5 Things to Watch at Trail Blazers' 2025 Training Camp

This has, unquestionably, been the most eventful and newsy Trail Blazers offseason I can remember.

You might counter with the summer of 2023, when Damian Lillard requested a trade. I would argue that, while that saga ate up the entire offseason that year, nothing actually happened between Lillard's trade request on July 1 and the eventual trade to Milwaukee on Sept. 27 besides increasingly tiresome relitigating of hypothetical Miami trade packages on podcasts and social media.

This summer was totally different. Hardly a week has gone by since April without some fairly major news. As someone who covers the team, I barely had a moment to breathe.

It started the last week of the 2024-25 regular season, when general manager Joe Cronin and head coach Chauncey Billups both agreed to long-term contract extensions. In the five months since then, we've gotten: a major shakeup of Billups' coaching staff; Paul Allen's estate announcing in May that the Blazers were finally for sale, seven years after his death; the Anfernee Simons-Jrue Holiday trade a few days before the draft; the shocking, out-of-left-field selection of Yang Hansen with the No. 16 overall pick; the Deandre Ayton buyout to fully clear the runway for Yang and Donovan Clingan to be the future of the center position; Yang's electric Summer League debut, which was watched in China by more people than watch most playoff games in the U.S.; Lillard's return to Portland on a three-year deal after he was unexpectedly waived by the Bucks; and, most recently, a group led by Carolina Hurricanes owner Tom Dundon agreeing to buy the team for $4.25 billion.

That's a lot for one offseason. But the basketball starts this week.

Tomorrow morning, the Blazers, along with most other teams in the NBA, will hold media day. We'll hear from Cronin, Billups, president of business operations Dewayne Hankins and most of the players. After such a chaotic offseason, there will be plenty to ask everyone, and we'll have full coverage here for paid subscribers.

Here are five things I'll be watching most closely later this week, after media day when training camp starts.

Yang Hansen's first NBA training camp

This is, without a doubt, the biggest story of camp. Outside of the sale, Yang's arrival could have the biggest impact on the future of the franchise of any of the offseason developments, depending on how quickly he can contribute and whether the public interest sustains.

Yang looked shockingly NBA-ready at Summer League. If you hadn't followed the draft or known where anyone was projected ahead of time, and then watched the Blazers' games in Vegas and someone told you Yang was a first-round pick, you would have thought it made sense.

But Summer League is not the real thing. Practicing and scrimmaging with the rest of the Blazers' Vegas team, which was mostly guys auditioning for a training camp invite, is not the same as practicing with real NBA players, let alone playing against them when the season starts.

I think it's a good thing that Yang was granted permission not to play for China in the FIBA AsiaCup tournament this summer in order to stay in the U.S. Adapting from the CBA to the NBA is hard enough from an on-court standpoint; it's even more difficult when you're in a new country learning a new language while also having to play against a much tougher level of competition. I haven't been around him in person since Summer League, but I predict he's going to be a lot more comfortable with his surroundings once camp opens, having been here for most of the summer.

Damian Lillard's impact behind the scenes

Lillard, by all indications, isn't going to play a minute this season as he focuses on rehabbing his torn left Achilles. At his introductory press conference in July, Billups all but confirmed that when he joked that Lillard would be "the world's highest-paid assistant coach" his first year back in Portland.

At that same press conference, Lillard said that coming back to the Blazers was a "basketball decision" in addition to a personal one, and named several of the young players that he's a fan of.

"One thing that I've missed over the last two years playing on an older team is, I'm able to be more and give more when I have something to pour into," he said. "When I'm invested in others' careers more. Having the opportunity to do that, especially having a young, rising point guard like Scoot that I'm gonna be playing with now, and Toumani and Deni and Shaedon, who I was with his rookie year. Being around those guys and having so much to share and being able to pour into them and be a part of their continued progress is something that elevates me as a player and as a teammate and as a leader. I'm looking forward to that as well, even when I'm playing."

Lillard's work with Scoot Henderson will have to wait a little, after Friday's announcement that Henderson will miss the beginning of the season with a hamstring injury. But it's still a young team with plenty of guys he can work with, which it sounds like he's actively preparing to do while he's not able to contribute on the court this season.

Pivotal year ahead for Shaedon Sharpe

There's no way around it: this is a make-or-break year for Sharpe. He and the Blazers haven't agreed on a contract extension yet, and I have my doubts that they will before the opening-week deadline in late October. That would mean Sharpe is a restricted free agent next summer, and we saw how that went this year with Jonathan Kuminga, Cam Thomas, Josh Giddey and Quentin Grimes.

I've always said I think Sharpe is the most talented player on the Blazers' entire roster, and we've seen stretches where he looks like an All-Star. But that hasn't been consistent, either due to health or effort. Remember, their second-half turnaround last season started the night Billups benched Sharpe against the Bulls and publicly called out his defense.

To his credit, Sharpe responded well to that benching and eventually won his starting job back. But stuff like that can't happen in year four, not when he's trying to convince the Blazers to pay him a lot of money for years to come. This year, the leap is either going to happen or it's not.

How do the starting roles shake out?

Even with Henderson missing the beginning of the season, the opening-night starting lineup is far from set.

It's probably safe to pencil Holiday in at point guard now that Henderson is out, and Donovan Clingan will almost certainly start at center. The other three spots could go a few different ways.

Does Sharpe start in the backcourt with Holiday?

Does Deni Avdija start in the backcourt as a point forward next to Holiday, with Toumani Camara and Jerami Grant in the two forward spots?

It's tough to see Camara and Avdija not starting, considering they were the Blazers' two best players for most of last season. But both of them can play multiple positions, so there are a few possibilities for how Billups can put the pieces together.

Can Kris Murray or Rayan Rupert break into the rotation?

Speaking of make-or-break years, at some point the Blazers' other two 2023 draft picks need to find a way to earn consistent playing time.

Rupert is still very raw. He had a good Summer League, but you're supposed to have a good Summer League when you're playing there for the third time. Murray earned some minutes in the second half of last season as a solid wing defender, but his shooting isn't nearly consistent enough to make him an everyday player on a team trying to make the playoffs. If that comes around in his third year, it changes a lot about the trajectory of his career.

The absence of Henderson at the start of the season and the rotational adjustments that will come with that could open up more minutes for Murray and Rupert. It's up to them to take advantage of it, especially since both of them will be up for new contracts next summer.