Pack your bags Ben, you’re heading to Portland!

After 8 weeks, it’s time to mix things up with a trade and, more than anything, I’m sick of reading about the Sixers and Simmons bitching and moaning about each other. One of the Sixers off-season targets was the Portland Trailblazers, offering Simmons for CJ McCollum and a stupid amount of draft picks. 

One of the reasons that offer was rejected was because Portland aren’t dumb enough to give away their entire future’s worth of picks – but hey, your first offer is always expected to be rejected, that’s negotiation 101. The other is because their then-General Manager, Neil Olshey, was under investigation for an apparent workplace culture of bullying and intimidation and, accordingly, had lost his trade card. Come Saturday and the Blazers had finished their investigation, finding that Olshey had breached his code of conduct and promptly fired him. Whether that had anything to do with the fact that Olshey’s multi-million dollar contract extension was due to kick in or the fact that there is increasing chat that franchise cornerstone Damian Lillard is unhappy with the attempts to build a genuine contender around him, is unknown. 

On-court Portland has been less than impressive this year. Yet again, they’re one of the worst defences in the league and Lillard’s production has been down across the board. Their defence is mostly based around the assumption that centre Jusuf Nurkic is capable of making up for everyone else’s mistakes and taking away shots at the rim from guys that make it past Lillard and McCollum, who struggle to stay in front of their man. That was a workable strategy until Nurkic’s leg snapped a couple of years ago. Since his return, Nurkic hasn’t been able to put the same fear into offensive players that he once did. Another issue Portland faces is the lack of secondary playmaking. If the ball isn’t in the hands of Lillard or McCollum, they become stagnant and struggle to figure out a way to score.

There’s one guy that’s kind-of perfect for the Trailblazers. He’s a defensive monster, he’s an incredible playmaker, he’s 6 foot 11 and can play multiple positions, he abandoned his nation during the Olympics –  sure he’s got a couple of dings. But why shouldn’t Portland kick the tyres on Simmons? They’re running in quicksand right now, fighting their way to another first-round playoff loss at best. Everyone knows what to expect when the same dudes who have been playing the same way for 5 years rock up and do the exact same thing. One of the reasons the league introduced the play-in games last year was to kick Portland out of the playoffs even quicker.

A Simmons-McCollum deal just works. “Trade McCollum” has been a common calling card amongst NBA nerds for years and he would pair perfectly with Embiid. Philly is showing right now that Embiid + shooters, mostly Seth Curry, works. McCollum can improve that formula and Philly can cover his defensive lapses with guys like Matisse Thybulle. There’s even signs that Simmons wants to play in Portland, with social media investigative journalists finding him liking posts about the potential he might end up there. That’s the most positive sign we’ve seen that Simmons is interested in playing the sport in months.

If a Simmons trade isn’t on the card then Damian Lillard just needs to get out of Portland. He’s been a faithful servant of the club for years and they’ve completely failed to make any meaningful moves to build around him. Who was the last big free agent Portland signed? I genuinely can’t think of any. There’s been plenty of trades that got them nowhere, plenty of mid-range draft picks who have kind-of worked out but not much more. Time for Dame to say goodbye to the family business and go and make his money in the big city.