Trail Blazers add Blake Wesley, Fill Final Roster Spot | Projecting Yang Hansen’s Rookie Production

Trail Blazers add Blake Wesley, Fill Final Roster Spot | Projecting Yang Hansen’s Rookie Production

In today’s show, Blake Wesley gets the Blazers 15th roster spot and the numbers behind Young Hansen’s summer league performance and why it might be better than you even think. Welcome to Locked On Blazers. Let’s get into it. [Music] You are Locked On Trailblazers, your daily Portland Trailblazers podcast, part of the Locked On podcast network. your team every day. What’s up world? It’s your pass first point guard and trailblazers reporter Mike Richmond. You are listening to another episode of Locked on Blazers, part of the Locked on Podcast Network. Available wherever you get podcasts and also on YouTube. Thanks for making this show your first listen. Coming at you each and every weekday, Monday through Friday. So make it a part of your daily routine. Make your first listen. Tell your friends to do the same as Lockdown Blazers, your team every day. In today’s program, the Blazers have signed Blake Wesley to their 15th and final roster spot. This thing is full and complete, plus some sticky stats you need to know from summer league because Yang Hansen might have even been better than you appreciate. And then we’ll talk a little bit about restricted free agency and the mess it’s been this summer and what that might mean for Shaden Sharp in the future. Let’s get into it. Starting with Blake Wesley, the news of the day. We were going to do something different today. That show’s going to be tomorrow. Uh but there’s some news today. Okay, so we move stuff around. The Blazers, as first reported by ESPN, uh, have agreed to a one-year deal with Blake Wesley, uh, who spent the first three seasons of his NBA career with the San Antonio Spurs, a 63 combo guard who spent a season at Notre Dame before coming out early. a second team allacc performer. Uh uh goes pro, 25th pick in the draft by the Spurs in 2022 and spends his first three seasons in San Antonio and just never really got it going. Career averages of 4.3 points, 2.4 assists, and 1.5 rebounds, averaging about 14.3 minutes per game across 156 games over his first three seasons, including just four starts. So, like this is a 15th roster spot guy. He’s not supposed to pop. He’s not This isn’t like these numbers, you know, like, oh, he only averaged 42 and one. Yeah. That’s why he was available as a free agent at the end of July, right? Um I I think if you’re listening to the podcast, that’s why you should listen to the show, you kind of knew this this flavor of move was coming. Clearly, the Blazers needed one more guard. You just look at the their roster. They need one more dude who if things go wrong can dribble. Even after signing um Damen Lillard, I forgot his name for a moment. Damen Lillard, who’s not going to play this season, they still obviously needed a guard. They’re now the roster is now full with 15 re NBA contracts cuz Dame counts as an NBA contract making $14 million to not play this year. Uh 14 million contracts or excuse me 15 guaranteed contracts. Um Wesley is is sort of the insurance deep bench guard. They do have one two-way spot remaining that they can they can figure out what they want to do with that. But that’s something you can address in training camp. And because of the nature of two-way contracts, you can kind of turn through it until you find the type of depth or the type of sort of flyer you want. But Wesley joins the Blazers via the free agency because he was bought out by the Washington Wizards. So, the Spurs this summer traded Malachi Bran Brham and Blake Wesley to the Wizards for Kelly Oolen in a second round pick. And then the Wizards um who had a relatively crowded roster had to make some decisions and reached a buyout with a couple different people. And the notable buyout that you recall was Marcus Smart who eventually signed with the uh Los Angeles Lakers. And people pretended that Marcus Smart regularly plays basketball despite his last 5 years in the NBA. But um it but Malachi Brandon also reached a buyout with the Wizards and um you know at the time this didn’t like peak my personal uh didn’t make my personal antenna like peak up but um he gave back some money according to Keith Smith of spot track. Uh Blake Wesley gave back 1 4 million in his buyout with the Wizards basically buying his own free agency back. A player of his status and caliber is very unlikely to give back a million half dollars just to reach free agency unless he knows he’s got a landing spot. Blake Wesley reached a buyout with the Wizards on July 19th. On July 22nd, he’s a Portland Trailblazer. He had a landing spot. This makes sense. Um this is, you know, a a 22-year-old former first round pick. It’s what it’s what uh people sometimes call a second draft guy. didn’t work out in his first spot. It was, you know, a drafted guy, a first round draft pick. Didn’t work out in his first spot. Um, you know, the the team that he landed on a trade just like we’re not going to cut him. Um, like or