#3: Portland Trail Blazers
The Portland Trail Blazers are stuck in a tough place. They are not quite good enough to compete with the top teams in the West and they have no room to add players due to their cap situation. They could look to move one of CJ McCollum or Damian Lillard if they don’t do well this season, but why not go all-in and swing a deal for Love and bring him home?
Kevin Love would be a good fit with McCollum and Lillard and they would form a lethal offensive trio, although their defense would be scary bad. The Trail Blazers have some large contracts to match salaries, but they do not have much in terms of young players, so a potential deal would have to involve multiple draft picks. I doubt the Trail Blazers would be willing to include Zach Collins even though Kevin Love is locked up long-term because he is their only young player of note as of now and he has been pretty important to them so far this season.
Something like Evan Turner, Maurice Harkless and a couple of future first-round picks could be a starting point for a Love deal. Players like Turner and Harkless don’t really appeal to the Cavs currently, but they are just for salary matching purposes. The two future first-round picks likely won’t be great if Kevin Love stays healthy for the Blazers and they keep the team together, but it is at least a couple of lottery tickets for the Cavs. They also get out of the Harkless and Turner contracts in two years.
Next Up: Trade Partner #4
