Cleveland Cavaliers: Top three RFA targets in 2020 free agency

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Cleveland Cavaliers’ Kevin Love (Photo by Jason Miller/Getty Images) /

The Cleveland Cavaliers are well-positioned to make some noise in 2020 free agency, however, restricted free agency may be a better course of action for them. Who should their top three RFA targets be in the summer of 2020?

The Cleveland Cavaliers should be major players in restricted free agency next July. For this article, we’re going to assume the Cavs are looking at only clearing the books this season, so we’re going to assume they won’t be taking any bad contracts back via trade and will just allow all expiring contracts to come off the books this summer.

We are also going to assume the Cavs are going to re-sign potential 2020 restricted free agent Cedi Osman to a 4-year, $49 million extension.

Lastly, we are going to assume that the Cavaliers move their All-Star big man Kevin Love in one of the deals outlined by a previous KJG article.

Following the 2019-20 NBA season, Tristan Thompson ($18.5 million), John Henson ($9.7 million), Matthew Dellavedova ($9.6 million), Jordan Clarkson ($13.4 million), and Brandon Knight ($15.6 million) come off of the books for a total salary cap savings of $66.8 million (all figures according to Spotrac).

If the Cavaliers execute trade one involving Love, outlined in the article above, they will save $23.5 million towards next year’s salary cap. If they execute trade two involving Love they will save $17.95 million towards next year’s salary cap. If they execute trade three in the article involving Love, they will save $26.8 million towards the cap.

Entering this summer, the Cavs could theoretically have as little as $47.1 million committed to player salary.

According to Shams Charania of The Athletic and Stadium, the NBA has informed teams that the projected salary cap is currently sitting at $116 million for the 2020-21 season.

If that were to be the case, the Cavaliers could potentially have $68.9 million in salary cap room entering the 2020 free agency period. It is a well-known fact that Cleveland is not a marquee free agency destination, especially with how poor the team is projected to be, restricted free agency may be the better route as they will be able to overpay for very good players.