Phoenix Suns at Portland Trail Blazers
Wednesday, October 21, 2026
10:00 PM ET, Moda Center
Portland is a 2.5-point favorite over Phoenix, and the total is 231.5. My play is the Phoenix Suns +2.5 (-105 at DraftKings).
Damian Lillard runs out of the Moda Center tunnel in a Blazers uniform for the first time since 2023, and the building is going to shake. I get it. I’m still betting the other bench.
The bookmakers already blinked. Portland opened as a 4.5-point favorite, and two full points have come off since. My read: that move is mostly about Deni Avdija. Portland’s best player last season, the guy who averaged 24.2 points a night and finished third in Most Improved voting, is questionable with a sore right ankle. Even if he plays, the Blazers are rolling out a starting five that has never played a regular-season game together. Lillard hasn’t played a game that counts in 542 days after tearing his Achilles. Ja Morant has played just 79 games over the past three seasons. Micah Nori is coaching his first game as an NBA head coach, and he’s Portland’s third head coach in less than 12 months.
Portland gives the ball away, and Phoenix takes it. This is the matchup I keep coming back to. Last season the Blazers committed a league-high 16.9 turnovers per 100 possessions, the worst ball security in the NBA. Phoenix’s defense lives on exactly that. Under Jordan Ott, the Suns ranked third in the league at forcing turnovers and turned a bottom-five defense into a top-10 one in a single season. Now hand that defense two ball-dominant guards who are still figuring out who brings it up the floor. Nori sounded like a coach who knows it’ll be a work in progress: “Regardless of how we start, I’m more concerned of the combinations throughout it.”
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The Suns aren’t scared of this building. Phoenix won both of its trips to Portland last season, 127-110 in November and 130-125 in February. In fact, the road team won all three regular-season meetings, and Portland went into Phoenix and won the Play-In game in April. Devin Booker (26.1 points a game last year) and Dillon Brooks (a career-best 20.2) are both back, and Miles Bridges gives Ott another grown-up scorer in place of Grayson Allen and Royce O’Neale.
The part that worries me. If Phoenix loses this game, it’ll lose it on the glass. Portland grabbed more of its own misses than all but one team in the league last season. Donovan Clingan led the NBA in offensive rebounds, and the Blazers piled up 18.4 second-chance points a night. The Suns were one of the worst defensive-rebounding teams in the league, and they’re starting the year without center Mark Williams, who’s out until around February after shoulder surgery. Oso Ighodaro and second-year big Khaman Maluach are splitting the job. Phoenix also went 1-4 in the preseason, and Luke Kennard is questionable with a sore knee. And if Avdija plays and Lillard has one of those nights, this crowd could carry Portland for 48 minutes.
Final call: Suns 113, Trail Blazers 111. Portland wins the rebounding battle, Phoenix wins the turnover battle, and Booker makes the late shots that settle it. Take the points while you still can, because if Avdija is ruled out, this line won’t stay at 2.5 for long. I’d play it down to +2. At +1.5 or lower, I’d pass.
The Pick: Phoenix Suns +2.5 (-105 at DraftKings)
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