The Portland Trail Blazers fall to 1-2 on the season after their 114-107 road loss to the Los Angeles Clippers. More concerning than the record is the fact that it now marks three straight underwhelming performances for recently extended guard Shaedon Sharpe.
It's extremely early on, but interim head coach Tiago Splitter should already be reevaluating Chauncey Billups' decision to promote Sharpe to a starting role this season.
Sharpe finished this contest with 19 points, five rebounds, one assist, and two steals. Although the assist total should be higher with Sharpe taken on this increased role as a playmaker, overall, those are still solid counting stats on the surface. The issue, however, is Sharpe's inefficiency, which has now been plaguing both him and the Blazers in all three games. Sharpe shot 7-of-24 from the field and just 1-of-9 from beyond the arc, leading both teams in field goal attempts.
Jerami Grant and Shaedon Sharpe continue trending in opposite directions
It's a delicate balance. Part of the reason Portland extended Sharpe to a four-year, $90 million deal is the fact that he arguably has the highest upside out of any player on Portland's roster. Anfernee Simons is now in Boston, while Scoot Henderson and Damian Lillard remain sidelined with injuries. They need Sharpe to be aggressive and embrace this increased role as a shot creator, filling the void for Portland's overall lack of ability to generate offense.
But, three games into the season, it's already apparent that Sharpe has taken that role too far to the other extreme. He had approximately four dunk attempts that were blocked this game, to go along with six turnovers.
Sharpe is just 22 years old, and to a certain extent, it's beneficial for him to play beyond his comfort level to improve as a result of these growing pains. But at the same time, Splitter's surprisingly new responsibility as interim head coach is to get this up-and-coming Blazers roster to win as many games as possible. From that standpoint, Sharpe has not shown anything in three games that justifies him remaining in the starting unit over Jerami Grant.
Sharpe has the upside of eventually becoming a better player than Grant due to his elite physical tools and potential as a three-level scorer with his ability to create separation. But unfortunately, Sharpe's three-point efficiency has now declined in all four seasons since entering the league.
Meanwhile, Grant is showing legitimate signs of a bounce-back campaign after what was a concerningly poor 2024-25 season.
One case to make for keeping Grant in that sixth man role is that, contrary to popular belief, he's embraced it. Portland lacks depth, especially with its injuries, and can still use Grant's scoring punch off the bench to help compensate for that roster weakness.
Splitter doesn't have much time to make this difficult starting lineup decision as the Blazers are set to take on the Los Angeles Lakers in the second half of a back-to-back. It remains to be seen what changes he'll make, if any. But this is certainly a situation to monitor in the coming games, with the two players continuing to trend in opposite directions.