The Cleveland Cavaliers have spent years resisting breaking up their core four. After consecutive playoff disappointments against the New York Knicks and Boston Celtics, the general consensus was that a team with two max contract guards and two big men with limited shooting ability would need to be balanced through trades. Koby Altman held firm. He kept Darius Garland and Jarrett Allen despite frequent calls to trade one of them for a wing, and the two of them joined Donovan Mitchell and Evan Mobley to lead the Cavaliers to a 64-win regular season under new head coach Kenny Atkinson.
But that 64-win season ended in disappointment as the Cavaliers were bounced from the second round of the playoffs in five games by the Indiana Pacers. Injuries may have contributed to that loss, but it was nonetheless discouraging. There aren’t other obvious levers to pull here. They’ve already — successfully — changed coaches. They built one of the NBA‘s deepest teams, one that is about to be ravaged by the aprons. And they still haven’t reached the conference finals.
So that raises the possibility of more extreme measures. Could this be the offseason in which Cleveland finally puts Garland and/or Allen on the table and sees what it can get? According to Chris Fedor of the Cleveland Plain Dealer, the answer might be yes. “I think the two untouchables are Donovan Mitchell and Evan Mobley,” Fedor said on his Wine and Gold Talk podcast. “I have been getting the sense that the Cavs would be more willing to entertain and at least consider possibilities for Jarrett Allen and Darius Garland than they have in the past.”
It obviously takes two to tango where a trade is concerned. It won’t matter if Garland or Allen are available if they don’t get good offers for them, and at least for now, the rules hamstring Cleveland from a trading perspective. As of right now, the Cavaliers are around $10 million above the projected second apron, and that does not include potentially re-signing Ty Jerome or Sam Merrill.
Any trade that brings back more money than it sends out triggers a first-apron hard cap. That’s a solvable problem for Cleveland, as most teams have just brought in a third team as a workaround in such situations. The greater challenge comes in salary aggregation. If team aggregates multiple salaries, it generates a second-apron hard cap. That means that unless Cleveland can somehow shed $10 million or so in salary even after filling out the roster, salary aggregation is probably off of the table.
So what does that mean for Cleveland? It makes it much harder for them to trade for a player earning more than either Garland or Allen. You’d have to aggregate to, say, trade Garland for Jaylen Brown, which would mean shedding a lot of money in the deal. More likely, they’d be looking to turn one or both of them into a couple of players at lower salaries that balance the roster out a bit. Teams with younger wings, or potentially even draft picks that could be re-routed, make sense here.
There aren’t many win-now teams aggressively seeking center help right now, but there is one very notable one in the Lakers. Cleveland could certainly extract something like the package L.A. offered for Mark Williams at the trade deadline, but Allen is much more accomplished. Austin Reaves is likely off of the table, so this would have to be a three-team deal that sends players to Cleveland instead of picks.
Garland’s market would presumably be wider. Shot-creation is among the most desired skills in basketball. Orlando needs a point guard. New Orleans traded a bunch for one in Dejounte Murray last offseason, but that was under an old regime and before he tore his Achilles. Houston could use him offensively. He’s young enough that a surprise suitor could emerge.
But trading Garland is probably more complicated than trading Allen. Mobley could comfortably slide to center if needed. Mitchell has many offensive gifts, but he’s not a point guard. He’s not at his best setting up teammates and running an offense. Maybe Cleveland could get a cheaper point guard back in a deal, or maybe it could find a way to re-sign Jerome and make him a starter (risky given his injuries), but Garland’s absence would be felt a bit more than Allen’s.
It’s still only May. The Cavaliers have time to scope out the market and see what’s out there. A willingness to trade one or both does not indicate a desire to. Someone is going to have to offer them something compelling enough to break up a 64-win team. There’s no guarantee that anyone does so.
