Season In Review: Shaedon Sharpe

“It's unfortunate that I got hurt, but the time that I was playing, I think I did pretty good for my second season. Just got to learn a bit more, so going into the offseason, just going to work on the things that I see need improvement from film and everything. I'd say my pace, playmaking stuff, finding teammates on the court, just getting stronger and working on my body so I can defend. And then just hitting shots, making shots, working on those things.” -- Shaedon Sharpe

GP: 32 (25 starts) | MIN: 33.1 | PTS: 15.9 | FG%: 40.6 | 3P%: 33.3 | FT%: 82.4
EFG%: 47.5 | TS%: 52.4 | REB: 5.0 | AST: 2.9 | BLK: 0.4 | STL: 0.9 | TO: 2.3

According to Sportrac, Shaedon Sharpe has a base salary of $6,614,160 for the 2024-25 season, the third year of his rookie scale contract after being selected with the seventh overall pick of the 2022 NBA Draft. Sharpe's contract has a team option at the end of the 2024-25 season.

The Portland Trail Blazers have had their fair share of opportunities scuttled due to injury. If Wesley Matthews doesn't blow out his Achilles, does LaMarcus Aldridge end up staying in Portland? If Jusuf Nurkic leg doesn't snap in two places, do the Trail Blazers have at least one addition Western Conference Finals appearance? If Damian Lillard didn't require core muscle surgery, do the Trail Blazers take one shot at it before shifting directions? All those questions are impossible to answer, but it sure would have been nice to find out.

So in the grand scheme, Shaedon Sharpe only playing 32 games before his sophomore season was ended prematurely due to undergoing corrective surgery to address a core muscle injury doesn't qualify as a significant injury in Trail Blazers' history. Heck, it doesn't even crack the Top 50, but to lose Sharpe, arguable the most important player on Portland's roster, after less than two months worth of games certainly qualified as one of the biggest disappointments, if not the biggest, this season.

The reasons are twofold. First, as just a 20 year-old who sat out his lone college season at Kentucky, Sharpe still has a ways to go in terms of development, despite already being a very good player at this point in his career. So to lose out on all of those minutes on the court while having to watch from the sidelines qualifies as a significant missed opportunity.

And second, Sharpe's injury meant he never got considerable time playing alongside his new teammates, particularly Deandre Ayton and Scoot Henderson. And while he might have played with Anfernee Simons during his rookie season, seeing how those two supremely athletic and accurate shooting guards might have come together with Damian Lillard now plying his craft in Milwaukee would have been one of the more interesting subplots of a season that ended up being decided by the All-Star break.

While there was initially talk of Sharpe returning before the end of the season, his post-surgery condition never improved to a point where he was able to return. And even if that were the case, one wonders if even they would have even risked it at the end of a season in which the playoffs were already well out of reach.

So barring any kind of offseason setback, Sharpe should be completely healthy coming into this third season. That's more than worth the wait if he's able to become the player many think he can be.

Unfortunately, it's not all that difficult to single out Shaedon Sharpe's best game this season. He had a number of exceptional performances, but with just 32 games to pick from, the options are somewhat limited.

I suppose one could argue for his 29-point, seven-rebound, five-assist, two-block and one-steal performance over the course of 42 minutes in a 110-101 victory versus the Pistons in Detroit on November 1, but when you take in the totality, you have to go with his effort in a win versus the Cavaliers in Cleveland on November 30. In that game, Sharpe put up 29 points on 73 percent shooting from the field and 51 percent shooting from three, 10 rebounds, five assists and a block in 39 minutes.

Not only was that game one of the best of Sharpe's young career, it also kicked off a five-game stretch in which he scored at least 24 points and shot no worse than 45 percent from the field.