The NBA is waiting on a Damian Lillard trade, but according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, there’s reason to believe a deal might take weeks—if not months—to materialize.
At long last, Lillard is ready to move on from the Trail Blazers, the only team he’s played for during his NBA career, after the club’s recent struggles. Lillard has also made it clear that he wants to play for the Heat, fresh off of their run to the NBA Finals, and Miami appears to be the only strong bidder for the seven-time All-Star.
As a result, things are at a standstill between the two sides, and the NBA calendar isn’t putting a lot of pressure on either Portland or Miami to proceed, Wojnarowski explained during an appearance on NBA Today Friday.
“It could take months, it could take weeks,” Wojnarowski said. “I think the absence of a real deadline lurking on a Damian Lillard trade—there’s no trade deadline coming, there’s no NBA draft, there’s no July 1 free agency about to start—all those landmarks in the NBA calendar give teams motivation and give teams parameters to get big deals done. The next real deadline for any of these teams is the start of training camp in late September.”
Damian Lillard trade update via @wojespn:
— Evan Sidery (@esidery) July 15, 2023
- Timeline for potential deal still likely to be weeks or months from now.
- Trail Blazers will not rush into what they consider a “bad deal” from the Heat.
- Miami doesn’t want to bid against themselves for Lillard: “They know that… pic.twitter.com/aZHUBb8gPL
The fact that the expectation is that the deal will come down to the Blazers and Heat doesn’t help matters, as Portland wants to receive maximum value, while Miami doesn’t want to give up so much that it becomes hard to build out the team around Lillard, Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo. Lillard’s lengthy contract is also a potential issue.
“I think for the Portland Trail Blazers, they don’t want to rush into what they consider a bad deal. The Miami Heat, the team that is most motivated to trade for Damian Lillard, where Damian Lillard wants to end up, they don’t want to be in a situation where they’re bidding against themselves right now. …They know that the market doesn’t love the idea of paying Damian Lillard a $60 million average at 35 and 36 years old, the last two years of that deal,” Wojnarowski said.
“There’s no rush for either side to be real aggressive in their conversations with each other, and for Portland, they’re motivated to wait this out and continue to see, ‘How do we get the most back for Damian Lillard?’ They don’t see it as moving quickly on a deal unless Miami came with all of their assets, you know what they’re able to trade for Damian Lillard. They’re not motivated to do that now, they’d be bidding against themselves.”
