In a perfect world, NBA teams would make every decision purely based on basketball merit. It rarely works out that way. Locker room dynamics are tricky.
Players fight hard to earn their stature within the sport. It affects their reputations, their earning power and their entire careers. It usually isn't something they're eager to sacrifice because someone else thinks it might make the team slightly better.
For the sake of maintaining harmony, teams are frequently forced to make decisions they might not otherwise make. The Portland Trail Blazers are currently experiencing such a dilemma. Earlier this offseason, the Blazers traded for Ja Morant.
Last summer, they reacquired Damian Lillard as he recovered from a torn Achilles. And last season, Deni Avdija grew into an All-Star as Portland's only reliable ball-handler. Having one consistent shot creator isn't enough.
Having three, at least in the wrong context, is too many. Yet at his media availability at training camp on Tuesday, Lillard said he expects to start alongside Avdija and Morant this season. This was apparently news to first-year coach Micah Nori, who has made it clear he does not yet know who will start and, according to The Athletic, said that Lillard and Morant starting together would make little sense.
That, fundamentally, is the issue here. Avdija, as the youngest and best of the players at the moment, will be starting. The question is who should be starting next to him, and the basketball answer almost certainly isn't both Lillard and Morant.
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