After weeks and months of trying to unload Brendan Haywood and his $10.5 million, non-guaranteed contract, the Cleveland Cavaliers have finally traded him along with Mike Miller as part of a deal with the Portland Trailblazers The trade was completely on Sunday night, and along with the Haywood and Miller, the Blazers received 2019 and 2020 second round picks from the Cavs in exchange for cash.
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Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo Sports reports on how this will definitely help the Cavs moving forward into a championship or bust type season.
Cleveland finally unloads the Haywood contract, bringing back a trade exception.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@WojYahooNBA) July 27, 2015
To be accurate on trade exceptions, they cannot be combined. Cleveland will have two exceptions — $10.5M and $2.85M.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@WojYahooNBA) July 27, 2015
Now, in case the Cavs deal with another mid-season injury or simply want to sign a player they see could fit in their system at a reasonable price. The Cavs can use these trade exceptions or the next year before they expire, and unfortunately, they cannot be combined into one large trade exception. Jason Lloyd of the Akron Beacon Journal explains why the Cavs added Miller in the deal:
“The addition of Miller to the deal was a mild surprise, but the source with knowledge of the negotiations, speaking on the condition of anonymity given the sensitive nature of trade talks, said LeBron James was fine with the move and that Miller had asked for it. Miller wasn’t going to find that much money on the open market, so electing to pick up the option was wise. But he wanted a chance to play after never really fitting into coach David Blatt’s rotation last season.”
Lloyd also added that the Cavs will have saved a lot of money in salary and in taxes by getting rid of Haywood and Miller.
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“The final figures won’t be known until decisions are made on Tristan Thompson, J.R. Smith and Matthew Dellavedova, but ESPN reported the Cavs at least temporarily slashed their luxury tax bill from $32 million to less than $5 million with the deal. That figure is expected to rise again, however, once the remaining free agents (Tristan Thompson, J.R. Smith, and Matthew Dellavedova) are signed.”
The next step for the Cavs to negotiate a contract with restricted free agent Tristan Thompson and unrestricted free agent J.R. Smith.