What It Means:

Injury concerns may have dampened his market in free agency. He checked out enough that the Blazers still decided to give him a two-year, $15 million contract, so they must not have seen any medical red flags. Ezeli said that defense is "the part of the game that I like the most...I'm trying to be the monster that I can be." He and Mason Plumlee will duel to start at center this season, a position battle that doesn't bode well for fantasy purposes.

Ezeli saw his minutes drop from 16.7 minutes in the regular season, to 8.8 minutes in the playoffs. He averaged 7.0 points, 5.6 rebounds and 1.1 blocks on a .548 effective field goal percentage this past year, earning a 2.3 nERD that ranked 57th in the league.