Why Cavs should keep JaVale McGee through the trade deadline

The Cleveland Cavaliers acquired veteran center JaVale McGee in a trade during the offseason with the Los Angeles Lakers. McGee has by no means been a star player for the Cavs and has not played quite as big of a role for the team compared to when he was on the Lakers. He has only started a single game this season and has played in 32 of Cleveland’s 40 games so far this season.

Despite of this, McGee has seen a statistical jump during his time in Cleveland and is putting up around his career averages across the board.

So far this season, McGee has averaged 7.8 points, 5.0 rebounds and 1.2 blocks per outing. Along with this, he has reportedly been a great presence in the locker room along with a savvy veteran that is a more than capable mentor for Cavs young center Jarrett Allen.

With the trade deadline approaching, there have been a handful of contending teams that have shown interest in McGee in hopes of him giving them a late season boost into the postseason. For instance, the Brooklyn Nets have, and the Boston Celtics, Toronto Raptors and Milwaukee Bucks have been linked to him; you can view reported details regarding McGee interest here, for what it’s worth.

Anyway, while it would make sense for the Cavaliers to trade McGee off of the roster as he is an aging veteran on a rebuilding roster, the pros outweigh the cons for keeping McGee on the roster.

Here, we’ll demonstrate why the Cavs should keep McGee through the deadline/end of the year.

The first reason that the Cavs should keep McGee on the roster is that he is a great locker room presence. McGee has a very happy-go-lucky personality and is always eager to joke around with teammates. This is something that is essential to have in the Cavs locker room at the moment.

The team is loaded with young lottery picks, such as Darius Garland and Collin Sexton, that have the weight of the franchise on their collective shoulders. This is a lot of pressure for players their age to have placed upon them.

Along with this, the Cavaliers are still stuck with Andre Drummond around the team. Even though Drummond has not been an issue seemingly behind the scenes, the Cavs still have not found a trade to get him off of the team, even with it being agreed that he’ll sit the rest of his games with Cleveland, and things could still be feasibly awkward. You can view more on Drummond at the link above/potential buyout rumors, anyhow.

But having someone like McGee around to lighten the mood and be a great glue guy off of the court makes keeping him around for the remainder of the season on a $4.2 million dollar salary for this season worth it. To be clear, McGee has seemingly been a player that as a veteran leader has been one to still preach accountability, though, and one shouldn’t gloss over that.

The other main reason as to why the Cleveland should keep JaVale McGee on the roster is that he could be the perfect mentor for Jarrett Allen the rest of the way. Allen does not do much scoring outside of the paint, however, close to the basket he is a major threat to score via lobs/rolls, cuts, putbacks and occasionally via post-ups.

Along with this, he is incredible on the defensive end on the interior as a team defender and an elite rim protector. This is a very similar style of play that McGee has had throughout his 13-year career in the NBA, though I’m not necessarily saying he’s nearly been at Allen’s level; albeit the rim protection has been there throughout.

We’ll ultimately have to see if the 33-year-old expiring McGee is dealt by the March 25 trade deadline, but from my perspective, Cleveland would be better off keeping him around through the end of the season.