The Portland Trail Blazers were off to a strong start to the 2025-26 season, looking to carry over the momentum from the strong finish to last year. That was put to an abrupt halt thanks to a combination of a demanding schedule and, most significantly, untimely injuries.
Spotrac's NBA injury tracker ranks the Blazers ninth in cash total per day missed at $12.5 million, showing how much value they've lost and the adversity they've had to overcome.
As a result of those injuries, interim head coach Tiago Splitter has relied on two-way players Sidy Cissoko and Caleb Love. The former has been servicable, starting in six games and helping Portland maintain its identity with his positional size and versatility. But unfortunately, the latter has become a liability for the Blazers.
Tiago Spliter must reconsider Caleb Love's role
Love is undersized, which contributes to his fifth-worst defensive rating (120.4) on Portland's roster. In order to provide value, he must compensate on the offensive end, but he's in no man's land as a tweener combo guard. He doesn't offer enough playmaking to be a lead ballhandler -- something Portland could use with Jrue Holiday and Scoot Henderson still sidelined -- yet is far too inefficient a scorer for the Blazers to continue using him off-ball to the extent they have been.
In 12 games played, Love is averaging 8.3 points, 2.9 rebounds, and 2.2 assists on 32/26/75 shooting splits. In a perfect world, he'd be efficiently filling the scoring void for a depleted Blazers backcourt. That's come to fruition occasionally, including a timely 26-point outburst in their upset NBA Cup win over the Golden State Warriors. But the reality is, those instances have been few and far between.
Love's shot-chucking is having a negative impact on Portland's offense, and it's ruining the progress they've made as a team that emphasized more movement and a less stagnant offense over the offseason. That's part of the reason why Portland moved on from Dalano Banton and, to a lesser extent, Anfernee Simons this summer. Those problems are resurfacing with Love.
His form looks solid, but it's not translating into efficient shooting, partly because of his questionable shot selection. Some of that is on the Blazers, as a two-way rookie like Love shouldn't be put in this position or have these expectations, regardless of unforeseen injuries. But at this point, interim head coach Tiago Splitter is better off giving other role players who are more impactful without the ball in their hands extended stretches, such as Kris Murray and Cissoko.
And if Love's development is a point of emphasis, why not play first-round pick Yang Hansen instead?
This inefficient hero ball isn't conducive to winning. Blazers fans have realized this for weeks, and injuries have compounded this issue as of late. It's something Splitter needs to reconsider, as Love is becoming unplayable despite the lack of options at his disposal.