Blockbuster NBA Trade of Damian Lillard May Have Been Facilitated by Rules Violation by Blazers
In a blockbuster NBA trade that involved the Milwaukee Bucks, Phoenix Suns and Portland Trailblazers — why is it the Dallas Mavericks and their fans who appear to have the biggest gripe?
First, the trade itself in a nutshell:
Portland Receives: Disgruntled Suns center DeAndre Ayton, a bevy of draft picks and pick swaps (Portland executed a subsequent trade, re-routing Bucks guard Jrue Holiday to the Boston Celtics.)
Milwaukee Receives: Arguably the greatest Trailblazer in the team’s history (it’s either him or Clyde Drexler), point guard Damian Lillard.
Phoenix Receives: A handful of role players to buttress the team’s depth.
Many pundits think the Suns got worse, and every pundit agrees the Trailblazers got worse, which would only help fellow Western Conference rival Mavericks.
So what’s the problem?
According to an in-depth timeline constructed by Bleacher Report’s Chris Haynes, there are rumblings that the blockbuster trade that ultimately sent Trailblazers legend Damian Lillard to the Bucks may have violated league “tanking” rules — the same league rules that the Mavericks were publicly shamed and fined for breaking at the tail end of last season.
“According to sources, Portland had asked Lillard to sit out the final 10 games of the 2022-23 regular season to help the franchise improve its lottery odds. He was told the higher the draft pick, the better chance they had at using the pick to facilitate a trade for a proven veteran player. He reluctantly acquiesced to being shut down, citing a calf injury,'” Haynes reported.
The tanking worked: “Portland went 1-9 to finish the season and would go on to win the No. 3 pick and select Scoot Henderson, a promising young point guard the team planned to keep.”
This ultimately led to the Lillard requesting a trade to the Miami Heat, despite ultimately ending up in Milwaukee.
The above proposition, intentionally resting your best players to improve your draft lottery odds, was exactly what the Mavericks did when it shut down otherwise healthy All Stars Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving from the team’s final stretch of games to secure a top-10 draft pick.
(For whatever it’s worth, tanking worked out for both the Blazers and Mavs. The Blazers got the aforementioned Henderson, while the Mavs acquired prized Duke big man Dereck Lively II, both of whom are perfect fits for where each team is going.)
While the entire Damian Lillard saga isn’t the best look for the league (the controversy in Portland stems from the team having allegedly promised Lillard that it would trade its draft pick to acquire veteran help for their star guard. The issue arose when the team unexpectedly jumped up the draft and suddenly found itself with a top-three pick — something they weren’t nearly as excited to trade away), it does highlight the biggest existential crisis the league has faced since a social justice-tinged “bubble” in Disney World.
That crisis? “Load management,” or the practice of resting otherwise healthy players for some sort of purported benefit (whether it’s intentionally trying to lose games for draft positioning, or resting a player to ensure future health.)
It’s become such a hot-button issue that the NBA actively pushed a new set of rules — collectively dubbed the “Player Participation Policy” — to actively discourage teams from resting players for anything other than actual injury.
As of this writing, there has been absolutely no indication that the NBA will give Haynes’ reporting any credence, or if the Trailblazers would face any sort of punishment (the Mavericks were heavily fined for sitting out a healthy Doncic and Irving) for the purported “tanking” that preceded this Lillard drama.
Regardless of whether or not the NBA investigates Portland’s alleged tanking, it’s clear that this is a far deeper issue than the league would prefer.
Because at the end of the day, monetary fines just aren’t going to be the strongest deterrent for a billionaire NBA owner — certainly not compared to the prospects of ensuring a player’s future health or securing a talented rookie.
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