Cavs: Cedi Osman would seem to be potential trade candidate

Osman’s contract is team-friendly for the Cavs/a potential trade partner

The other aspect to Cedi seeming to potentially be a player the Cavaliers look to deal is his contract structure. After signing a four-year, $30.8 million contract extension at the beginning of last season, Osman is set to make $8.8 million, $8.1 million and then $7.4 million over the next three seasons, with his $6.7 million deal for 2023-24 set to be non-guaranteed.

When you consider that Osman’s compensation is pretty reasonable for the Cavs, weighing in the deal and with the contract being declining and/or that last non-guaranteed season, Osman’s deal would seem very tradeable. That’s again if the Cavs at some point felt the desire to do so.

And while it doesn’t appear that we’ve seen much as far as Osman trade rumors, perhaps he could potentially be involved in a package with players that have been key subjects in rumors such as Andre Drummond or Kevin Love at some point?

Given how The Athletic‘s John Hollinger on an appearance on the NBA Big Board podcast with Chad Ford, formerly of ESPN, noted how he doesn’t think Love has “any market,” at this point, though, I wouldn’t expect that to relate to Love being dealt near the 2020 NBA Draft, for instance.

But maybe some point later on near the 2021 deadline or perhaps following the 2021 free agency frenzy could be a Love trade, and Osman could be part of a package as well down the road, given his team-friendly contract structure?

Perhaps in a middle-of-bench role, with how he’s progressed as a catch-and-shoot player, and being an exemplary teammate, the Cavs could have some interest for Osman in a potential trade, with Love or maybe Drummond, provided Drummond were to opt into his $28.7 million player option.

And for what it’s worth, Drummond is said to be reportedly likely to pick that up by Thursday’s 5 PM deadline for that, per a report from Evan Dammarell of Forbes. Dammarell did hit on how the expectation is for Cleveland to trade Drummond, albeit that was not “immediately” in that sense.

For further context, the aforementioned Fedor stated how if the Cavs were to trade Drummond after opt-in, their “best chance” would be near the 2021 deadline. So I’d think Drummond, even while he won’t seemingly sign an extension with Cleveland, would appear to stick around for some chunk.

Anyhow, aside from a mere hypothetical sense, we haven’t really seen Cedi’s name as one that’d appear to be a key subject in trade rumors for now. But when you project onward, it’s understandable for him to seem to be a potential candidate at some point be traded by the Cleveland Cavaliers.

That’s when considering Windler, KPJ some, maybe albeit not as likely as before, Okoro, or Deni Avdija more so, or a possible free agent wing add potentially cutting into Cedi’s minutes from here onward. And to reiterate, Osman’s team-friendly/seemingly pretty tradeable contract.

Albeit it’s fair to imagine that Osman could be a productive bench piece for the Cavs, conversely, which could suit him well, as more so an energy middle-of-bench guy for them in coming years.

But if the Cavaliers were to move Cedi, though I wouldn’t really expect that necessarily soon, it wouldn’t be all that surprising. And while I wouldn’t have wanted that to be the case previously and I’m not pounding on the table for it, I couldn’t really blame Cleveland for doing so down the road.