Donovan Mitchell may have just played a big role in the Cleveland Cavaliers’ strong free agency where they not only brought back Caris LeVert, but also signed Georges Niang and Max Strus.
Whether directly or indirectly, Mitchell’s influence may have just helped the Cavs land their free agency targets and improve the roster behind him, Darius Garland and Evan Mobley. Team president Koby Altman hinted as much when he talked about how Mitchell helped in their recruiting.
According to Altman, Mitchell’s “glowing” praises for the Cavs has definitely made the team a more alluring free agent destination. Altman even shared that thanks to that, when Strus did his research and reached out to people in his “orbit,” there were only positive words for Cleveland, per Chris Fedor of Cleveland.com.
“I’m not going to say exactly what Donovan did or didn’t do, but I do know that he spoke glowingly of this place,” Altman said of Mitchell.
“Players talk and the things we can control are the experiences that players have in the building, how they feel like they’re being treated, performance plans for them, and when guys have their best years at a place, they’re going to speak glowingly of a place. We don’t know what happens offline and what they’re saying, but when Max Strus does his research and calls different players in his orbit that have been to our place and they talk glowingly of the place, it helps.”
The fact that Donovan Mitchell is happy with the Cavs certainly speaks volumes of the kind of culture and environment the team has built. While they suffered an early playoffs exit last season, it clearly didn’t bother Mitchell and the rest of the roster. Instead, it may have just motivated them more to help the front office build a stronger team for 2023-24.
It has yet to be seen how the Cavs’ free agency moves will impact their performance next season. But with Max Struss and Georges Niang in the fold, Cleveland surely got deeper. Of course we have Mitchell to partly thank for that.