we’re not going to play him. We’re just going to cut him. And then then you end up kind of he’s free in the open market. I’m I’m I’m certain it’s a minimum deal. Here’s how I know here’s how I know it’s a minimum deal. When uh a player signs for more than the minimum, uh the news breakers and news brokers put it in their tweets. They put it in their social media post. They say he signed for this much money and this and this many years and they always like um whatever the most amount of money you could possibly earn, they that’s the number that you get. So like if it’s a three-year deal for 40 million bucks, but the last two years are are non-G guaranteed, you get three for 40, baby called the Duncan Robinson Zack Collins rule. Um but like yeah, it’s Blake Wesley didn’t get a number attached to his name. He got a one-year fully guaranteed contract from Michael Scott. Um one-year contract from from Scott. Um it like and when it’s one-year contract when they don’t give you the number pre-safe bet pretty safe bet uh that it is uh it is the minimum um because that is how the news brokering world works. That’s just a little that’s a little tip for you as as you’re moving along. Um who is who is Blake Wesley? Like I said 63 combo guard. Um he’s a really speedy athlete. Uh I I read a couple profiles of him. I’ve watched him like I remember he he played at um played in the ACC, played against uh his collegiate season was the year that the University of North Carolina Tar Hills ended up being the national runner up with Caleb Love. So he played against my beloved Tar Hills. I remember him in college just as a player. He’s second team all ACC. I don’t have strong memories of watching him play with the Spurs. Um I’m sure I’ve seen him, but I I can’t recall. So, I I read some uh scouting reports, including a really good post from Sherlock- Spreadsheet on the uh Spurs subreddit on on Reddit and um Jacob Douglas on Pounding the Rock also um also had a like a season profile and those those are the sort of the places that I went to say, “Hey, these people watch them closely.” And to um credit where it’s due on sort of how I got my quick scouting report on him. Wesley is a speedy athlete whose best skills are on defense. The question is, can he score? Um, he had a 2.3 steal percentage last year. 2.3% steal percentage last year. That ranks in the 83rd percentile for combo guards according to Clean the Glass. That’s a good number. That’s like a that’s like a oh, you’re a disruptive defender type of thing. Um, his passing numbers per 36, just looking at his numbers, suggest that he’s he’s a pretty good playmaker. Um, I hate basketball references uh positional breakdown. I think it’s just nonsense. I do not think they know how positions work on basketball reference. Um they say he played a lot of point guard. Um sure. I think what it means is he could play a little bit based on the his passing per 36 numbers and the um absolute nonsense from basketball reference. I’m going to suggest that he can play a little bit of point guard and that’s exactly what the Blazers needed. They need an emergency dude who can dribble. Um and that’s what and that’s what uh Blake Wesley is. He’s an emergency dude who can dribble. um despite having pretty good like you know oh six assists per 36 uh nobody who I read scouting reports of neither on Reddit or on pounding the rock which is the SP Nation blog for the Spurs neither neither writer made mention of Wesley as much of a meaningful passer. The defense is where he’s going to where where he who will set himself apart. 52% of his shots last year were inside 4 feet according to Clean the Glass but he just he shot just 57% inside 4 feet. Um, that’s the 31st percentile among combo guards. He’s a dude who is a career 29.7 three-point shooter. Um, low volume and low accuracy. He’s taken 165 threes in 156 games. Doesn’t take many, doesn’t make many. Most of his shots come at the rim. And he is in the for his position and size, a very bad finisher at the rim. Um, this is a dude who has not figured out what what he can do and what he’s capable of. And maybe what he’s capable of is not much on offense. Um, but I feel like this fits the Blazers um, sort of MMO, right? Um, he is a young player with upside. He’s he’s measured with a 69 wingspan at the NBA draft combine despite being, you know, under 6’4 with under 6’4 barefoot. Um, I I think he measured at the combine 6’4 in shoes and the Blazers have him listed at 6’3. Bless them. That’s really that’s brave of them to to admit his actual height. um like but it is you know he’s he’s a good athlete with long arms who can defend who has been much more effective as a chaos creator on defense and a transition player um on offense and has kind of a real question marks about how he can score and contribute in the half court. And boy does that sound like who the Blazers have targeted over the last few seasons in terms of like young upside swings. This is the type, this is fits sort of their prototype. Like I said, for a 15th draft pick or for a 15th roster spot, I think this is fine. This is exactly