Cleveland Sports Forum

Knight has about 15 million this year and next. So Gilbert would be buying draft picks again. Unfortunately the Rockets only have Knight without using about 6 players to match salaries. That might be why the trade has not happened.

Houston would be acquiring JR for his defense.

Now Thompson is out for 2-4 weeks. Getting a little thin on the active roster. More time for Zizic to show his stuff.

Today is the day that traded or FA players from this summer can be traded. I would look for a JR Smith trade within the next 72 hours !

rusty2 wrote:Knight has about 15 million this year and next. So Gilbert would be buying draft picks again. Unfortunately the Rockets only have Knight without using about 6 players to match salaries. That might be why the trade has not happened.

Houston also is interested in getting back Trevor Ariza, and he also is now eligible for trade. He almost went to Washington, but that didn't happen...

Ariza just traded to the Wiz after all. So that leaves Houston still looking.

Houston and Los Angeles were both after him. Houston has nothing but draft picks to trade so they never were involved. Houston has to have a team that is willing to take on money for them to make a trade.

Please take JR....


The Rockets have reportedly been shopping Brandon Knight and a first-round pick as they look to add another wing to the roster.

Thus far, the Rockets haven't had any takers on that deal, which isn't terribly surprising with Knight owed roughly $15.6 million next season. Houston has been linked to Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, and the Lakers are said to be shopping him, but nothing is imminent on that front.

The fact that the Cavs have not jumped at that tells you that they are not willing to take on contracts that they have no possibility to flip.

Is Jordan Clarkson the kind of player a contender would want? Final Thoughts


By Joe Vardon 6h ago 6

TORONTO​ — Twenty-one​ thoughts for 21 points​ by Toronto’s OG​ Anunoby in the​ Cavaliers’​ 126-110 loss​ to the​​ Toronto Raptors on Friday.

1. Jordan Clarkson is, in at least one key way, enjoying a career year. His 16.9-points-per-game average is the highest of his five pro seasons, and he’s never averaged fewer than 11.9 points. He’s shooting more shots (14.9) and 3s (5.2) than ever, his free-throw percentage is a career best (.851) and those rebounds (3.5) are the second most of his career. He’s making the most of a bad situation. He’s been doing that for most of his career, too.

2. “I would say I block most of it out in terms of wins and losses, stuff like that,” said Clarkson, who led the Cavs in scoring Friday with 20 points. “Still come in here trying to improve every day. … Definitely, don’t want to continue to keep losing like this for a long time, but just trying to get better every day and keep grinding.”

3. Clarkson is the Cavs’ leading scorer this season, in no small part because Kevin Love has only played four games. A second starter counted on for big buckets, Rodney Hood, is cruising along with 12.9 points per game. Clarkson, meanwhile, is third in the NBA among bench scorers. But the team, well, the team is 8-25 now.

4. Clarkson spent 3 ½ years with the Lakers. Their best year was last when they were 22-31 when they traded him and Larry Nance Jr. to the Cavs. In Clarkson’s first three seasons in Los Angeles, his team won 26, 17, and 21 games.

5. Obviously, the only time Clarkson’s been a part of any sustained winning was last year, upon being traded to LeBron’s Cavs. The playoffs were his first, which makes Cleveland’s Finals berth his first, too. He struggled mightily in the postseason, averaging just 4.7 points and shooting .301 from the field and .239 from 3-point range. Clarkson’s talked a lot about this, about not getting used to not knowing when or if shots are going to come, about being shaken by opponents game-planning for him in a series, and yeah, about the pressure of playing with LeBron. Clarkson’s not going to get another chance in the playoffs this season unless a contender comes calling with a trade offer. Clarkson isn’t angling to be moved, but the right offer would probably pry him from Cleveland.

6. Clarkson is 26. He’s making $12.5 million this season and $13.4 million the next — which is his last year. A team that would take him now, as opposed to next year, when his sizable salary is on an expiring contract, would have to decide who Clarkson is. In the meantime, Clarkson’s left to try and keep another losing season from wearing on him.

