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[Adrian Wojnarowski] The Portland Trail Blazers are picking up the option for G/F Dalano Banton, sources tell ESPN.



[Adrian Wojnarowski] The Portland Trail Blazers are picking up the option for G/F Dalano Banton, sources tell ESPN.

by sean_buttcannon

16 Comments

  1. moore_money

    Makes sense, showed some stuff last season. But realistically he’s like the 9th or 10th guy off the bench at best.

  2. allaboutthatpace

    Makes sense. This team is a bit light on ball handlers, and that’s before a potential Simons trade.

  3. Loose_Voice_215

    Seems like a formality and I’m a little annoyed they didn’t do it last year when he was playing well, but I’m no GM and I’m sure they have their reasons. Roster flexibility, etc.

  4. Nice! Banton is better than probably most of those 2nd rounders from this years draft anyways. If he can tighten up his game, he could be a serious rotation player with his offensive power and speed. He’s got the size and tools to play defense too.

  5. PDXtoMontana2002

    Sure, why not? Let’s see if he can become a good role player on a play-in team instead of a chucker on oneof the worst teams in the NBA. He can score at an NBA level.

    He needs to change his game to secondary scorer and defender to find if he fits in the rotation on a decent Portland team that hopefully is just a few seasons away.

  6. RunninOnMT

    Good. I noticed him taking the tiniest of beats to line up three pointers when he had the time last year. And when he did this, it almost ALWAYS went in. Obviously you’d prefer to have a faster release, but for a guy who’s knock was in part a lack of shooting, I have a huge amount of confidence in his ability to space the floor going forward.

  7. As expected after how the draft went, no need to waive him to open up a roster spot for a newly drafted player. Excited to see if he can build off of last year but still realistically just expect him to be an end of bench guy for us.

    Can’t have him chucking up shots like last year, don’t expect that though with all of our roster playing. If he can focus on just a few parts of his game (ball-handling, 3p shooting, D) and settle into a Justise Winslow like role for us as a G/F then he could legitimately be a solid role player for us, still only 24 years old, 25 next season.

    We saw that he could legit shoot the ball from 3 for the first half of his games here (40% on about 5-6 attempts a game) once given starter minutes but when he was given the greenlight it slowly went down (25% for last 12 games). If he can hover around even just 33-34% from 3 and continue to play good D and be able to run the ball up in transition and be an off-ball slasher then he could be good. Make it so all his shots are near the basket while slashing or getting open underneath and let him occasionally shoot from 3 if he proves he can get back to where he was when he first got here. Can’t let him just pull up wherever he wants though.

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