11 Free agents Utah Jazz must resist overpaying this summer

Utah Jazz, Jordan Clarkson (Photo by Alex Goodlett/Getty Images)
Utah Jazz, Jordan Clarkson (Photo by Alex Goodlett/Getty Images)
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Jerami Grant (Stephen Lew-USA TODAY Sports)
Jerami Grant (Stephen Lew-USA TODAY Sports)

Jerami Grant

Jerami Grant is a free agent that no one seems to be talking about much. And most of that is due to the fact that the expectation is that he’s going to re-sign with the Portland Trail Blazers. My question is, will that change in the event that the team elects to trade Damian Lillard, which at this point seems like a very real possibility? If I had to guess, I’d say that Grant’s future with the Blazers is very much linked to Lillard’s.

If the team knows they’re going to trade Lillard during the offseason, I’d have to assume that they try to work a sign-and-trade with Grant when free agency opens. That means that we should have a decision on Lillard at some point between now and the start of free agency. If Grant is eligible to seek a new deal elsewhere, the Jazz will be one of the teams that could theoretically offer him a max contract.

And on paper, he’d be a good fit next to Walker Kessler and Lauri Markkanen. While Grant would make sense, there’s no way the Jazz could afford to allocate that much of their salary to one player who may or may not be much of a needle-mover for the team.