With a revamped backcourt, the Portland Trail Blazers' offense should look different this 2026-27 season, likely at the expense of Shaedon Sharpe in particular.
Portland's high-flyer only started in roughly half the season, yet was a focal point of the offense when he played, and still led the team with a 30.5 percent usage rate. The fact that Sharpe was ahead of the Blazers' newest All-Star, Deni Avdija, was already a sign that things should likely change.
This may have been Sharpe's best season statistically, yet it may have been his worst year overall as far as where he now stands within the Blazers' hierarchy.
Shaedon Sharpe fell down the Blazers' pecking order this offseason
At least Portland finally addressed its playmaking problems as a team that finished dead last in turnovers last season. They now have the luxury of a crowded backcourt, giving head coach Micah Nori optionality between whether the offense should be run through Ja Morant, Damian Lillard, or Avdija.
Ultimately, the Blazers' ceiling is at its highest when Avdija has the ball in his hands playing that jumbo guard role similar to a Luka Doncic or Cade Cunningham.
The secondary playmakers should depend on whether Morant can find a way to fit Avdija's game, which presents as a dilemma: Morant's game is better suited with the ball in his hands as another player who prefers to get downhill and can't really space the floor as an off-ball threat.
In addition to Morant's fit, Portland also has to evaluate what they actually received in their buy-low trade to take a shot on a former two-time All-Star.
Then, there's the nine-time All-Star in Lillard.
If he can return to form, that's a far better offensive fit alongside Avdija. But would a starting backcourt of Morant and Lillard be too much to overcome defensively?
Nori faces difficult decisions that will determine whether the Blazers retain their defensive identity or embrace a more balanced unit. Whatever Nori ultimately decides, it likely won't include Sharpe in that starting five, or having the highest usage rate on the team, for that matter.
Does Shaedon Sharpe fit in Portland's offense anymore?
It's been quite the up-and-down start to his career in Portland. He was the initial top ten pick to jumpstart this rebuild in 2022 and still possesses that star upside as a 23-year-old who gets better each year. But how much of that has actually resulted in making more of an impact on winning?
Sharpe has now been benched by consecutive head coaches, with Chauncey Billups benching him mid-season for lack of defense and Tiago Splitter surprisingly axing Sharpe from his playoff rotation in their first-round series against San Antonio.
Portland still believes in the upside, committing long-term to Sharpe in the form of a four-year, $90 million rookie-scale extension last summer. That still doesn't mean he's safe from a potential trade, especially after seeing the construction zone in the Blazers backcourt.
Despite four quality point guards, it's actually Sharpe, not Scoot Henderson, who shouldbecome the odd man out in Portland, and it's because of the concerns regarding the scalability of his role.
That role of an individual isolation scorer who struggles to defend and is a below-average three-point shooter could be valuable off the bench if Portland is struggling to generate offense. But overall, it risks the flow of what should be more overall movement in the Blazers' offense, something that Nori made a point of emphasis at his introductory press conference.
Unless Sharpe can make progress in impactful areas that he's yet to show to start his young career, it could be hard to see how his ball-dominant role fits on a team suddenly full of more polished playmakers.
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