Denver Nuggets: 3 possible Damian Lillard trades
By Sean Carroll
Denver Nuggets potential trade for Damian Lillard: #2 Jamal and picks
This completely drains Denver’s draft capital for the rest of the decade, relegating them to pick swaps or draft night trades until 2029.
But that’s okay because Michael Malone could roll out a lineup of Dame, Monte Morris, MPJ, Aaron Gordon, and the MVP, Nikola Jokic. That lineup might rival the Brooklyn Nets’ offensive firepower and I’d rewatch their regular season matchups ten times over.
From Portland’s point of view, they save some money dropping from Dame’s salary to Jamal’s and have more than enough first-round picks moving forwards for a rebuild. And that’s before they decide to move on from other pieces like CJ McCollum and Jusuf Nurkic if they go that way.
This move also requires moving on from Will Barton which hurts the team’s depth. When assembling a Dame-to-Denver roster, you have to assume that outside of JaMychal Green, Monte Morris, and Aaron Gordon, the role players are all on rookie deals or minimums.
We all saw how that movie played out for Brooklyn this season, getting huge contributions from players like Jeff Green, Blake Griffin, and Bruce Brown. If Kyrie Irving doesn’t get injured and James Harden’s fully healthy, are those role players enough for title contention? I think so.
It hurts here to part with Jamal for all the same reasons as before. You open up a title window in the 2021-22 season, but with not much room to move under the cap, AG’s free agency, and little-to-no assets, it gets hard to see how the team gets better in the future.
If only there was a way Denver could keep Jamal as well…