Wes Iwundu could be a sneaky good add by the Cleveland Cavaliers.
The Cleveland Cavaliers have been rumored/reported to have interest in players such as Josh Jackson, Pat Connaughton, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, among others.
Derrick Jones Jr. is a free agent target said to be in that realm, too, although per a report from Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald, Cleveland was not a team listed as a squad said to pursue Jones. And Sam Amico of Sports Illustrated and Amico Hoops seemingly confirmed that report.
In terms of reported details involving potential Cavs free agent targets, you can view those further here.
Now, in this sense, though the Cavaliers could seemingly move Andre Drummond in the near future via trade, if he eventually opts into his $28.7 million player option, which would seem to happen at some point, he could be a deadline trade piece, anyhow. Maybe Drummond sticks around until then, and say, Cleveland drafts a big such as USC’s Onyeka Okongwu for long-term.
Or, while he stressed he hasn’t heard anything involving this, perhaps Cleveland were to move Drummond sooner rather than later to the Oklahoma City Thunder, along with Cedi Osman, for Chris Paul.
That was a hypothetical scenario that ESPN’s Brian Windhorst stated he believes, on an appearance on the Wine & Gold Talk Podcast with Cleveland.com’s Chris Fedor and Hayden Grove, could do it for Cleveland.
That possibility involving a CP3-centric trade, though, again, was completely hypothetical, as Windhorst emphasized.
But in any case, if Cleveland were to look to add a contributing free agent this offseason, that would seemingly mean Tristan Thompson is not back, and looking to add a wing defender would seem like a smart move as an alternative. The Cavs also reportedly, albeit didn’t do so formally, per se, “offered” TT a deal of which he rejected. Drummond could feasibly still stick around until near the trade deadline, anyhow.
In terms of a free agent add, that’d be via the $9-10 million non-taxpayer mid-level exception, and we’d have to see in terms of the years, but I could understand Cleveland’s reasoning there. And a player aside from Jackson or Connaughton I could be on-board with is Wes Iwundu, who was suggested as a free agent target by Bleacher Report’s Dan Favale.
Favale believes that’d take “most of,” or perhaps all of the full MLE yearly for an offer sheet for the Orlando Magic’s to-be restricted free agent. But for Cleveland, making that to me would be an intelligent pickup, should Orlando not match; Iwundu has a $2 million qualifying offer, for reference.
Iwundu could impact winning for the Cavaliers.
Iwundu would make an intriguing piece for Cleveland, firstly, given his perimeter defensive capabilities.