Ranking the 5 worst Blazers starters of the Damian Lillard era

It's a miracle Damian Lillard didn't ask out sooner.
San Antonio Spurs v Portland Trail Blazers
San Antonio Spurs v Portland Trail Blazers / Steph Chambers/GettyImages
facebooktwitterreddit
Prev
3 of 5
Next

3. Moe Harkless, 2018-19

Moe Harkless was another Blazers wing who had solid positional size at 6-foot-7 but, like Turner, never developed a reliable three-point shot. Harkless played with Lillard and the Blazers for four seasons from 2015-19.

He joined the Blazers when he was 23, coming over from the Orlando Magic in exchange for a 2020 second-round pick. It seemed like solid value at the time - Harkless was the No. 15 overall pick in the 2012 NBA Draft out of St. Johns, and the Blazers desperately needed more 3-and-D wings to compensate for their star backcourt pairing of Lillard and McCollum's lack of size and defensive weaknesses.

The issue with Harklesss was that he was a very volatile three-point shooter. During his peak season with the Blazers in 2016-17, Harkless started 69 games and averaged ten points on 35 percent shooting from three, which is close to the league average. But later on in his career with Portland, in the 2018-19 season, Harkless regressed to 27.5 percent from beyond the arc.

He had an up-and-down four-year stretch with the Blazers and ultimately was traded to the Clippers as part of a four-team deal headlined by Jimmy Butler's departure to the Miami Heat. After the Clippers, Harkless had multiple other landing spots, including the Knicks, Heat, and Kings.