The Portland Trail Blazers have received some good news about rookie guard Shaedon Sharpe.
Per a release from the team, Sharpe will not have to have surgery on his injured left shoulder and will available for the start of training camp in the fall. Sharpe, the seventh overall pick in June’s draft out of Kentucky, suffered a small labral tear in his left shoulder on July 7 in the first quarter of his Summer League debut against the Detroit Pistons, sitting out the rest of the Summer Blazers’ run to the championship in Vegas.
Sharpe, at 19-year-old, is a long-term play for Portland — especially since they still have 32-year-old Damian Lillard and recently signed him to a contract extension. He’s was the Draft’s greatest mystery after he spent a year not playing at Kentucky, and Summer League was supposed to be Portland and the rest of the league’s first chance to really see where he was as a player. That never came to fruition due to the shoulder injury, but him being able to begin his first training camp recovered from his injury and get his professional career going on the right foot is the best case scenario all things considered.
The Trail Blazers are one of the few teams without their own G League affiliate, so his development will have to come via camp, practices, and any playing time he’ll get in the regular season, which only adds to the importance of his availability from the start of camp.