Cleveland Cavaliers Rumors | Hoops Rumors

Poll: Cavs’ Slow Start A Cause For Concern?

November 2nd, 2017 at 12:56pm CST by Luke Adams

The Cavaliers fell to the Pacers on Wednesday night, marking the fifth time already this season that they’ve lost to a team projected to have a losing record. The Cavs, who lost early in the season to Orlando, have now been beaten by the Nets, Pelicans, Knicks, and Pacers in their last four games.

As Dave McMenamin of ESPN details, the club held an “air-it-out” meeting earlier this week to address its poor start. The reaction to that meeting at the time was positive, with one source describing it to McMenamin as “very productive,” but it seemed to have little effect on Wednesday, with the Pacers beating the Cavs by 17 points.

Although he didn’t express much concern about Cleveland’s first few losses, LeBron James was more perturbed by the club’s latest loss, McMenamin writes in another article for ESPN.com. Admitting that he hoped things would change now that “it’s a new month,” James had trouble explaining why exactly the Cavs are struggling so much.

“We have an opportunity to be very good and then you see some of the lulls that we have and it’s just very difficult on our team right now,” James said. “We’re just trying to figure it out on the fly. … So, our team is kind of depleted as well, both on and off the floor.”

The team has been impacted by injuries in the early going. Isaiah Thomas is out for at least a couple months while he recovers from a hip issue, Iman Shumpert is sidelined with knee soreness, Derrick Rose has missed some time, and Tristan Thompson is expected to miss up to a month after suffering a calf injury on Wednesday.

The Cavs’ slow start can also be attributed to poor defensive play. As Joe Vardon of Cleveland.com relays, players and coaches felt like they were playing tougher D on Wednesday, but the team still remains at or near the bottom of the NBA in several defensive categories. Teams are making 14.0 three-pointers game at a 41.8% clip so far against the Cavs, who have a defensive rating of 111.3. All of those figures are NBA worsts.

We’ve seen the Cavs get off to sluggish starts before, but the current losing streak – four straight games by 63 combined points – is the worst of James’ NBA career. And, according to Sam Amico of AmicoHoops.net (via Elias), no team has reached the NBA Finals after starting 3-5 since the 1990/91 Lakers (Twitter link).

What do you think? Is this just a blip on the radar for the Cavs as they get accustomed to their new-look roster, or is this slow start a harbinger of things to come this season? Vote below in our poll and jump into the comment section to share your thoughts!

Trade Rumors app users, click here to vote.

Tristan Thompson Expected To Miss 3-4 Weeks

November 2nd, 2017 at 12:02pm CST by Luke Adams

12:02pm: The Cavaliers have issued their own update on Thompson, confirming that he’s dealing with a calf strain and indicating that they expect to get him back on the court in three or four weeks.

11:13am: Cavaliers big man Tristan Thompson is expected to miss the next month due to the left calf injury he sustained on Wednesday night, reports Shams Charania of The Vertical (Twitter link). After leaving Wednesday’s game in the second quarter, Thompson later departed the arena on crutches.

Thompson’s injury is the latest blow to a Cavs team that has had to deal with multiple injuries in the early going of the 2017/18 season. Isaiah Thomas, of course, is expected to be out until at least December – and possibly later – due to his hip injury. Derrick Rose has also missed some time so far, and Iman Shumpert is currently sidelined with a knee ailment.

After opening the year as a reserve, Thompson has re-entered the Cavaliers’ starting lineup for the last five games, but the club is just 1-4 during that stretch, and the 26-year-old’s production has been modest. In eight total games, he’s averaging a career-low 4.4 PPG and 6.1 RPG.

With Thompson sidelined, Jae Crowder seems like a good bet to re-enter the Cavaliers’ starting lineup, with Kevin Love spending a little more time at center. Cleveland doesn’t have a ton of depth up front, so it will be interesting to see whether Channing Frye and/or Ante Zizic see increased roles, or if the team opts to lean heavily on smaller lineups for the next few weeks.

Of course, making a roster move to add another big body is also a possibility, but the Cavs have 15 players on guaranteed salaries and will be reluctant to add salary, since that would increase their projected luxury-tax bill.

Iman Shumpert To Miss At Least 5-7 Days

October 31st, 2017 at 10:14pm CST by Luke Adams

Cavaliers swingman Iman Shumpert will be sidelined for at least the next five to seven days due to knee soreness, the team announced today in a press release. Shumpert, the subject of trade rumors throughout the offseason, is averaging a career-low 18.2 minutes per contest early this season for Cleveland.

