Blazer players have developed, but their coach has, too

Billups would like to return next season as the Blazers’ coach, but says he has had no communication with the team’s management about it (courtesy Trail Blazers)

There is little question that Chauncey Billups is a different coach than he was when he took over the Trail Blazers in 2021.

How much different?

“Light years,” Billups told me Sunday before the Blazers’ 105-102 win over Toronto at Moda Center.

It won’t show up in this season’s won-loss record, but there have been a number of positives on the court for the Trail  Blazers — particularly the development of the “Young Core Four” of Deni Avdija, Toumani Camara, Scoot Henderson and Donovan Clingan.

Perhaps as apparent has been the development of the man running the show.

When Billups came on as head coach for the 2021-22 season, he had a grand total of one year’s experience on an NBA bench, as assistant coach with the Los Angeles Clippers. Billups was thrown into the ocean without a life raft. Get to shore, young man. Figure out a way.

The Blazers began that season with a veteran roster featuring Damian Lillard, CJ McCollum and Jusuf Nurkic along with promising young Anfernee Simons. Getting something done in the playoffs was the goal.

In December, Billups’ boss — general manager Neil Olshey — was fired and replaced by Joe Cronin. In January, Lillard was declared lost for the season after abdominal surgery. In February, Portland traded McCollum to New Orleans. Suddenly, a youth movement was imminent. The Blazers, 20-26 in late January, went 7-29 the rest of the way to finish 27-55.

In 2022-23, Portland seemed bound again for a bid for the playoffs. The Blazers were 26-26 in early February and still 31-34 in early March. But there were injuries, and then Lillard was shut down, as was every veteran on the roster. The Blazers, in full-bore tank mode, lost 15 of their last 17 to end the season 33-49.

After a Lillard offseason trade, the 2023-24 campaign was “look to the future” all the way. Portland started the season 3-11 and limped to the finish line a Western Conference-worst 21-61.

This has been a strange season for the Blazers, whose management was clearly intent at first to develop the young players and go for as low a lottery pick as possible in what is considered a strong 2025 draft class.

“We are heavily invested in a lot of our young guys, so development will continue to be a focus,” Cronin said on media day. “We are not going to win at an extremely high level until some of those guys are ready.”

Funny thing, though. Billups — 81-165 in his first three seasons as head coach — figured it was time to forget the future and chose to play for now. He was beginning the final year of his contract, with a team option for 2025-26, and ownership/management had declined to give him an extension during the offseason. Billups, now 48, was a company man, but he was coaching for his future, too.

And gradually, the talent level had been upgraded. Veterans Jerami Grant, Deandre Ayton and Anfernee Simons were still aboard, but the youth was beginning to come of age. Trade pickup Deni Avdija, 23, was an awakening, a ready-made big-time contributor at both ends and a leader. Toumani Camara, 24, a second-round draft pick acquired as part of the Lillard trade, has become a premier defender and an improving offensive contributor.

Lottery picks Scoot Henderson (No. 3 in 2023) and Shaedon Sharpe (No. 7 in 2022), both 21 years old, have talent out the ying yang and have begun to turn that into production.

There was a lot of lackluster play early in the season as the players got used to each other. In late January, the Blazers were 13-28 when they went on a tear, winning 10 of 11. Suddenly, “tank mode” went out the door as the goal turned to a chance to earn a play-in spot.

You can argue that is a mistake, and I get it. Odds are not high that the Blazers get the play-in spot, and even less that they advance into the final eight in the West. Adding another low pick in a strong draft would only help the future.

But there is another side to it. After three and a half years of losing big, the players — and a good number of their fans — are tired of it. The coach is, too. A losing culture can have a negative effect on everyone involved. It is contagious, and hard to shake.

So Billups is going for it, and has his guys playing hard. Sunday’s game was a microcosm of the season. Toronto jumped to leads of 18-4 and 22-6, but Portland battled back to a 52-52 tie at halftime. The Raptors went on a 13-0 roll to go ahead 70-57 in the third quarter and still led 95-86 with 5 1/2 minutes left. The Blazers rallied and took a 105-102 lead in the closing seconds. With the game on the line, Matisse Thybulle — playing his first game of the season — came from nowhere to block Orlando Robinson’s 3-point attempt, and a win was in the books.

Billups is not the raw, inexperienced coach he was 3 1/2 years ago when he took over the Blazers.

Chauncey Billups is not the same coach that he was 3 1/2 years ago when he took over the reins of the Trail Blazers

“I am so much more knowledgeable about the league, the players, how I like to play, how I like to coach,” he said. “The roster has changed a ton since I started here. What most people don’t understand, every time your roster changes, so do you. There is different talent, and you have to find different ways to play. As a coach in this league, you don’t really have a system. A system is whatever players you have, and you try to figure that out. You have to change every single time. Having had to change so much has helped me grow.”

There is more, Billups said.

“My patience has changed, even though I think I have always been pretty patient,” he said. “Watching the flow of the game now — it has all really changed for me in a great way.

“I knew going (into the 2021-22 season) I was going to be a totally different coach by year three or four than I was in year one, and I certainly am. I would like to think I have gotten a ton better, but I still have a long way to go in this thing, I really do.”

I asked Henderson if Billups is a players’ coach.

“Definitely,” the second-year point guard said.

And has Billups been instrumental in Henderson’s development, as a Hall of Fame point guard mentoring a youngster with similar aspirations?