the position they needed just in terms of insurance and positional depth. Um, if this works with Blake Wesley, awesome. If it doesn’t work, it’s a one-year flyer on a 22-year-old, so be it. Um, I don’t expect we see very much of him at all. But um those of you who are still holding on to the Caleb Love plays rotational minutes stream um it has ended because Blake Wesley is younger than Caleb Love and has played in four NBA or three NBA seasons and Caleb Bluff has played in a total of zero. Um that’s Blake Wesley. That’s who you need to know. The Blazers made it official, so it’s it’s um they don’t release contract info, but it’s official. He’s on the team. He’s your 15th guy. Um, he’s really more like your 12th guy because Dame is the 15th and he’s not going to play and Robert Williams is a big question mark at 14. So, this is Blake Wesley, 13th guy. I did the math wrong. Blake Wesley, 13th guy, plus some question marks. Um, let’s talk about sticky stats. What if I told you young Hansen was better than you think or at least has some indicators that suggest what you saw was real? Join me in that second segment. We’ll talk about reality and Hansen. Before we do that though, let’s talk about FanDuel is summer sports. We We got them. Uh baseball is rolling along. They’re back playing baseball games. They got golf all every green in America seeing golf balls drop on there in a lot of bunkers as well. Plus, you got high stakes footy action here and abroad. And FanDuel is the best way to make every game more exciting. So, if you want to get into all those, you want to get into the WNBA, you want to get into whatever obscure sport you’re into, you’re going to find that action on FanDuel, you’re already a sports nut, you’re listening to this particular program. So, with FanDuel, it’s a just another way to get in on something you’re already watching. You can track your favorite matchups. Um, you can find different fun daily promotions on the app with new ways to bet. Plus, you can build a live same game parlay, so if you miss the beginning of whatever you’re watching, you can still get in on creative parlays. Or you can just watch a bet right out to the very end just like the good old days. And if you’re new to FanDuel, new customers can bet f just $5 and get 150 bucks in bonus bets if your first bet wins. Open the FanDuel app today or visit or visit fanuel.com to get started. [Music] All right. So, over at the F5, Owen Phillips wrote a post about summer league stats that you can trust. Um, Owen Phillips is writ. It is like an analytics focused basketball um basketball blog. It’s great. Um, it is it is deep dives into things um with a sort of a statistical bent. Um, and it has really good sort of um data visuals that that make it really easy and fun to read. It’s very pretty. Um and and so what and and what Philips does and Phillips is is really good at exactly this type of thing. Um if you want to subscribe, you can subscribe for free or you can pay a little money and get all of all of the posts. But but what Philips wrote is like um he he put together a sort of um a study to see which statistics in summer league are sticky, which are which which things do we watch in Vegas that actually translate to the regular season? And to find out, Phillips tracked 25 different stats across summer league and the NBA for 485 different rookies since 2008. So basically, if you’re watching a rookie in July, you watch him, you know, you’re getting your first you’re getting your first uh impressions of of them in July, what are the real things that you see that um actually will show up when that player gets on the court during the rookie season. That is basically what this is an attempt to do. Um and and a lot of this was using or all of this was using per 36 um numbers like u familiar box score stats, points, rebounds, assists, blocks, things like that. Um and then other sort of rate based stuff because it was those things are less sensitive to playing time. So like anybody who gets on the court, you can kind of track these things. And what Philips found was basically the stickiest things are how you play, not how well you play, but how you play. So three-point attempt rate, that was a very that’s a that’s a stickiest stat. And by sticky, I mean the strongest indicator, the thing that sticks from July to October or or into your rookie season. Three-point attempt rate. If you shoot if you bomb a bunch of threes, you’re probably going to bomb a bunch of threes in in uh in the regular season. And I think importantly, if you do not bomb threes, three-point attempt rate in both directions. If you do not bomb threes in Vegas, it is very unlikely that how you play and like if you didn’t if you weren’t someone who shot a bunch of threes in in in summer league, uh, according to this study, you are very unlikely to do that your rookie season. How you play is is a pretty pretty strong indicator. But other things are are also fairly sticky as well. Assists per 36, blocks per 36, rebounds per 36 are all pretty sticky. And the least sticky stuff, the stuff that’s just