Lue Believes LeBron Intimidates Some Players

October 30th, 2017 at 6:52pm CST by Dana Gauruder

Cavaliers coach Tyronn Lue believes some of his players are too timid because of LeBron James‘ presence, Joe Vardon of Cleveland.com relays. Lue expressed those feelings after an embarrassing loss to the Knicks on Sunday. “Guys have got to understand that LeBron, he’s a giving person, he’s a giving player,” Lue said. “You’ve got to come in and play your game and we’ll adjust. I think a lot of times we defer to LeBron or guys are scared to be aggressive because of that.” Vardon speculates that Lue was referring mainly to former Celtics forward Jae Crowder, who’s averaging 7.3 PPG on 6.6 shots per game.

2017 Offseason In Review: Cleveland Cavaliers

October 29th, 2017 at 6:00pm CST by Austin Kent

Hoops Rumors is breaking down the 2017 offseason for all 30 NBA teams, revisiting the summer’s free agent signings, trades, draft picks, departures, and more. We’ll evaluate each team’s moves from the last several months and look ahead to what the 2017/18 season holds for all 30 franchises. Today, we’re focusing on the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Signings:

Kyle Korver: Three years, $22.06MM. Third year partially guaranteed ($3.44MM).
Jose Calderon: One year, minimum salary.
Jeff Green: One year, minimum salary.
Derrick Rose: One year, minimum salary.
Dwyane Wade: One year, minimum salary.
John Holland: Two-way contract. Two years. $50K guaranteed.

Camp invitees:

Kendrick Perkins: One year, minimum salary. Exhibit nine. (Waived)
JaCorey Williams: One year, minimum salary. Summer contract. (Waived)
Isaac Hamilton: One year, minimum salary. Summer contract. (Waived)

Trades:

Acquired Isaiah Thomas, Jae Crowder, Ante Zizic, the Nets’ 2018 first-round pick, and the Heat’s 2020 second-round pick from the Celtics in exchange for Kyrie Irving.
Acquired the draft rights to Dimitrios Agravanis and draft rights to Sergiy Gladyr from the Hawks in exchange for Richard Jefferson, Kay Felder, a 2019 second-round pick, the Trail Blazers’ 2020 second-round pick (top-55 protected), and cash.
- Note: 2019 second-round pick will be the less favorable of the Lakers’ and Timberwolves’ selections.

Draft picks:

None

Draft-and-stash signings:

Cedi Osman (2015; No. 31): Signed to three-year, $8.325MM contract.

Departing players:

Kay Felder
Kyrie Irving
Richard Jefferson
Dahntay Jones
James Jones
Edy Tavares (waived)
Deron Williams
Derrick Williams

Other offseason news:

Parted ways with general manager David Griffin.
Offered president of basketball operations job to Chauncey Billups, who withdrew from consideration.
Promoted assistant general manager Koby Altman to GM.
Isaiah Thomas expected to be out until at least late December.
Kendrick Perkins joins Cavaliers’ G League affiliate.

Salary cap situation:

Operating over the cap and over the tax line. Carrying approximately $134MM in guaranteed team salary. Projected tax bill of approximately $43MM. Portion of taxpayer mid-level exception ($2,549,143) available.

Check out the Cleveland Cavaliers’ full roster and depth chart at RosterResource.com.

Story of the summer:

The Cavaliers looked thoroughly overpowered by the Warriors in the 2017 NBA Finals, so it’s understandable that their offseason was punctuated by moments of panic and general uncertainty.

It wasn’t long before the Cavs’ plan of making a landmark move to emphatically one-up their Western Conference rival in Golden State quickly gave way to desperate attempts at self-preservation. After missing out on early targets like Jimmy Butler and Paul George, the franchise managed to survive, emerging from a substantial personnel shuffle with an oddly intriguing smorgasbord of assets.

This couldn’t have been the summer that LeBron James hoped for on the heels of Cleveland’s season-ending loss in Oakland last June, but the club handled unforeseen adversity as well as anybody inside or outside of the organization could have hoped.

Will the forced – but nonetheless decent – moves that the team made in 2017 be enough to convince James to re-sign in Cleveland in 2018? Well, that will be the story of next summer.

Key offseason losses:

When Kyrie Irving forced the Cavaliers’ hand into trading him over the course of the summer, the team had little choice but to oblige. Irving’s ability to create offense on the perimeter will be missed heading forward, as will his general presence as an unquestioned superstar talent who drew significant attention from opposing teams. There’s no single player that will make up the loss of Uncle Drew (not even a fully healthy Isaiah Thomas), so the best the Cavs can hope for is success from the backcourt committee they’ve assembled.

