The Portland Trail Blazers are willing to trade away one or more of their three first round draft picks if they could land a proven veteran or other valuable assets, a league source told The Oregonian/OregonLive. Despite a large payroll heading into the 2017-18 season the team isn't interested in a simple salary dump.

Sean Deveney of Sporting News reported that the Blazers were exploring trade options for first round picks that would include Portland shedding some of its larger contracts. According to Deveney, the Blazers have had discussions with the Brooklyn Nets and New York Knicks about potential deals.

Portland has picks 15, 20 and 26 in the 2017 NBA draft and could package one or a combination of the three in a trade.

The Blazers have just shy of $133 million in guaranteed contracts on the books for the 2017-18 season. That puts the Blazers about $11 million over the tax threshold for next season, bringing a tax bill of roughly $20 million before filling out the final three roster spots.

Blazers President of Basketball Operations Neil Olshey has said he plans to be aggressive heading into the draft, admitting that it was unlikely Portland would use all three of its picks to add rookies to the roster and that he would consider trades to acquire an "impact player."

"All of our players are under long-term contracts, or we control their rights," Olshey told NBA TV's Scott Howard-Cooper at the Draft Combine in May. "So we are building long term. The end game is to hopefully win a championship in Portland. If we can accelerate that process because we've got the three picks in a very deep draft, where these picks are coveted and we can get a player on a timeline from a team that is maybe going in another direction, we will absolutely push our chips in and do that."

--Mike Richman

mrichman@oregonian.com

@mikegrich