nonsense, right, is stuff you would expect to be nonsense if you just use your little lizard brain. three-point percentage, two point percentage, and very obviously plus minus. Plus minus is always is is pretty meaningless in in small samples anyways, but particularly in Vegas where it’s like, oh yeah, like the Blazers really won um Yang Hansen’s minutes. Well, look who came in behind him when he went to the bench. Did a single player who’s going to play NBA minutes next season come in? No, they did not. No, they did not. So, like, yeah, like the plus minus is obviously nonsense. Three-point percentage though, that’s like, you know, you just need to shoot a bunch of them. I think the the the sort of the guess from the analytics community or the projection from the analytics community is something like 750 attempts for the for three-point percentage to normalize and stabilize and like be an indicator of something. You’re probably not going to get to shoot 750 three-pointers during four or five games in Las Vegas. So, you’re never going to get that number two point percentage shot making. Shot making really doesn’t translate. It is not an indicator. Now, certainly some guys make shots and then they make shots as rookies. But in terms of what is like truly predictive, um three-point percentage, two point percentage meaningless, plus minus meaningless. Um but how you play, where you shoot from, three-point attempt rate, um assists per 36, are you are you someone who throws passes? Do you try to set guys up? And block percentage, are you getting or excuse me, blocks per 36, are you attempting to block shots? And are you effective blocking shots? And like, do you put yourself in position to do so? how you play. Rebounds per 36 as well is a sticky stat. Which brings me to the young king of Rip City. It’s funny. It was funny to call Young Anson the the young king of Rip City when Damen Lo is back. It was it was better hyperbole before Dame signed, but uh I still like it. He’s got some strong indicators here. Um he’s he’s he’s among the leaders in assists per 36 as as a rookie at 5.5. We watch the dude throw dimes. We I I mean, we watched him throw passes that weren’t assists that were just really good passes, but he’s just throwing to either like um you know, guys who can’t get shots off because some good passes don’t obviously lead to to shot attempts or even shot makes. And also just like he’s throwing to summer league dudes. Not everybody not everybody hits everything and um and so like you’re just it’s a lower quality of of teammate, obviously a lower quality of opponent as well. But in terms of just like if you make a good pass, you’re probably less likely to be rewarded at that lower level. It is in general, broadly speaking, I believe as Nate Duncan and Danny Laroo like to say, it is a lowass assist environment. So just the fact that 5.5 per 36 for a 72 center, hello. That’s meaningful. That looks like that is a like the way you play that is sticky. Do you think I mean you could just watch him and know like yeah this dude’s going to dime people up when he plays in the when he plays in in the NBA but also like the sort of statistical measurements here the the stat science behind this suggest yes that is something that you can say typically translates blocks per 36 Hansen was at 3.3 that typically translates I think there was some questions about his defense in terms of um effectiveness um I know that people tend to think like shot blocking is the indicator of defense and I and I did read Kevin Pelton say that that uh that he thought that Hansen’s rim protection was better than had been anticipated. I thought he would be fine as a shot blocker. Um I thought the sort of out on the perimeter get stuck on an island stuff would be more troubling than his ability to protect the rim. But I I guess he was not well he was defensive player of the year in China. The sort of projections of him was that he would not be that level of um of rim deter in in at as he made this sort of transition to higher level competition. and he did 3.3 per 36, one of the better numbers in the league or in the in summer league for rookies, a a strong indicator. Um, and his offensive rebounds, 1.5 per 36, um, suggests that that is that’s not really high among his peers, among his other fellow rookies, but that’s like on the better side, that’s an indicator. the blocks and the assist though like that if you are to believe um Phillips’s study here and I do because I think Owen Phillips is really smart um like it is these you kind of knew this like just with your brain right you could say like yeah I bet he’s going to be a good passer and he’s probably going to block shots because he’s 7-1 um but these as opposed to like what is real um the phrase I had used going into summer league is know what you underreact but know what you see. And by that I mean it’s like you got to figure out how guys are going to perform in context. It’s like Caleb Love is not going to get to shoot 17 times in an NBA game. So it’s like that doesn’t like what he does with 17 shot attempts is not that important. If