Ken Blaze-USA TODAY Sports
Trading for Kuzma or anyone like him would not be an indictment of the excellence of the Cavaliers’ Evan Mobley/Jarrett Allen pairing. Rather, it would be a deal made to complement them and essentially upgrade on the defensively-solid-offensively-limited Georges Niang and Dean Wade. For that reason, and considering their apt contract sizes, those two would be a logical starting point for any trade.
Cleveland’s financial wiggle room to make a trade is limited. After buying out Ricky Rubio, they sit $3.2 million below the luxury tax line, and with not a lot of salary coming off the books over the summer. That said, a combination of the $8,800,000 of Niang and the $5,709,877 of Wade, paired with the expiring $8,920,794 contract of Isaac Okoro, gets the Cavaliers to a place where they can just – just – acquire Kuzma without straying over the tax threshold.
The problem, though, will be finding the draft capital to get the Wizards what they want. Okoro has some value as a potential re-draft player, but not much, and because of the residual effects of the Donovan Mitchell trade, the Utah Jazz control Cleveland’s draft position until 2029. If picks are the priority for Washington, Cleveland might struggle.
The Cavaliers have been mentioned as enquiring after names such as PJ Washington recently, seeking some frontcourt reinforcements and multi-positional spacing to offset the loss of Kevin Love and the limited shooting range of Mobley. Kuzma is that, and, to a team looking to add to what they have while also budgeting for Mobley’s future deal, the declining nature of his salary will be most useful. The final year of it might be troublesome as constructed, but it is a problem that can be dealt with later. The much more immediate problem is finding the draft capital to get anything done.
