Let’s break down the needs of each piece involved. Cleveland is reportedly going to trade DG and JA and plans to resign Donovan Mitchell to the Supermax. They plan on the future of the team being centered around Mitchell and Mobley. Their biggest need? Depth at C and wings who can shoot and defend. They also could use a secondary play maker assuming Mobley remains the third option on offense (the team may try to develop him into their second scorer).
New Orleans needs two things this offseason: 1) a C who can coexist with Zion on offense and protect the rim on defense. 2) a PG to distribute the ball to Zion and share the scoring load with him as well. San Antonio needs one thing above all else… they desperately need a PG to distribute the ball to Wemby and share the scoring load as well. They have also been linked to DG. Reports state they would be more interested in his services than Trae Young. Lastly, Brooklyn. It’s time for them to properly rebuild. Mikal Bridges is a great 2nd or 3rd option, but, he proved he can’t do it alone.
Onto the trade itself and how those needs will be met. Back to Cleveland, BI may not be a perfect fit, but he certainly helps the team if they want to win now. If the Cavs made this trade, I would expect two of the following players to be traded at the deadline or in the 2025 offseason to clear up cap space to try and resign both BI and Mobley. Those players are: Okoro, Strus, Niang, and LeVert. Cleveland will not be able to retain all of those guys as well as Mobley and BI. As far as needs are concerned, they’re getting plenty of scoring options between Bridges, BI and Thomas. They’re also getting substantially more size on the wing. To add depth at C, I would expect the Cavs to heavily consider drafting Zach Edey of Purdue to come off the bench for them.
New Orleans is addressing two issues with this trade: 1) They’re getting value out of BI. 2) They’re getting the C they se desperately need. As far as a Pg is concerned, I would expect NO to look at Trae Young. Considering their cap sheet, they could easily take on his money after trading BI’s contract for JA’s in return. They have a plethora of picks and CJ’s contract to get the deal done. If they pull off a Trae young trade, they would have him, Murphy, Herb, Zion and Jarrett as they’re starting 5. If you ask me, that can easily contend with the best of teams out West.
Onto San Antonio, they have already been linked to DG. The moment news came out about his availability, the Spurs reported they liked DG better than Trae. The only thing this comes down to is the picks. They may not want to trade 4 and 8 for DG. That said, this is an incredibly weak draft class. With that said, they have a plethora of future firsts they can dip into instead.
Lastly, we have Brooklyn. As discussed earlier, it’s time for them to blow it up. Getting 4 1sts and two young players is quite the return for Bridges and a ball-hog SG. They may be stingy about trading Thomas is concerned, but if that’s the case, Cleveland would most likely still make the trade. They do have Emoni Bates that they can call up from the G League as a potential bench scorer.
What do you all think? Let me know in the comments below. Personally, I don’t think it could get much better than this for Cleveland this offseason.