he plays in the in an NBA game, he’s going to shoot six times or less once, right? So, it’s like you with sort of within context, but in context, Hansen’s going to get the ball at the top of the key in an NBA game and get to run dribble handoffs, run pick and roll, run that delay action whereas like guys cut off him. Like, he’s going to get to be a playmaker. That sort of playmaking hub type of thing is fairly common. Um, the Blazers don’t run it super well, but also like um they haven’t had great passers. Um certainly I I think there is more passing to unlock with Klingan, but Hansen’s already much more developed than he is in terms of just like passing touch and feel in that world. Um and the and the shot blocking seems to be something that will translate. I will say last year, uh, Don Vincllingan led all of summer league in blocks, was a monster, blocked everything. And when he got to the league, particularly the second half of the season, once he kind of found his comfort and figured out how to to function a little better in the league after, you know, you know, 45 games or whatever, he was a very, very, very good rim protector. It translated right away as rookie year. I I I think Hansen was already impressive and these numbers suggest that the things that he did well are things that often translate to your game as a rookie. So his strengths will stay strong. And I I I if you know me, you know that I think the the like the mark for young players, the most important thing you can do is make your strengths strong. Do what you do best as often as you can and then figure out how to sharpen your weaknesses. But being able to execute your strengths is incredibly important for young players. And uh I would say this Philip story that I will link in the episode description for this episode is makes kind of feel good about the direction that Hansen is headed. Even if you already felt pretty good, there’s some numbers behind it, too. You know who doesn’t feel pretty good? Jonathan Kaminga, Josh Giddy, Quinn Grimes, Ken Thomas. Those dudes are in a stalemate with restricted free agency. And that got me thinking about the future of the Blazers and some restricted free agents they’ve got coming up. Let’s talk about that to close the show. Join me in that third segment. [Music] Still a pass first point guard. I’m still Mike Richmond. You are still listening to Locked on Blazers. There was a This was rum rumaging around in my head. This is kind of banging around in my head as I was uh I was in the car for a very long time for work earlier this week. Um and I was thinking about kind of uh I was listening to various NBA podcasts. Um when you when you’re in the car for as long as I was, you can listen to all of them, baby. But um there’s a lot of discussion of Cam Thomas’s uh restricted free agency and how he kind of finds himself in no man’s land and also like he was mean to Zach Low on the internet. Um he said the f word to Zach Low on the internet. So what he got talked about on on podcast like he he made the news. Congratulations, you did it. Uh you say you you tell someone um to you you tell them the f- word is friendship for my for my younger listeners. Um and if you call someone, you know, you tell them friendship really loudly, everyone hears it. Um but Cam Thomas is a restricted free agent just kind of sitting out there with a chance to go back, but no long-term contract. Jonathan Kaminga is basically in this weird stalemate with the Warriors where they don’t want him to be back on the team necessarily and they want him to be somewhere else but they don’t want to give him up for nothing and no teams have cap space so they can’t sign him so it has to be a signing trade and blah it’s like Jonathan Kaminga he’s also in the prison of restricted free agency Josh Giddy who had a breakout um second half of the season but there’s some real question about whether the numbers like translate to impactful basketball impactful highle basketball and like really what how much money you want to commit to Josh Giddy knowing that even with how well he played, do his flaws matter enough that that like they would offset some of his strengths? Josh Giddy without a contract. And Quinn Grimes um who was reportedly asking for somewhere in the range of $30 million. I read earlier this summer. Um he unsurprisingly he is without a contract. He was hooping last year when he ended up on the Sixers, right? like he he he um the Mavericks let him go because the Dallas Mavericks don’t really understand how talent works in the league and they um Quinn Grimes got to a place where he got to just like you know because of the nature of the Sixers roster kind of got cart blanched to shoot a bunch and he hooped like he was a really good scorer and he looked like kind of that guy that the Knicks didn’t want to trade for Donovan Mitchell way back when um and now these gentlemen who were good last year Cam Thomas averaged like 24 a game um Jonathan Kaminga I’m not as I’m not I’m I’m not a big fan of his game, but like he was pretty good in the playoffs when they really needed him