Portland Trail Blazers: 2016 Offseason Grades
Keeping Crabbe
When the Brooklyn Nets made a massive four-year, $75 million offer to restricted free agent Allen Crabbe, they were testing Olshey’s hand with an inflated deal. Much to their dismay, Portland matched the offer that will pay their backup wing an average annual salary of $18.8 million.
For a player who averaged 10.3 points per game and posted .459/.394/.867 shooting splits last year, that’s a massive pay raise, and one that likely wasn’t coming from the Blazers front office if not for Brooklyn’s offer.
Amazing to think Allen Crabbe was scrapping with Blazers' Summer League team at this time last season. Now, he's 2nd highest paid on team
— Jason Quick (@jwquick) July 11, 2016
At only 24 years old and coming off his third NBA season, Crabbe showed real signs of being a solid bench contributor for a young team on the rise. A career 38.4 percent shooter from long range, Crabbe’s floor-spacing and wing defense will be crucial for a second unit that doesn’t have the same star power as a starting unit with Lillard and McCollum.
However, this is an awfully large sum of money to commit to a good but not great reserve, especially in the wake of the Evan Turner deal…and the overall spending spree that Olshey would go on to keep his young core intact.
Grade: C+
Next: C.J. MaxCollum