While the Cavs didn’t initially intend to part ways with Richard Jefferson this offseason, the opportunity to pick up a recently bought-out Dwyane Wade was too irresistible to pass up considering everything else that transpired over the summer. Fortunately for Cleveland, there are no shortage of valued veterans in the team’s locker room.

The Cavs didn’t exactly get what they hoped for when they brought Deron Williams aboard during buyout season last year, so the 33-year-old’s exit won’t have a major impact. Williams averaged 7.5 points per game for the team in 2016/17 and remains unsigned.

Key offseason additions:

Despite an MVP-caliber campaign and his role in the revitalization of the Celtics as a legitimate contender, Thomas doesn’t move the needle as much as Cavaliers might have hoped. Perhaps it’s the hip injury that could keep him out until Christmas; perhaps it’s the pending free agent’s affinity for measuring his salary in Brink’s trucks. Regardless, it’s hard to be confident in a guard who only transitioned from good to great last season, particularly because of the shoes he’ll need to fill when he gets back on the court.

The Cavaliers haven’t had a particularly physically imposing perimeter defender during their most recent Eastern Conference reign so the addition of Jae Crowder could add a much-needed element to their lineup. If he can provide value checking the likes of Klay Thompson and/or Kevin Durant, he could end up being the most influential component of Cleveland’s offseason haul.

It’s easy to disregard the idea of Derrick Rose as an NBA star these days, but the former MVP had a decent, if weird, lone season with the Knicks last year. The fact that the Cavs were able to lure him on a minimum contract could go down as one of the steals of the summer so long as he’s able to stay on the court. Rose will never again be the prolific threat to penetrate that he was during his heyday, but he finally appears to be trending in the right direction.

After one underwhelming year in Chicago, Wade and the Bulls parted ways, and it didn’t take long for the veteran to team up with James, his former running mate during their time with the Heat. Just what Wade can provide for the Cavs remains to be seen, but he remains capable of moments of greatness, as he showed sporadically last season. While Wade’s contributions in the regular season may be pedestrian, it’s inevitable that he’ll prove dangerous come playoff time.

It’s hard to know quite what to make of Jeff Green, considering the various forms he’s taken with five teams over the past four seasons. Still, in the worst-case scenario, he’s a long, experienced combo forward capable of getting hot intermittently throughout the season. Green is an underrated depth add and yet another massive bargain signed to a minimum contract.

Outlook for 2017/18:

The Cavaliers seem to be in good hands with Koby Altman at the helm (not that they were in necessarily bad hands with outgoing general manager David Griffin). Altman managed to cash in on James’ years of accumulated goodwill in the form of not one, not two, but three presumed rotation pieces signed to team-friendly, veteran’s minimum contracts.

Questions abound for the Cavs this regular season, but there’s no denying that they hastily patched together a veritable firing squad of established talent. On paper, at least. It may take some time for the acquisitions of Thomas, Wade, and Rose to bear fruit, but – in theory – they help make up one of the most prolific supporting casts James has been surrounded with in Cleveland.

If this team gets healthy and gels at the right time, the Cavs will be as scary as ever in 2017/18.

Salary information from Basketball Insiders used in the creation of this post. Photos courtesy of USA Today Sports Images. Luke Adams contributed to this post.

Shumpert Gets First Start Of The Season

October 29th, 2017 at 9:08am CST by Arthur Hill

Cleveland’s reported interest in Suns guard Eric Bledsoe is the latest sign that the addition of Wade isn’t working out, states Ira Winderman of The Sun-Sentinel. Wade, who asked to be removed from the starting lineup this week, is averaging 8.6 points through five games and is shooting just 43% from the field. Winderman suggests that Wade’s friendship with LeBron James blinded the Cavs to the reality that Wade can’t produce at an elite level anymore.

Iman Shumpert, whom the Cavaliers spent most of the summer trying to trade, was in the starting lineup for Saturday’s loss at New Orleans, notes Dave McMenamin of ESPN. The move was necessitated by injuries, as Derrick Rose continued to be unavailable with a sprained left ankle.

Rose wants to remain in the lineup once he returns, writes Jason Lloyd of The Athletic, and he was concerned he might have to sit out today’s game if he played Saturday. Coach Tyronn Lue recently moved Dwyane Wade and Jae Crowder to the bench and didn’t want to disrupt their new roles, so he called on Shumpert. The Cavaliers have used four different starting lineups in six games.

