Cavs Trade Alonzo Gee To Pelicans

4:46pm: The deal is official, the Cavs announce. Gee goes to the Pelicans, and Cleveland will get the Clippers’ 2016 second-round pick, which New Orleans acquired in a previous trade, protected through pick No. 55. If it doesn’t fall within the final five selections in 2016, the Pelicans don’t owe the Cavs anything.

4:36pm: The Cavs will still acquire No. 45 overall pick Dwight Powell from Charlotte as part of a reworked Haywood deal, reports Rick Bonnell of the Charlotte Observer (Twitter link).

3:09pm: The Pelicans will waive Gee upon receiving him from the Cavs, according to Ken Berger of CBSSports.com (Twitter link).

2:57pm: The Cavs and Pelicans have struck agreement on a deal that sends Alonzo Gee to New Orleans, reports Brian Windhorst of ESPN.com (Twitter link). Marc Stein of ESPN.com first reported the teams were close to a deal, which nullifies the agreement that Cleveland had to send Gee to the Hornets for Brendan Haywood. Cleveland apparently still plans to acquire Haywood from Charlotte via other means, as Stein reported. A source also told Stein that Gee could wind up as part of the Pelicans’ deal with the Rockets to acquire Omer Asik,

Gee’s $3MM salary for this season is non-guaranteed, so it’s conceivable that the Pelicans envision waiving him to create the necessary cap flexibility to accommodate their deal for Asik, though that assumes New Orleans is giving up salary as part of the trade. The Cavs are reportedly still trying to clear room for a max contract for LeBron James, as Stein wrote earlier, and losing Gee, whose salary can be taken off the books, wouldn’t advance Cleveland toward that end unless other deals are in the works.

The 27-year-old Gee has been a part of the rotation for Cleveland for the better part of the last two seasons, and he started all 82 games in 2012/13. He mostly came off the bench this past season, averaging 4.0 points in 15.7 minutes per game.