While the Portland Trail Blazers didn’t make the playoffs this season, their record represented the best performance since the 2020-21 campaign, and they took a significant step forward.
Young players like Shaedon Sharpe, Scoot Henderson, and Donovan Clingan all showed notable improvement, while Deni Avdija had a breakout season, and Toumani Camara emerged as one of the league’s top perimeter defenders.
According to Quick, Blazers GM Joe Cronin shared that the team is now ready to shift its focus from simply acquiring talent to targeting specific positions and skill sets to enhance the roster.
“As a front office, we don’t feel that pressure to take swing after swing to try and hit on the next up-and-coming guy,” Cronin said. “We are starting to feel really comfortable with our talent base that we can be more diligent about adding specific types of guys.”
Despite having a promising core of young talent, there’s uncertainty about whether any current player will evolve into an All-Star capable of leading the franchise to contention.
However, both Cronin and head coach Chauncey Billups remain optimistic and unbothered by the lack of a clear franchise player.
“There’s a lot of talent on this roster, and I wouldn’t put ceilings on a lot of these guys,” Cronin said. “There is still a lot of time and talent that can be maximized. So these guys … I wouldn’t write them off to becoming star-level guys.”
Billups echoed that sentiment, emphasizing that developing star-level players takes time.
“It’s true you need to have top-flight guys, but to me, we are raising that, we are growing that,” Billups explained.
“I look at Oklahoma City, they traded for Shai (Gilgeous-Alexander), but he wasn’t a star yet. Now he’s probably going to be the MVP. Joker (Nikola Jokic) wasn’t a star when he got to Denver. They raised him into that. Giannis (Antetokounmpo) wasn’t a star when he got to Milwaukee. They raised him into that. That’s where I think we are trying to go … Deni, Shaedon, Scoot, Ant (Anfernee Simons) … We are raising those guys.”
Deni Avdija says the future is "super bright" in Portland, plus more Trail Blazers notes: https://t.co/QUBKbI9eLv
— Hoops Rumors (@HoopsRumors) April 15, 2025