“I would say so,” he said. “Coach has been good to me, being that extra eye on the court and off the court. As a person, he is a great dude. He just understands certain situations that we are in, especially as a young team. He knows what it takes to get better. He is doing a good job of letting me go out there and hoop. As a team, we are learning on the fly.”

Billups’ criticism of his players mostly comes behind closed doors. Occasionally, though, he has made it public, as when the Memphis Grizzlies, going without an injured Ja Morant, clobbered Portland 134-89 at Moda Center on Nov. 10.

“That was just f-ing embarrassing,” Billups told the media afterward. “We were soft as hell the whole game. Nobody really fought. It was just embarrassing for everybody. That is just not who we are, it really isn’t. No excuse for that.”

Billups was tough on his players in private that night, too.

“Deservedly so,” Henderson said. “Everybody took that to the heart. We took it personal, not even just him yelling at us, but not wanting to have him feel that way again.”

Billups has cachet because of the trust he has gained from his players.

“You have to pick your spots,” is the way Billups looks at it. “My guys know I am a very competitive person, but I am fair with everybody. It doesn’t matter if you are the best player on the team or on a two-way contract, I am the same way with everybody. They don’t always love it when it is their turn (for criticism), but I think they respect that.

“That is me more than anything. I would rather be respected than liked. I have always thought that way. The people you respect, you trust that their heart is in the right place. There are tough things you have to say, tough ways you have to coach at times. But it is all a part of the process. That is another way I have gotten better as a coach, in knowing when to pick those spots, when to do it, why to do it, how to do it. That has been a part of my development.”

The Blazers, 30-39 after Monday night’s victory over Washington, are on the outside looking in at the postseason. Prior to Sunday’s win against Toronto they had dropped five in a row, all of them to strong playoff teams. The Blazers, though, were competitive in each of those games. There has been a good spirit to them, even in defeat.

When I asked Billups if this has been the most rewarding season of his stint in Portland, he nodded emphatically.

“You are 100 percent right on that,” he said. “This year has been the most fun for me. You have to have good players, healthy players who can play whatever way you want to play. It helps everything. By and large, we have been pretty healthy all season, which allows you to compete, for my coaches and me to instruct.

“We have been able to sustain how we have played, whether we win or lose. Our guys are competing our behinds off. When you are young, you can compete as hard as you want to and still maybe lose a game. We have to understand — I have to understand — that is a lesson, not a loss. That is just a part of it.”

Grant and Ayton have been out of action with injuries as often as not in recent weeks. When they have played, Billups has walked a tightrope of using them in important situations but also getting his youngsters ample minutes. I would argue that the use of Clingan instead of Ayton and Camara instead of Grant actually gives Portland a better chance to win. But I am only your trusty scribe, not an executive running the club. I love Avdija’s contributions and have been won over by Henderson’s growth in recent months, but I digress.

Even so, I am of the suspicion that management — at least earlier in the season — has suggested that Billups use the young players more, ostensibly sacrificing the opportunity to win for development (and draft) purposes.

“I wouldn’t say I have gotten pressure to do that,” Billups said. “It is one of those things that I believe in. It is one of the things I want. When we took Shaedon and Scoot and these young guys, I was in there promising them, ‘I am going to develop you. I am going to make you better. It is not always going to be easy. You are probably not always going to be happy with me, but I have to develop you.’

“I have had no pressure at all. The pressure on that is just me doing it, and me taking a lot of pride in teaching these guys how this game is, teaching them tough lessons.”

When after last season, the Blazers declined to extend Billups’ contract, he handled the situation with class. No squawking to the media. If it got under his skin, he didn’t show it.

“I know I have gotten better (as a coach),” he said. “I have grown. And I feel like I have been a great soldier. I have never once been negative about what we have done and my situation here. I feel like I deserved (an extension), but there are a lot of times in life when you don’t get what you deserve. I understand that.

“I knew coming into this year that I was walking in as a ‘lame duck,’ as they call it. But I have always felt like I am at my best with my back to the wall. I have been like that my whole life. I accept that challenge. I am going to do the best I can. If that’s not good enough? Well, I will figure it out. If it is good enough, great. I came in with that mentality, and I still have it. I am really lucky in that my guys have been healthy enough that I have been able to show growth and promise in my skills.”

Billups is leaving his contract situation to agent Andy Miller. He said he has had no communication from Cronin on the subject.

“We haven’t spoken about it,” Billups said. “When the season is completed, I am sure we will. For now, I am more focused on continuing to enhance my skills and to enhance my guys.”

Would Billups like to return next season?

“Sure,” he said. “Hopefully so. I love what we are doing. I love who we are doing it with. I love our young guys. We have taken some steps together.”

I have seen enough from Billups this season to suggest that a two-year extension added to the option year would make sense. He has his players’ attention and respect. Billups could use a bell cow — a veteran marquee player who could front the promising youngsters and turn a good group into a great one — but there are only so many Nikola Jokics and Shai Gilgeous-Alexanders out there.

According to the website bolavip.com, Billups is getting $4 million a season from the Blazers. The average coach’s salary is $7 million, so Billups is on the lower end.

I have no idea what Cronin and Bert Kolde — the Paul Allen crony who oversees the operation for Jody Allen — are thinking. They may be looking at giving Billups his walking papers. Careful what you wish for. Another team may see him as the right fit and hire him away.

What, you think the Blazers are capable of screwing things up?

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