and kind of like had had to finally go back to him after putting him, you know, benching him and and getting him out of the rotation for a long extended period of time. These players are good. These are NBA players and they are without they are without deals and they are restricted free agents. How restricted free agency works is if you are a either a first round pick or a second round pick who has played uh three or fewer years three or fewer years in the league, you can be become a restricted free agent when you hit free agency coming off that contract. um if you if the other if your team incumbent team extends a qualifying offer to you which means that um they can sign you to a contract and because they have because of uh they have option to match and because of in all of those situations they will also have bird rights so they’re able to sign you and go over the salary cap to retain you right so your team has your incumbent team has all of the control restricted free agency is not free agency you don’t have a choice to go anywhere that’s why these dudes are stuck there is no for there is no cap space to be spent on these gentlemen. They’re not quite good enough to clear cap space to go get them and their incumbent teams don’t want to overpay. Now, we’ve seen some restricted free agents this year sign contracts that are a little bit smaller. Uh oh, I mentioned this. This is rumaging around my brain. is bumping around in my brain. And then uh Dan Deine of Yahoo Sports wrote about it um and kind of uh kind of broke down all these situations. And Dan Devine mentioned three, you know, lower level guys who have reached uh agreements on on restrictive for Asian deals. Santi Dama, a three for $52 million contract. DaVon Mitchell in Miami, two for 12. Two for 12 though. Like yeah, that’s easy to agree to. Uh and Isaiah Jackson in in Indiana with uh three years $21 million. That’s a little bit different because they lost they lost Miles Turner. Do they do that if they don’t lose Miles Turner? Does Isaiah Jackson get any money if if like um their team is whole if if they’re coming off the season they just did? Like he’s coming off an Achilles injury, but like I I think his is unique. I think we can even cut him out. So like of this sort of conversation because it’s it’s very specific to the sort of Indiana’s situation. But so it’s like you’re talking about DaVon Mitchell very little money 2 for12 and Santi Alama 3 for 52. But this isn’t that isn’t huge massive starter money. Like that’s a bunch of money. But in the modern NBA like starters are going to make 20 plus million a year, right? Like that’s that that is a starting center, starting bigs in the league make like $20 million a year. Normal. Other other players at more premium positions on the wings make more than that. And stars obviously make um coming into this season like some of them $50 million a year. But this got me thinking about Shaden Sharp. Yes. Indeed, this has a Blazers tie-in. He is not a restricted free agent this summer, but he is he is extension eligible. Um, I have said a bunch of times I don’t think the Blazers should extend him this summer. And I don’t think the moves they’ve made by adding Drew Holiday and um and Dame Lloyd have any impact on whether they’ll be able to sign him to a contract, but I think they like that the money won’t get in the way for those extensions, but um for that extension specifically or for too many Camara, but like it that those contracts won’t matter for that uh next next summer. But they will matter for like planning, right? Like James’s under contract for this, you know, two more after this one. Drew Holiday is under contract for two more after this one. You’ve like um there is there is it at one point it might have been a no-brainer, right? Okay, we’re committing to you. Let’s give you a bunch of money and kind of figure it out. But I think in the new era of this sort of restrictive CBA, throwing just like giving someone immediately a $25 million contract and saying we’ll figure it out later. That’s just what you do. you give them 25 to 40 million bucks depending how effective they are and like move on from there. I think we’ve seen those contracts come back to bite teams pretty badly. So I think for me um I would just like not pay Shaden Sharp this summer. I would just say like hey there’s we want you on the team. There’s no reason that you’re not going to be on the team. If you hit restricted free agency next summer, we’re going to match whatever contract you get. So if you do if you do ball out this summer and some other team wants to, you know, back up the Brinks truck, we will happily hop in the passenger seat and help them back it up to your house and then you’ll still be on our team. like it there’s there’s no there’s no flight risk. Um, anyone telling you there’s a flight risk with Exchange Sharp just like does not understand the rules and I’m hoping that this podcast can help them understand the rules. So, but but what it could do like I don’t think they should sign him to an extension this summer just because I don’t think he’s