Portland Trail Blazers: Three players to target with trade exception

Portland Trail Blazers exception candidate three – Enes Kanter

Another ex-Trail Blazer, Enes Kanter, should be on Neil Olshey’s radar if he is to use their trade exception this off-season.

The 28-year-old Kanter only played sparingly for the Boston Celtics this season after signing a two-year $10 million deal in the 2019 offseason.

Kanter still had a decent role in the regular season, averaging around 17 minutes a night. But in the playoffs, this dropped to nine minutes a night as Kanter’s defensive limitations were shown up.

In the playoffs, a guy like Kanter can only play in the most conservative of defensive systems. If he is on a team that switches ball screens a lot, he gets played off the court. Kanter is a poor defender away from the rim.

But, if you remember the Blazers playoff run last year, Kanter was able to play such a big role because Terry Stotts ran a very conservative drop coverage. In the pick and roll, he was able to sit in the paint most of the time.

This will only work against certain teams, but this also means that Kanter is fine as a backup center during the regular season.

He has always been one of the best rebounders in the league, even if he only plays small amounts of minutes. And he is a big energy guy. As a regular season center, he is perfect. He can feast against smaller lineups or bench units as he is so big and moves well for his size.

At six-foot-ten and 250 pounds, he can be a great bench producer against the right teams. Kanter earns just $5 million in the 2020/21 season, so he could fit perfectly into this trade exception.

He has played with many of these Blazers before, and he knows Coach Stotts and his systems.

All three of these guys could back up big men Zach Collins or Jusuf Nurkic off the Blazer bench. Also, not having to commit any of our precious midlevel exception to them would be a win.