Swartz: Blazers Should Trade Shaedon Sharpe for Win-Now Help

The Portland Trail Blazers are off to a surprising 6-3 start to the NBA season, capturing wins with loads of clutch shooting (sorry, Phoenix Suns) and plenty of good vibes. Considering the hot start, Bleacher Report’s Greg Swartz has an idea he believes could turn Portland from a feel-good story into a contender: Trade rookie Shaedon Sharpe.

Swartz writes the opinion in a recent piece that predicts what every NBA team would do if the trade deadline was tomorrow. He reasons Portland should use this strong start as evidence to push all-in for a title run, especially considering 32-year-old All-Star Damian Lillard’s timeline. Sharpe, the seventh pick in June’s NBA Draft, shows amazing promise at 19 and would be one of Portland’s strongest trade chips to net an impact player.

The Blazers should take advantage of this strong start, even if it means making sacrifices in the future.

No. 7 overall pick Shaedon Sharpe is the perfect trade piece to acquire some win-now help with, adding to a core of Lillard, Anfernee Simons, Jerami Grant, Jusuf Nurkic and Josh Hart. Young players like Nassir Little and Keon Johnson should draft interest from rebuilding teams as well.

Portland may only have a few years of elite Lillard left. Now is the time to go all-in.

It sounds almost distasteful to discuss trade ideas before the 10th game of the season, especially one that involves such an exciting young player who’s barely introduced himself to Rip City — I mean, look at Sharpe blocking Devin Booker in the photo above. Yet, Swartz isn’t the only one to float around such an idea. ESPN’s Zach Lowe discussed the possibility of trading Sharpe for generational talent Kevin Durant on his podcast earlier this week.

What do you think Rip City? Is Sharpe untouchable in trades, or is there a price that could pry the prized rookie away from Portland?