In the spring, the Portland Trail Blazers and the Phoenix Suns faced off in an epic 7-8 clash in the NBA Play-In Tournament, which Portland ultimately won thanks to Deni Avdija’s late heroics and earned the right to lose to the San Antonio Spurs in the first round.
Tonight at 11 p.m. ET, the Suns and the Trail Blazers will face off again, though this time with significantly lower stakes and modified rosters in the NBA Summer League. No player who participated in that game will play tonight.
Phoenix is a 3.5-point favorite at DraftKings Sportsbook (-155 on the Moneyline), and Portland is +130.
Portland Trail Blazers vs. Phoenix Suns (11 p.m. ET)
Neither of these teams appeared at either the Salt Lake City Summer League or the California Classic, and neither has played yet in the NBA Summer League, so this will be the first time that either takes the court. The Trail Blazers had a slightly better performance in the 2025 Summer League, finishing 3-2 to the Suns’ 2-3, and there is some overlap between those teams’ rosters, though that isn’t hugely indicative of how the teams will play tonight.
Phoenix’s roster has the more notable names, if only because the Suns acquired a rookie in the draft and Portland neither drafted a player nor acquired one via trade. Phoenix, therefore, has Koa Peat, who was projected to be a lottery pick for much of the college season but slid to No. 30 after an up-and-down campaign with Arizona in which he shot just 62.3% from the free throw line. Additionally, the Suns have brought back Khaman Maluach, the 10th overall pick in the 2025 draft who showed some flashes as a rookie and even featured as a rotational piece in the first-round series against the Oklahoma City Thunder. The Trail Blazers only have one notable name, Yang Hansen, whom they selected with the 16th overall pick in 2025 and who played sparingly as a rookie. Yang shot the ball extremely inefficiently in his NBA stints, but he had a lot more flashes in the G-League, averaging 17.1 points and 9.2 rebounds per game.
Beyond Peat and Maluach, Phoenix also has Rasheer Fleming, who played 55 games in the NBA rotation and actually had the team’s best on-off plus/minus among players with at least 600 minutes. In those minutes, Fleming wasn’t particularly efficient, but he ranked in the 81st percentile in points saved per 100 possessions. Koby Brea also went 13-for-30 (43.3%) from deep in his NBA minutes, and as a 43.4% career shooter in college, that sort of efficiency is probably sustainable. Besides Yang, Portland’s roster is less deep, as Quincy Olivari was a regular G-League starter last season but was pretty inefficient. Jalen Bridges at least showed some flashes for the Maine Celtics, but Chris Youngblood was awful in his 34 minutes of garbage time duty for the Thunder.
If Yang starts to live up to the potential that caused Chinese fans to anoint him “Chinese [Nikola] Jokić”, Bridges provides him with enough shooting to operate. However, besides the occasional isolated game in the G-League, Yang hasn’t shown much. He doesn’t have the mobility to challenge Maluach, who consistently put up big stat lines in the developmental league as well as elite per-36 rebounding numbers in the NBA. Fleming is also simply too good for either the G-League or the Summer League, and his perimeter defense could present both Olivari and Youngblood with problems. The Suns should be able to get their redemption for their Play-In Tournament defeat.
NBA Summer League Pick: Phoenix Suns -3.5 (-110)
