Portland Trail Blazers Become NBA Laughingstock Over Extreme Budget Cuts
Portland Trail Blazers owner Tom Dundon is facing mockery across the NBA following strict cost-cutting measures, including charging staff for expenses and offering low salaries.
The owner of the Portland Trail Blazers, Tom Dundon, has not been considered a particularly popular figure in the NBA, to put it mildly. Alongside battles with the Portland city council over arena renovation funding—casting a shadow over the team's future in the city—are the austerity measures he implemented over the past year to cut costs.
The Trade and the Parking Joke
Chris Vernon, host of the podcast The Mismatch, regularly covers the Memphis Grizzlies, who traded Ja Morant to Portland this summer. As part of the deal, Jerami Grant headed to Memphis, and the journalist revealed a joke at Portland's expense that even amused Grant himself.
"I told him one of the biggest jokes of Media Day, rave reviews," Vernon joked. "I told Grant we saved him with this trade, because if he had stayed in Portland, he would have had to pay for his own parking this year. He loved the joke."
Budget Cuts and Staff Reductions
Among the cost-cutting steps taken by Dundon in recent months were staff downsizing, avoiding late check-out payments for staff on road trips, preventing two-way contract players from joining playoff road games, and allocating a low salary for the head coach—with Micah Nori signing an unusual one-year deal.
Vernon also touched on another angle of the trade, noting that after seven consecutive years, Ja Morant was no longer part of Memphis Media Day. "When you see him talking about life with Damian Lillard, Boston fans looking at Jaylen Brown, Milwaukee fans looking at Giannis, and Memphis fans looking at Ja in a new uniform, it all suddenly becomes real," he concluded.
