Would the Blazers Be in the Conference Finals If Portland Drafted Kevin Durant?

“With the first pick of the 2007 NBA Draft, the Portland Trail Blazers select…Kevin Durant.”

If commissioner David Stern uttered these words, the landscape of today’s NBA would look drastically different.

But would fans be anticipating a Portland—San Antonio matchup in this year’s Western Conference Finals?

The short answer is yes. It’s just too hard to imagine keeping Durant down.

Let’s break down how things would have shaped up had Portland picked Durant instead of Greg Oden.

Instead of the LaMarcus Aldridge, Brandon Roy and Oden Big Three that never came to fruition, the Blazers boast a trio of Roy, Aldridge and Durant.

As a rookie, Durant has a difficult time adapting to Portland. His reasons, however, are different than Oden’s. Instead of boozing and sexting, Durant struggles grasping his role on the team.

Durant doesn’t fit in immediately with the Blazers’ methodical, isolation-heavy approach. The silky smooth scorer is unsure of where he fits in the pecking order with Roy and Aldridge. With two capable scorers ahead of him, Durant slinks into the background.

That offseason, still-coach Nate McMillan tells Durant the team needs him to be more aggressive offensively.

Durant comes out of his shell a bit in his second season. He spends the offseason working on his three-point shot and is able to spread the floor for Roy. That boosts Durant’s scoring numbers.

In his third year, there is a seismic shift in Portland. The team no longer belongs to Roy—it’s now Durant’s team. Roy is the No. 2 man. Aldridge plays the part of Miami’s Chris Bosh: The offense runs through him, but he is not the go-to scorer.

Durant blossoms into an All-Star.

But Durant’s development as a star does not deter the deterioration of Roy’s knees.

That paves the way for this season, with Aldridge playing the Black Widow to Durantula.

Durant wins his second straight scoring title.

Nicolas Batum emerges as the starting shooting guard. Batum, Durant and Aldridge’s combined length creates the most-effective-while-looking-effortless 2-3-4 combo in the NBA.

With the team adapting from Roy’s slowhanded pace to Durant’s score-from-anywhere mentality, the addition of Raymond Felton gives the Blazers a good point guard. Instead of pouting and passing the ball to nobody, Felton emerges as a top-five point guard in the Western Conference as the Blazers burst to the two seed behind the Spurs.

The Blazers are still weak at center, with Marcus Camby and Joel Przybilla doing a steady but far from sensational job.

They do well enough to make Kobe Bryant blame Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum for losing a playoff series to the Blazers.

However without the scoring depth that Durant has in real life with teammates Russell Westbrook and James Harden, the fantasy Durant-led Blazers team does not get past the Spurs in the Western Conference Finals.

Unfortunately for Blazers fans, this is only fantasy.

Fortunately for Durant fans, the scoring sensation and his Thunder teammates have what it takes to get past the Spurs and into the finals.

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