3 Cavaliers players who tanked their trade value in 2023
Isaac Okoro tanked his trade value
Coming into the league after he was drafted No. 5 overall in the NBA Draft, the scout on Isaac Okoro was simple. He profiled as an elite on-ball defender, the kind of player who can absolutely hound opposing guards and generate steals to spark transition opportunities. The question mark for Okoro was whether he could develop an outside shot or on-ball shot creation to make him a plus on offense too.
Over his first two seasons in the league, Okoro got a ton of playing time and proved two things. First, he was the defender he was thought to be; second, he was never going to be an on-ball shot creator. That left the question coming into this season: could Okoro improve his shot enough to become a 3-and-D player who could thrive alongside the stars in Cleveland?
The answer this season has been, mostly, a no. Okoro did have a nice shooting stretch in the middle of the season, but the end result was 36.3 percent 3-point shooting despite the highest percentage of wide-open shots in the league. Teams ignored him on the perimeter, and he wasn’t able to punish them enough for it to matter.
That came to a head in the playoffs, when the Cavaliers would have loved to play Okoro big minutes to defend Jalen Brunson. Instead, they had to pivot away, as Okoro was completely ignored by the Knicks’ defense. In five games he hit just four of his 13 3-point attempts and completely suffocated the Cavs’ offense.
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Okoro is still young and an excellent defender, so a team may take a chance on him on the trade market. What is very unlikely is that another team values him as a future starter, because he has not proven he is anything but a disaster for an offense. Until that changes, his trade value is on life support.