7. “Just don’t even think about it to be honest with you,” he said. “Think about the next game or kind of move on from it, learn from it and just put it past you.”

8. Yeah, I could say a lot of the same stuff about Nance, who came over with Clarkson and therefore has had just one, tiny taste of winning in the NBA. One, the Cavs gave him a four-year, $45 million extension. Two, he lost half a tooth Friday night when Pascal Siakam’s shoulder or elbow crashed into his chin. So I’m giving him a break.

9. “Apparently my chin fouled him,” said Nance, who was indeed whistled for a foul on the play — which happened at the start of the second half. Nance didn’t lose the full tooth, but it was a bad chip and he’ll be seeing a dentist Saturday. He finished the game and produced 16 points and 12 boards.

10. This was not a banner night for the Cavaliers. Toronto was missing All-Star point guard Kyle Lowry, and starters Danny Green and Serge Ibaka. Actually, eight of the 11 players the Raptors used Friday had spent at least some time with Toronto’s G-League affiliate. One of the guys who didn’t was Kawhi Leonard, who killed the Cavs with 37 points.

11. “Well we’re giving him different matchups, and then just mix our zones up,” Cavs coach Larry Drew explained. “Whether we go man, whether we go zone, just to take it out of his hands at times and then recognize, which I thought we didn’t do a good job, as far as just containing him on the drive. He was able to get, I don’t know how many and-1s he got … Just too many.”

12. Leonard shot 12-of-16 from the field and 11-of-12 from the line. And, let’s see here, yes, five and-1s for Leonard, all in the second half. He scored 24 and 34 points against the Cavs in the first two games against the Raptors this season.

13. This was not a banner night for the Cavs because while Leonard does indeed play for Toronto, and the Raptors do own the best record in the NBA, missing three starters is tough. Don’t forget, Jonas Valanciunas is also out. Toronto still scored 66 points in the paint.

14. This was not a banner night because while Cleveland was also missing two of its top players in Kevin Love and Tristan Thompson, the Cavs’ bench was a much stronger group than what the Raptors threw out there. And Cleveland’s reserves outscored their Toronto counterparts, 53-31.

15. I’ve been saying it all season — for the Cavs to have had a chance this year, one of the things that needed to happen was Rodney Hood needed to be good. He took four shots Friday and finished with six points in 18 minutes. It’s just nowhere close to what the Cavs would need on a night like this. After the game, Drew said Hood was dealing with a foot injury, and Hood clarified that his left Achilles was sore. He said he’d been dealing with the injury since the Indiana game Tuesday.

16. Another Cavs starter, David Nwaba, twisted his left ankle in the second quarter. He tried to play in the second half, but “he just wasn’t effective with it,” Drew said.

17. “Both guys, obviously they’re a big part of what we do — they’re starters,” Drew said. “We had to kind of switch some things up after either guy was having problems. We gave it our best go.”

18. Collin Sexton fouled out for the first time as a pro. He finished with 17 points on 6-of-17 shooting. This was game no. 33 for Sexton and the Cavs — the same number Sexton played in his only season at Alabama. Drew was asked if Sexton’s recent struggles meant he had hit the proverbial “rookie wall.”

19. “Could be,” Drew said. “But if it is, I want him to learn to push through it. This is his first year, this is not an easy thing to do. Night in, night out going against elite guards, but that’s the NBA.”

20. Matthew Dellavedova broke his string of consecutive games with at least 10 points. For the first time since re-joining the Cavs, he scored eight (with six assists). Cedi Osman, meanwhile, recorded his career-best fourth game with at least 10 points, registering 12.



21. The Bulls visit Sunday. Like the Raptors, they’re short-handed. Otherwise, they’re very much unlike the Raptors. Cleveland and Chicago are tied for the NBA’s worst record, a half-game worse than Phoenix.

(Top photo: Nick Turchiaro / USA Today Sports)

4 hours ago – via The Athletic

Hood is playing on a one-year qualifying offer worth $3.4 million. Because he’s on a qualifying offer, he can refuse any trade. The Cavs, meanwhile, are clearly rebuilding, and teams are studying them to scavenge spare parts. The Clippers, for instance, have scouted the last several Cleveland games, home and away.

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The whole world is coming around to what everyone in Cleveland has known for years: There is no better late game shot maker on earth than Kyrie Irving.

There is still no offensive threat like Kyrie, when healthy. Top 3 in basketball to give him the ball with the game on the line.

LeBron James: Cavs title 'made me the greatest player of all time'
9:43 PM ET
ESPN

When LeBron James reflects back on the Cleveland Cavaliers' first NBA title in 2016, he says that accomplishment allowed him to think of himself as the best player in the game.

"That one right there made me the greatest player of all time," James said in Episode 7 of the eight-part ESPN+ series "More Than An Athlete."



The Cavaliers, after falling behind three games to one to Golden State in the 2016 Finals, rallied to win the last three games -- including two on the road, capped off by a 93-89 win in Game 7. James scored 27 points and had 11 rebounds and 11 assists that night, and was unanimous Most Valuable Player in the series, his third Finals MVP honor.

More Than An Athlete

The eight-part docuseries, produced by UNINTERRUPTED and airing on ESPN+, will follow LeBron James and Maverick Carter's improbable journey from Akron to the global stage. Watch on ESPN+

"That's what I felt," he told friends and business partners Maverick Carter, Randy Mims and Rich Paul during the episode which began streaming on ESPN+ Sunday night. "I was super, super ecstatic to win one for Cleveland because of the 52-year drought. ... The first wave of emotion was when everyone saw me crying, like, that was all for 52 years of everything in sports that's gone on in Cleveland. And then after I stopped I was like -- that one right there made you the greatest player of all time.

"Everybody was just talking -- how (the Warriors) were the greatest team of all time, like it was the greatest team ever assembled," he said. "And for us to come back, you know, the way we came back in that fashion I was like, 'You did, you did something special.' That's probably one of the only times in my career I felt like, oh s---, like you did something special. I haven't had, really had time, to really, like, sit back and think but that...that was a moment."

The argument of who is the game's greatest player -- James or Michael Jordan -- has been a lightning rod for NBA debate over the years. Jordan won six NBA titles to three for James. Jordan won five MVP awards, while James has won four. Both are 14-time All-Stars (James is likely to make it 15 this year); James has made the All-NBA team 14 times to 11 for Jordan (James, who joined the Los Angeles Lakers this year, is in his 16th season; Jordan played 15).


LeBron James says coming back and beating the Warriors in seven games to give the city of Cleveland its first major professional sports title in 52 years made him "the greatest player of all time." Deanne Fitzmaurice for ESPN
James has long said Jordan was a role model for him as a youngster. And he has talked at times about the challenge of being compared to MJ.


"My motivation is this ghost I'm chasing," James told Sports Illustrated in the summer of 2016, after winning the title in Cleveland. "The ghost played in Chicago."

He added: "My career is totally different than Michael Jordan's. What I've gone through is totally different than what he went through. What he did was unbelievable, and I watched it unfold. I looked up to him so much. I think it's cool to put myself in position to be one of those great players, but if I can ever put myself in position to be the greatest player, that would be something extraordinary."

After breaking Jordan's record for all-time playoff points in 2017, James said: "I wear the number (23) because of Mike."

In "More Than An Athlete," James has shared his thoughts on his childhood, working with his longtime friends and his moves from Cleveland to Miami and back to Cleveland again. The first seven episodes are available to stream on ESPN+. The final episode is scheduled to be out on Jan. 8.

LeBron keep kidding yourself. I know Michael Jordan.... You are no Michael Jordan ! Michael would make you cry like a baby and then steal your milk money.....