There may not be an NBA player whose name has popped up more in trade rumors over the last few years than Cavaliers forward Kevin Love. While nothing has happened, obviously, Love has been in a weird spot, as he’s been really the only player Cleveland could offer up in a big trade.
Each time, though, Love has managed to get past the rumors and contribute to the Cavaliers as they’ve made runs to the NBA Finals. It would make sense if this summer ends up being different, though, because if Cleveland loses LeBron James, there’s not much of a point in a rebuilding squad keeping Love around.
As Zach Lowe of ESPN laid out, there is a possibility that Love doesn’t get moved in response to James leaving Cleveland. Instead, Lowe wrote that we should “expect” to see a package involving Love and the No. 8 pick in the 2018 NBA Draft getting shopped around with the hopes of convincing James to stay in town.
They missed chances to trade their best non-LeBron player, Kevin Love, at something close to peak value, and will have hard time flipping him for even 50 percent of that now. Expect the Cavs to explore what they might get for a package of Love and the No. 8 pick around the draft in a last-ditch attempt to convince LeBron to stay.
Negotiating from a position of desperation would, understandably, make Koby Altman’s ability to get the best possible deal in return way more difficult. As would the fact that Love really struggled at times during the postseason — he averaged 14.9 points and 10.2 rebounds per game on 39.2 percent shooting from the field and 34 percent shooting from three. When Love was good in the playoffs, he was really good, but on the whole, he hardly looked like an All-Star.
Adding in the No. 8 pick would certainly sweeten a deal involving Love, and it’s not like he’s a slouch or anything. Getting a top-10 pick and someone capable of putting up big numbers, even if he turns 30 before the season tips off, would give any team a boost. The issue might lie in Love’s contract, as he’s under contract for each of the next two years — 2019-20 is a player option — and is owed $46.8 million total.
It’s also difficult to imagine a team that checks all of the following boxes: 1. Can take on Love’s contract, 2. Can give Cleveland something back that is worth moving its two most valuable assets and, 3. Can give Cleveland something back that makes it way harder for James to say he’ll stay. It’s especially difficult, theoretically, for that to happen when every other team knows Cleveland has to do this.
Most of the chatter surrounding the Cavaliers over the next few weeks will center around James, but Love’s future is ostensibly up in the air, too. The smart move is to sit back, wait, and see what happens with the No. 8 pick and with James, but Cleveland is in a position where it might have to swing for the fences and hope they don’t strike out.
