Despite a relatively mum press conference on Wednesday, the Cleveland Cavaliers are putting wheels in motion on a Kyrie Irving trade and could look to ship out other assets that have put the organization over the luxury tax, according to Steve Kyler of Basketball Insiders.
“Another stated goal is to dump off some salary and reduce the luxury tax bill,” said Kyler in his report.
Now with Irving’s exit imminent in the organization’s future, new general manager Koby Altman will be responsible for re-wiring the circuits and build toward the future, giving this team a chance to make potential acquisitions down the road.
Among the main candidates to be bundled up in a trade are Tristan Thompson, who received a whopping extension in 2016 and now has three years and $52.4 million left in his contract and J.R. Smith with three years, $44.2 million remaining (just $3.87 million of $15.68 million guaranteed for his final year).
Some minor potential packages include Iman Shumpert (two years, $21.3 million remaining) and Channing Frye (one year, $7.4 million left) — two commodities that haven’t panned out where it counted the most during the NBA Finals.
The Cavs were already in a losing bargaining position the minute the news of Irving wanting a trade got out, making them the seeker.
While a team shipping a star out of town rarely gets equal value for their investment, Cleveland will try to compensate by unloading hefty sums along with Irving — a hefty price teams will have to be willing to pay if they hope to net his services.
This provision will allow to have the cap space necessary to potentially re-sign LeBron James and/or get pieces around him in hopes of making him stay, starting next offseason.
The timing of Irving’s request is rather peculiar, given how trade possibilities only get narrower as time expires and a lack of free agent prospects just makes the margin for error that much thinner for any front office, especially one just grouped together so recently.