Longtime digital reporter Casey Holdahl let go by Portland Trail Blazers

When Tom Dundon paid $4.25 billion for the Portland Trail Blazers, Casey Holdahl had already spent nearly two decades building the franchise’s digital presence. On Tuesday, Dundon made clear what that tenure was worth to him, as Holdahl, one of around 70 employees, was let go on the business side of the organization.

“I have indeed been let go after 18+ years with the @trailblazers,” Holdahl wrote on X. “My sincerest thanks to all of you who have read/listened/watched/engaged with my work over the years.”

The departure follows a month of scrutiny over how Dundon has been running the franchise since the NBA Board of Governors approved his $4.25 billion purchase in April. Last month, multiple reports surfaced that for both the play-in game in Phoenix and the first-round series in San Antonio — Portland’s first road playoff trip since the 2020-21 season — the Blazers left Holdahl and award-winning team photographer Bruce Ely at home as part of broader cost-cutting measures. Both were kept out of the traveling party, not because their work wasn’t needed, but because sending them cost money that the organization apparently didn’t want to spend. The people whose job it is to document and distribute the franchise’s postseason moments to its fan base weren’t there to do it.

That wouldn’t be the last of it.

The Rose Garden Report‘s Sean Highkin reported that the Blazers also left their three two-way players — Caleb Love, Chris Youngblood, and Jayson Kent — at home rather than bring them to San Antonio, something Highkin confirmed no other road playoff team did this weekend. Sports Illustrated‘s Chris Mannix, meanwhile, reported that staff members were asked to vacate their Phoenix hotel rooms mid-afternoon to avoid late-checkout fees. OregonLive’s Bill Oram added that the team decided against offering a T-shirt giveaway to fans when the series returned to Portland, and that the Blazers skipped sending a scout to the Minnesota-Denver series despite potentially facing the winner in the second round.

Dundon addressed some of the criticism in an appearance on The Ringer’s Game Over podcast last week, claiming he was willing to spend on players and calling the two-way player situation a “mistake” he hadn’t understood. Clearly, he understands what laying off an 18-year employee and 69 of his colleagues on the business side means, and yet here we are.