Cavs Not In Mix To Acquire Bledsoe; Thompson Moved Into Starting Lineup

October 27th, 2017 at 8:01pm CST by Austin Kent

The Cavaliers are not in the mix to acquire Eric Bledsoe at this point in time, Joe Vardon of Cleveland.com writes in a question-and-answer with readers. There are no Bledsoe trade scenarios that make sense for the squad so long as Isaiah Thomas returns healthy and Derrick Rose is accountable all season.
The Cavaliers will start Tristan Thompson for the next little while, Joe Vardon of Cleveland.com tweets. Head coach Tyronn Lue opted to slot the familiar face in at the five, bumping Jae Crowder out of his role as the starting small forward.

Cavs Need More Out Of Both Shooting Guards

October 26th, 2017 at 4:14pm CST by Austin Kent

The Cavaliers are going to need plenty more out of their shooting guards, Joe Vardon of Cleveland.com writes. So far this season, free agent acquisition Dwyane Wade has struggled to find a rhythm while J.R. Smith has gone ice cold from the field.

Cavs Notes: LeBron, Nets’ Pick, Rose, Green

October 26th, 2017 at 8:47am CST by Luke Adams

While the LeBron James rumor mill hasn’t really picked up in earnest yet, there has already been plenty of speculation about where he’ll sign when he becomes a free agent in 2018, and it’s a storyline that figures to pick up steam over the course of the season.

Over at SI.com, Richard Deitsch takes an early look at James’ options, soliciting opinions from basketball writers like Howard Beck of Bleacher Report, Michael Lee of The Vertical, Tania Ganguli of The Los Angeles Times, Candace Buckner of The Washington Post, and more. Asked to predict LeBron’s 2018 landing spot, Beck stresses that no one knows yet where the four-time MVP will play next season, but the group overwhelmingly votes in favor of the Lakers, with the Cavaliers as the runner-up.

Meanwhile, Bobby Marks of ESPN (Insider link) also explores the LeBron sweepstakes in a roundabout way, examining which clubs will have the cap flexibility next summer to make a run at a maximum-salary free agent. While teams like the Sixers, Mavericks, Hawks, and Bulls project to have significant cap room, no team will have more room than the Lakers, who could potentially open up two max-salary slots with a little help.

Here’s more on the Cavs:

After losing to the Nets on Wednesday night, James points out to Joe Vardon of Cleveland.com that Brooklyn’s 2018 first-rounder – currently held by the Cavs – “might not even be that good of a pick.” Given the Nets’ record over the last couple seasons, their unprotected 2018 first-rounder was considered the crown jewel of the Cavs’ trade with the Celtics this summer, but Brooklyn is off to a good start this season, with a 3-2 record. “We’re running around here worrying about getting the Brooklyn pick, they might want our pick,” said head coach Tyronn Lue.
The Cavaliers are giving Derrick Rose what the Knicks didn’t last season, according to Alex Squadron of The New York Post, who explains that Lue’s offensive system gives the former MVP far more freedom than he ever had in the triangle. “Coach Lue and the team have been doing a great job of letting me play the way that I want to play,” Rose said. “So I can’t complain at all.”
Lue hopes to get Rose – who has been sidelined with an ankle injury – back in the lineup on Saturday, per Ashish Mathur of AmicoHoops.net.
Moves like the Kyrie Irving trade and the Dwyane Wade signing overshadowed the Cavs’ offseason signing of Jeff Green, but the team is relying upon the veteran forward to be a defensive stopper early in the season, as Chris Fedor of Cleveland.com details.

Knicks Notes: Irving, Hardaway, Lee, Kanter

October 25th, 2017 at 9:59am CST by Arthur Hill

“Close to home” was the explanation Kyrie Irving gave to reporters Tuesday about including the Knicks on his list of possible destinations, writes Marc Berman of The New York Post. However, the Celtics’ new point guard was careful not to say much more as the media congregated around his locker.

“It’s pretty easy man. They were on my list for a reason, I think you guys know that,” Irving explained. “Close to home, that’s about it. I’m not going to go into detail about all that extra stuff because I know where this is going to lead. … Cameras all here, I know exactly where this is going to go.”

New York was among four preferred cities that Irving gave to Cavaliers management when he requested a trade this summer. The Knicks reportedly offered Carmelo Anthony and a collection of draft picks to Cleveland, but never came close to a deal. “Playing with a guy like that would make the game a lot easier,’’ Kristaps Porzingis said. “That’s dreaming how it would be. He’s not here with us. He’s in Boston. That type of player would bring a lot to this team.’’

There’s more out of New York this morning: