Part 8 of the offseason guides features two teams that have switched places over the last couple of years. The Cleveland Cavaliers and Brooklyn Nets. The Cavaliers recently lost in the Eastern Conference semifinals to the Celtics and made a change to their head coach. Brooklyn, on the other hand, has finally triggered its inevitable rebuild.
The Cleveland Cavaliers were a nice feel good story two seasons ago. They traded away a lot of their draft capital to the Jazz for Donovan Mitchell, who had a tremendous regular season for Cleveland. They made the postseason for the first time since 2018, the last time Lebron James played for the franchise. They ultimately got manhandled by the Knicks in 5 games in the first round. A series that could be summed up in one quote by center Jared Allen "The lights were too bright for us”. Now, a year later, the expectations had risen for them. After struggling to stay above .500, the team lost both Darius Garland and Evan Mobley. Then they ripped off 16 of 18 wins and were able to claim home court advantage in the postseason. They faced a plucky Magic team that took them to 7 games and had them down 20 points at one point before making a comeback and winning the game. After the Magic series, they were able to split the first two games on the road against the Celtics before losing in five games. It was an up and down season for the Cavaliers, which is ironic considering the position they were in just 2 years ago. JB Bickerstaff had an extreme minutes staggering between the four core players in Darius Garland, Donovan Mitchell, Jared Allen, and Evan Mobley. It worked, but now Bickerstaff is gone and a new coach has been hired for the Cavaliers.
It was obvious going into the offseason JB Bickerstaff just wasn’t the right coach for the current Cavaliers. He’s a smart coach, who figured out how to get the best out of Mitchell, Garland, Mobley, and Allen. Ultimately his time was due though. Kenny Atkinson was hired for Cleveland. He recently had a stint with the Brooklyn Nets and was deserving of a second head coaching gig. He comes to the Cavs after serving as an assistant with Golden State for the last several seasons. He brings experience and a slew of interesting offensive sets. It will be intriguing to see how Mitchell and Garland fit into them. The overall season for the Cavs was rocky. Many were worried that Donovan Mitchell would get traded or walk in free agency. Garland had an injury riddled season and Allen and Mobley never seemed to be in the lineup at the same time either. Overall, the offseason has been good for Cleveland. They re-signed Donovan Mitchell to a 3-year, 150 million dollar extension that includes a player option in the third year. Trade rumors around Darius Garland have settled down and Allen and Mobley are now healthy for the Cavs. This was the best case scenario for the Cavs this offseason. Now they can fill out the roster around these four. I will note Evan Mobley developing his perimeter game this offseason will be the biggest help to the Cavs, but I will get to that later on.
Right now the Cavs are searching for one of the most coveted positions in the NBA; a 3 and D wing player. Isaac Okoro has currently been filling that spot and they recently signed Max Strus before this past season to help out as well. Okoro is not a good shooter making the spacing for Mitchell and Garland to operate on the perimeter more difficult. But he’s a better defender than Strus. Okoro is currently a restricted free agent and aside from the core 4, he’ll be the most watched Cav if the front office chooses to bring him back. On offense, Okoro mostly sat in the corner and tried to make open threes when possible. He's a good cutter and an above the basket finisher, but with Mobley and Allen in the paint it would help tremendously if he could develop his outside shot more. Ultimately, the Cavs are still searching, but adding more wing depth and perimeter defense is the top need right now for Cleveland. They aren’t near the luxury tax threshold, but would be approaching it if they choose to give Evan Mobley his max rookie extension that they’re available to offer on July 6th. If he signs it, this means they’ll have 160 million dollars locked up between Mitchell, Garland, Mobley, and Allen. I understand the salary cap will increase by 10% at the end of each season, making this number a little less scary, but it’s still worth noting. The most notable development for the Cavs will be how Garland and Mitchell can still learn to play together better. They are two guards that are undersized compared to current NBA guards and they’re below average defenders. The Cavs most likely won’t go after a bunch of free agents. Considering the amount of players they have under contract for next season and the limited amount of draft assets they can use, Cleveland really needs to look within for its development and there is no better place to look than Evan Mobley.
Mobley was the 2nd overall pick in the 2021 NBA draft. His first couple of seasons in the league he showed that he’s an excellent defender. I think as he fills out his frame a little bit more, he’ll guard centers a little bit better, but he can switch onto almost anyone and keep them in front. When he and Allen are on the floor together, Mobley typically guards the biggest player on the perimeter against opposing teams and Allen guards the centers. Ultimately, Mobley's biggest weakness is his offense. He’s not a good shooter and he has a thin frame making it difficult for him to be on balance when he drives to the basket. He’s shown ability to shoot the three, as he shot 37.1% this past season after previously being below 30% his rookie and sophomore years. But, he only takes 1.3 attempts a game, a number teams aren’t too concerned with. If he’s able to take steps towards shooting that number on 4 or 5 attempts a game, he’ll open the floor much better for the Cavs. But, as of now, he hasn’t been able to do that. With that being said, he’s still only in his third season in the NBA and he had a fantastic series against the Celtics, when Jared Allen was injured. He averaged 26 ppg, which included 33 points in game 5 and about 9 rebounds, in a series where he played solely the center position. If Mobley can improve his offensive game, specifically his shooting, the Cavs can take a leap for next season.
Now moving down the Eastern Conference standings we have the Brooklyn Nets, whose offseason has been dominated by the Mikal Bridges trade that triggered the necessary rebuild for the Nets. Before we dive into that, let’s take a look back at quite possibly the craziest 10 year run in front office history. In the beginning they went all in during the 2013-2014 season as they traded for Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett and gave up essentially their entire draft equity for a win now position. This is possibly the second worst trade of all time, behind the Paul George Clippers trade. They made it to the second round, but never contested anything beyond that. After this, they went through some stretches where they were really bad, but didn’t have any draft picks to improve the roster. Eventually they got to the 2018-2019 team that was exciting and fun, and featured DeAngelo Russell making an all star team. They were full of excitement under then coach Kenny Atkinson. This sparked Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving wanting to join during 2019 free agency. Durant was coming off an Achilles injury and Irving had a dynamic first part of the season before Covid shut down the season. Neither Durant nor Irving attended the bubble at the end of the 2020 season. After this they went all in again trading for James Harden and formed possibly the most dynamic scoring trio in NBA history that played a grand total of 16 games together in the better part of 100 games. Durant then demanded Sean Marks and Steve Nash be fired or wanted to be traded. Harden was eventually traded after Irving didn’t get a vaccine shot and ultimately they then disbanded the team of Durant, Irving, and Harden. Now we are here with the 2024-2025 Nets, spoiler alert they’re going to be really bad.
After trading Kevin Durant to the Phoenix Suns, the Nets were in a weird position. They had a collection of good wings that could play well together. Mikal Bridges, Cam Johnson, and Dorian Finney-Smith are all good 3 and D players and the Nets decided to see what they had amongst the group. They had good young players in Cam Thomas and Nic Claxton making the front office believe they could build around this core. However, this past season showed they couldn’t take this approach. The overall team seemed disinterested and it was obvious. The main determination for this was the few games they got blown out before firing head coach Jacques Vaughn. Now they seemed to have picked a direction to follow, blowing everything up. Mikel Bridges was traded to the Knicks for a staggering 5 first round picks. Dorian Finney-Smith, Cam Johnson, Dennis Schroeder, and Ben Simmons, yes that Ben Simmons, are all expected to be traded at point throughout the offseason or this upcoming season. Most importantly for Brooklyn, they made a side trade with Houston in exchange for the Suns picks they got in the Durant trade for their own 2025 and 2026 first round pick Houston acquired from the Nets in the James Harden trade.
So where do the Nets go now? They have essentially every trade exception available to sign players this off season, but I don't think any free agent really wants to go to Brooklyn willingly. They did sign Nic Claxton to a 4-year, 100 million dollar deal. Something that the front office should be very satisfied with as they get a good young player on a team friendly deal. The next place the Nets go is developing their young players. Most notably Cam Thomas. If you have not seen Cam Thomas, boy, are you in for a treat. He has quite possibly the most neon green light in the NBA when shooting. He takes every type of shot at any point in the shot clock. At one point, two years ago, he scored 40+ points in 3 consecutive games. In one of the games he came off the bench. From then on, he’s put the league on notice with his scoring prowess. He’ll take quite literally any shot on the court. His development needs to come from his playmaking. With more minutes he was able to accumulate 26 or more games with 5 assists this past season, but he can make life easier for his teammates if he keeps making better reads while on the ball. He can score the ball from anywhere, but this is the area of his game the Nets will want to develop this off season and during the year. Overall, Thomas can help them bridge the current team to when they’re able to draft some younger guys.
The Nets, after trading back for their 2025 and 2026 picks, are now in a good position with draft assets. They have control of 12 first round picks and 10 second round picks over the next 7 seasons. As of right now, the rebuild seems to be going to plan for Brooklyn, but let me just put a reminder out there. Tanking isn’t as easy as it once was. The lottery odds have encouraged teams that can get to the play-in to go for it and even if you’re bad you’re still not guaranteed a top pick. The Pistons had a 14-68 season last year and were 1 of the top 3 teams to have a 14% chance to get the first overall pick and wound up picking 5th as they did the previous two seasons. Making trades and getting draft assets is good until you pick a player that isn’t as good as expected. The Nets need to make sure they’re able to hit on their draft picks and have some luck to stay towards the top of the draft over the next couple of seasons. If this all happens, then the franchise can start to see some success in their future.
As always, feel free to comment below. Any news that happens after the release of this article will be updated prior to the start of the season.
Add comment
Comments