6/30/26

After a relatively successful season where the Portland Trail Blazers were the #7 seed in the Western Conference before falling in five games to Western Conference champions in San Antonio, the Blazers decided to try to accelerate their building process. On Monday, Portland acquired the controversial point guard Ja Morant from the Memphis Grizzlies. Shams Charania broke the news on Monday. Portland sent forwards Jerami Grant and Kris Murray to Memphis to complete the deal.

Morant was the second overall pick in the 2019 NBA Draft after becoming a huge name leading Murray State to an upset of Marquette in the opening round of the 2019 NCAA Tournament. He would go on to win the 2020 NBA Rookie of the Year and is a two-time NBA All-Star and second team All-NBA in 2022. In seven seasons, Morant is averaging 22.4 points per game and 7.4 assists per game.

The controversy surrounding Ja Morant comes from social media posts during his time in Memphis where he would regularly flash guns as well as doing gun-related celebrations on the court. Morant was also involved in a controversy with the Indiana Pacers after getting into an altercation outside the Pacers bus. A red laser was pointed at the bus that Pacers players and personnel believed was attached to a gun but Morant was not punished for the incident as the league was not able to “corroborate that any individual threatened others with a weapon.”

Morant has also dealt with injury issues, missing most of the 2023-24 season due to suspension and shoulder surgery and he only played in 20 games last season due to a calf injury and UCL sprain.

For more on the trade, click this link to read ESPN’s coverage with contributions from Tim MacMahon

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