Lakers Trade Pitch Flips Hachimura, 1st-Rounder for Versatile $160 Million Wing

“The Lakers have had talks about bringing in Grant, per Sean Highkin of Rose Garden Report, but they’ve so far had hang-ups on the trade particulars,” Buckley wrote. “Namely, the tanking Trail Blazers are trying to get both of the Lakers’ tradeable first-round picks (2029 and 2031), which the Lakers are understandably not willing to move. Slice the pick request in half, add a pinch of protection on the first and tack on a future second, though, and the Blazers should be in business.”

Jerami Grant Built to Contribute to Lakers on Both Offense, Defense

Grant can do most everything the Lakers need, and most of that stuff he does exceptionally.

Namely, he averaged 21 points per game last season on a roughly two-to-one mix of 2-point shots against 3-point tries. Grant is a career 36.4% shooter from behind the arc, but he’s knocked down north of 40% of his 3-pointers in each of the past two seasons on 5.7 attempts and 5.1 attempts per contest, respectively.

Grant was a solid-to-average defender for the first half of his career, until playing for bad teams like the Detroit Pistons and Trail Blazers changed that. Some of Grant’s defensive decline is probably due to aging, as he will play in his 11th NBA campaign next season at 30 years old.

However, poor team defense around him and a lack of incentive playing for squads that won just 23, 33 and 21 regular-season games over the last three years, respectively, have almost certainly played a role in Grant’s defensive woes. An increased offensive load at a usage rate above 25% in three of the last four seasons has also led Grant to shift more of his focus to the offensive side of the floor.

The presence of LeBron James on a player’s team will change that, though, as Grant would primarily play off-ball and would likely shoot fewer 2-point shots in favor of a couple more 3-point attempts per contest. Grant could convert the energy he would conserve on offense and apply it to defending opposing wings, which Grant’s physical attributes (6-foot-7 and 210 pounds) theoretically equip him to do well.

Blazers Have Zero Incentive to Keep Jerami Grant if Lakers Make Quality Trade Offer

Beyond the Lakers’ needs and perspective, trading Grant makes sense from Portland’s point of view as perhaps the only Western Conference team out of 15 incapable of challenging for the playoffs.

The Utah Jazz will probably move Lauri Markkanen and intentionally pull themselves out of that mix, but essentially every other squad in the West has an argument for at least making the NBA Play-In Tournament as one of the conference’s top 1o seeds. Grant is the Trail Blazers’ best player after the team dealt Damian Lillard to the Milwaukee Bucks ahead of the 2023-24 season, and the next two drafts are loaded with talent. It makes sense for the Blazers to be bad, and the worst version of their roster doesn’t include Grant.

Getting off of the final four years Grant’s contract and acquiring the Lakers’ 2029 first-round pick with a top-three protection should be enough incentive as it is. The inclusion of Hachimura and Vincent in Buckley’s trade pitch is solely about making the salaries match up closely enough for the deal to pass league rules.

Hachimura is a solid rotation player/part-time starter for a contender entering his age-26 season and could bring back an asset if the Blazers flip him elsewhere. Vincent was also a high-level contributor/part-time starter for a Miami Heat team that made a run to the NBA Finals in 2023.

Vincent missed all but 11 games for the Lakers last season due to injury, but he is certainly a movable player when healthy, which means Portland would have options going forward.