The Cleveland Cavaliers don't want to get anything from the Golden State Warriors of all teams, but they should be looking closely at how the Warriors have sustained their depth despite years of contending for titles.
The Cavaliers are absolutely brimming with talent and depth right now. riding their third double-digit win streak of the season and running away with the best record in the Eastern Conference. They have the league's best offense and go 12-deep with viable rotation players. Their core is also young and under contract for multiple seasons; while they will get expensive, this group should have an extended window of contention ahead of it.
The trick to maintaining a contender is adding inexpensive depth on the margins. That can come from tactical minimum contract signings, but the best pathway is to nail draft picks later in the draft to ensure help at a severe discount for multiple seasons.
The flip side of that approach, however, is that you have to nail those picks -- and they have to be ready to contribute right away. The Milwaukee Bucks continue to whiff on their picks in recent seasons, in part because they choose the wrong players but in part because they pick young, raw projects. A contending team cannot use up roster spots and draft picks on long-term prospects who might develop into something in three or four years.
The Cavaliers need to be able to find players who are ready to contribute right now. Yet at the same time, teams chasing such players often leads to drafting old, theoretically "ready to play" prospects who never have the requisite athleticism or skill to make it in the NBA.
The Warriors are setting an example in the draft
The Warriors have realized that certain skillsets tend to be available in more win-now players in the draft, prospects with a lower ceiling but a higher starting point. What's more, the rise of NIL means players who enter the draft at an older age are not necessarily doomed to fail, but rather may have simply taken the paycheck to stay in college and are ready to contribute upon drafting.
The Warriors drafted an older player in Trayce Jackson-Davis with the penultimate pick in the 2023 NBA Draft, and he immediately pushed into the rotation and by midseason was starting for them. He was a steal with the 57th pick, written off by many teams because of his age after playing a full four years in college.
They turned around and did the same thing this season, taking Boston College center Quenten Post with the 52nd pick of the NBA Draft. Post was 24 years old on draft night, hardly the kind of prospect that historically would develop into an NBA player. Yet the Warriors front office identified him and took their time developing him, and he made his debut at midseason and has become a staple of the rotation since then.
In fact, the Warriors have discovered that Post, a stretch-5 with a buttery-smooth stroke, pairs perfectly with the newly-acquired Jimmy Butler. Those two players have a +22.5 point net rating when they share the court together, and the Warriors have lost just once with Butler in the lineup.
They identified older, productive college players with at least one elite skill that would translate to the NBA. Post, as a shooting center, has been able to plug right in because of his maturity, basketball IQ and shooting stroke.
That's what the Cleveland Cavaliers will need to do moving forward. They will have just a pair of second-round picks this year to add to the roster; nailing one or both with players ready to step in as needed would be massive. The next year they will have the worst of their, Utah's and Atlanta's first-round picks in the 2026 NBA Draft. Having a first is better than a second, but they will still be picking late and trying to identify a win-now player.
As the years go by, the Cavaliers will only get more expensive and be forced to move on from current players. The more they can stock the back-end of the roster with draft picks, the more they can afford their expensive core players. Identifying overlooked prospects with NBA upside -- likely older, productive ones -- will be the key to maintaining an elite team.
The Cavaliers would rather beat the Warriors than learn from them. Yet in this one area, the Warriors have found some recent success -- success the Cavaliers would be wise to try and replicate.