The Portland Trail Blazers are headed into the 2026-27 season with a roster that looks nothing like the one they rolled out a year ago. A coaching change, the addition of an All-Star point guard, and Damian Lillard’s return after missing all of last season with a torn Achilles have completely altered the shape of the team. When that much shifts at once, roles don’t just change - they can get rewritten.
One player who could feel that more than anyone is Deni Avdija. He was Portland’s leading scorer last season and earned the first All-Star nod of his career, but he also handled the ball a ton because Lillard was unavailable.
That setup likely won’t last. With Lillard back and Ja Morant now in the mix, Avdija’s usage rate should take a hit.
The challenge for Portland will be finding a way to keep his game front and center while also putting the ball in the hands of two other high-usage guards. Last season, Avdija led the team in usage rate, but that may not be his lane anymore.
It could mean a return to the kind of supporting role he played earlier in his career with the Washington Wizards alongside Russell Westbrook and Bradley Beal.
Scoot Henderson is in a different kind of transition, but it may be just as important. He saw some of this coming last season, when Jrue Holiday was on the floor more often.
Henderson entered the league with the expectation that he’d be a classic point guard, yet that may not be the position he holds in Portland going forward. Morant, Lillard, and Holiday are all expected to handle the ball more than he does, which means Henderson will need to sharpen his work without the ball.
That matters even more now because he’s in a contract year. If he can adjust to Nori’s system and settle into the role he’s being given, it could shape his future in the league.
Holiday, meanwhile, goes from being the steadying force Portland needed last season to someone whose job description looks very different this time around. He arrived as a breath of fresh air with Lillard sidelined and started most of the team’s regular-season games.
Now, though, the Blazers are expected to use him as the leader of the second unit and their primary ball handler there. Even then, he may still spend plenty of time sharing the court with another point guard such as Lillard, Morant, or Henderson.
Holiday’s experience should make that adjustment manageable, but Portland may not lean on him the way it did a year ago.
In Other News...
Former Blazers Big Just Landed A Chance Portland Fans Should Watch
Duop Reath is getting another NBA opportunity, and it is one that Trail Blazers fans will remember well. Phoenix signed the former Portland big man to bolster its frontcourt after an injury thinned the Suns depth, giving the undrafted 2023 center a fresh opening after stints with Portland and Atlanta. Reath carved out a niche as a stretch five, the kind of big who can space the floor and fit alongside more traditional rim protectors.
For Portland, the move is a familiar reminder of how quickly roster math can change for a young big. Reath was moved out of the Blazers crowded center picture at the trade deadline, and now he lands on a Suns team looking for help while it waits on Williams to work back. If Reath can steady a front line in Phoenix, it would be another example of a player whose value is easiest to see once he is no longer in a Blazers uniform. [Read more 🡒]
Deni Avdija Now Faces A Blazers Question That Could Define His Season
Portlands offseason makeover has left plenty of moving parts, and Deni Avdija sits right in the middle of the conversation. The Trail Blazers have a new owner, a new coach in Micah Nori and a reshaped roster, and Avdija is entering his seventh NBA season with expectations that hell anchor the starting forward group after emerging as one of the teams most important players.
The wrinkle is that Portland now has multiple point guards, which changes the feel of the lineup around him and could alter how much creation responsibility falls on his shoulders. Avdija is in the third year of a four-year contract, so the Blazers are no longer just projecting what he might become, theyre trying to define what he is in this version of the team, and that answer could end up shaping his season as much as any new addition. [Read more 🡒]