played at a consistent enough level where you’d want to give him like highle starter money. You have this chance to like give him a runway to play, you know, u real minutes this year and and and take a big leap and earn that contract and like you’re not going to burn bridges, right? You can say like, “Hey, I bet you want to make 25 to $28 million a year. We’re not there yet. We’d love to be there. Go ball out. We’ll happily give it to you.” Right? Like kind of simple as that. And and you and you know, you you kind of communicate to Shaden Sharp and his people and and and go from there. Um, but what what what I I’m thinking about what looking at these guys is like the sort of Quinton Grimes, Cam Thomas, Josh Giddy’s, Jonathan Kamingas. Shane Sharp could find himself in a similar vein where he is good enough to get paid a lot of money, 5 for 125, 4 for 110, like you know, like 4 for 112, like these big contracts, like a big old deal. But um he might there might be some apprehension from um teams about giving him that level of contract. So then you get into these debating areas where good enough to get a big contract but not good enough to get the biggest contract and then you get caught up. Um obviously I think this is a unique situation because this particular summer there was no teams with cap space other than Brooklyn. More teams can line up to have cap space next year. Right now, the only team that’s projected again to have cap space is Brooklyn. Um Utah has a path to it and some other teams could get there depending on what they do with some other free agents. Um but like there’s going to be um sharp because like because of the nature of free agency, teams don’t typically clear a bunch of cap space to chase restricted free agents because there’s no guarantee that you’ll sign them. And the way that you lure them away from other teams is not offering them a fair contract. It’s offering them an unfair contract. So it like you don’t even have a ton of appeal as a restricted free agency. You’re just not really a free agent. So I I do think Sharp is perfectly talented enough to end up in this weird stalemate zone. Kaminga, Giddy, Grimes, and Thomas. I think this gets a little yucky with teams and players. I don’t think this is a good space to be, but I do think we might end up here as more common than it has been in the past with teams because teams are probably wisening up about um not going too early with restricted free agents. Why, you know, if you don’t if you can’t agree to a good deal early, why wait? Uh or, you know, why rush? You can wait. And if you wait, you might have all of the leverage because these guys end up stuck in purgatory. That’s um you know I think the best case scenario for Shaden Sharp is that he plays himself just into a world where the Blazers like don’t blink and offer him a fat contract and it’s like and it is what it is or another team offers him a fat contract and Blazers match and it is what it is. But like um I do think you could look at that that quartet of Kuminga and Gideon and Grimes and Thomas and say, “Yeah, I can totally see Shaden Sharp in a similar he’s like a very could be a very similar range of player. Good, talented, but not quite talented enough which things get messy. Um, I think following how these get resolved, how Kaminga gets resolved, how Giddy gets resolved, how Grimes gets resolved, won’t be an indicator of exactly what will happen to Shaden Sharp, but it will be a good indicator of what could potentially be an outcome based on where the Blazers find themselves. Now, knowing all this, the way that my the way that my podcast works, the Blazers are going to sign Shane Sharp to a contract extension in like couple days. Uh any any educated guess I ever come up with on the show is immediately thwarted by the Blazers who are committed to doing the thing that I don’t think they should or will do. Um but it’s been a really fun offseason, at least in terms of activity. So who am I to complain? Uh come back for tomorrow’s show. Tomorrow’s show, barring any news, we’re going to talk about the future roles of Scoot Henderson, Drew Holiday, and Damen Lillard. how that trio and we’ll talk a little bit of Shaden Sharp too what that trio means for the future of the Blazers particularly just kind of looking at how they’ll deal with the guards point guard of the future point guard of the present and all of a sudden the the existence of that pesky point guard from the past who just showed up this week. Um that’s going to do it for today’s program. Come back for that one tomorrow. It’s what we do five days a week wherever you get podcasts. Uh tell your friends about the program. I appreciate you listening. I’ll talk to you soon.

The Trail Blazers roster is officially full with the addition of Blake Wesley on a one year deal. Plus, Yang Hansen’s summer league production that will translate in his rookie season via an interesting study by Owen Phillips (https://thef5.substack.com/p/summer-league-stats-you-can-trust) and the pain of restricted free agency.

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