysis, prompting the front office to make decisions on insufficient evidence. I’m talking directly to Sharpe’s restricted free agency and Henderson’s post-2026 role with Lillard expected to return in 2026-27.
Sharpe fails to find his shot, loses interest in the game, influencing his defense and overall impact. Henderson proves all our concerns true, affirming his inability to make good decisions, finish at the rim while generating costly turnovers. Clingan can’t offer starter-level minutes and Yang is a slow footed, defense-less big who isn’t the playmaker and scorer we all hoped.
As a team, the Blazers finish with the league’s 9th or 10th worst record with no real excitement or growth on the horizon. They also have no clear path to a high draft pick or infusion of talent, prompting more questions about how this team returns to the NBA Playoffs without any distinguishable elite talent. It also extinguishes hope of a return to the postseason play in 2026-27, depriving the franchise of playoff basketball for a sixth-straight season.
Conclusion
This season will be judged by more than just where the Blazers end up in the Western Conference Standings. It’ll also be gauged by the development of its young core, namely Shaedon Sharpe, Scoot Henderson, Donovan Clingan and Yang Hansen. Deni Avdija and Toumani Camara should be reliable leaders but it’s the disparity between the former quartet’s best and worst that will dictate success.
The start of every season brings with it optimism. But as we’ve witnessed in recent years, that optimism can be quickly dashed. Many believe the optimism accompanying the team this season might be a little closer to reality. The prediction is based on an inarguably positive end to the 2024-25 campaign.
But given the large portion of this group still yet to prove they belong in the upper echelon of the league, the word “cautious” should always be tentatively used in prelude to “optimism” as this team develops.
The above scenarios will be this team’s extremes over the next 12 months. The actual result is more likely somewhere in between the ranges. The hope is that it skews a little more closely to the best-case scenario with at least three of the four players discussed meeting expectations. This will help the front office make informed and confident decisions at February’s trade deadline and into next summer.
