Trail Blazers: 3 CJ McCollum trades with California teams
By Joe Capraro
CJ McCollum trade rumors will be plentiful until he is dealt by the Portland Trail Blazers
Portland Trail Blazers all-star guard CJ McCollum has been the subject of many a trade rumor and proposal this season — including a bunch here at Rip City Project.
The current NBA Players Association president and nine-year Blazer veteran has been out since December 4 with a collapsed lung, but the team announced on Friday that he had been cleared for workouts again.
He’s at least a couple of weeks away from game action, but we’re still about six weeks from the trade deadline, so he’ll likely be back in action long enough to command full value in a deal. He’s one of the Blazers’ most attractive trade assets and could command a significant package of players and/or picks in return.
3 trades to send CJ McCollum to vineyard state California
It remains to be seen whether Portland will be looking to swap a few pieces and retool for a championship run this year or gut the roster of anyone not named Damian Lillard and reboot for next season. Either way, McCollum is redundant as the second best score-first-play-very-little-or-no-defense guard on this team. And he’s not the only valuable trade piece on the Blazers’ roster.
Anfernee Simons will be a restricted free agent this offseason and Portland already has more than $100 million of next year’s projected $119 million salary cap committed to just six active players — they’ll pay Andrew Nicholson nearly $3 million to play in Korea next season.
Jusuf Nurkic and Robert Covington are also good values on expiring deals at $12 and just under $13 million, respectively, and will command attention from contenders and rebuilding “poopshows” alike.
With McCollum’s interest in winemaking, we figured the least we could do for someone who had been such a valued teammate and community member for nearly a decade was send him somewhere he could pursue his off-court interest, so here are three California-based trade suggestions for Interim General Manager Joe Cronin.