Nothing is imminent yet, It has been done! the Cavs have traded Leuer for Marreese Speights and Josh Selby. Picks may or may not be involved.
Someone talk Kevin down from the ledge.
SECOND UPDATE: As Pete was kind enough to point out, Jones has been sent to the D-League – NIX THAT! Looks like Jones is coming back.
THIRD UPDATE: Looks like Pargo has been waived. Looking at a very different roster after today.
Totally down with this.
Also, this is the exact kind of trade I’m totally cool with. Decent young guy, reasonable price. Only problem is he almost definitely hits the free agency this year since there’s going to be quite a bit of money flying around.
I don’t know anything about these players, but Leuer doesn’t play at all, so this has to be an upgrade.
I do know Selby was a top recruit coming out of high school, though to say he wasn’t very good in one season at Kansas would be an understatement. Speights is just a solid big guy off the bench. To also get a 2nd round pick out of this, and only giving up Leuer to get this, is an awesome trade. Now the Cavs have 3 second round picks correct?
Actually I am fine with this trade. Low risk. I liked Leuer, but even in my opinion, he obviously wasn’t make or break to the re-build. Cleveland obviously had no use for him, and maybe he will get some burn in Memphis.
Wayne Ellington is apparently part of the deal also? Do the Cavs have another player involved or are they waiving someone? Seems like there are still a few questions to be answered. Ellington will add a solid shooter to the mix.
I’m sure Pargo and Jones are out the door.
Selby under control for a few years (if they want him) but Speights has a Player option and Ellington a QO. Not sure those guys are coming back or if the Cavs want to pay to bring them back. The picks might be the only thing around after this season but not a huge loss only giving up Leuer and cutting D-Leaguers.
It’s also interesting that Leuer was 14th on Hollinger’s draft Rater in 2011. Now Hollinger works for Memphis. This is definitely a salary dump for them, but Memphis’s front office may be intriqued by some Leuer potential.
Can Speights play interior defense at all?
Also, I like this trade, Leur is a dumpster fire on defense and we already have enough of those.
With the Cavs presumably drafting another big this year, we had 0 room for Leur.
UPDATE:
FTS reporting we received their FIRST ROUND PICK top 5 protected.
LOL, do work Chris Grant.
Witmi,
Every indication is no, that Speights is a poor defender. He shoots well and rebounds. He’s made like 47% of his long twos in the last couple seasons. Hopefully he helps spread the floor and converts some Kyrie / Dion assists on pick & pops.
Ellington can shoot, making 39% from three for this career. Having him standing in the corner when Kyrie or Dion drives will look better than Walton or Gee.
They are both players with very low assist rates, so they won’t help the team’s ball movement. Shooting is more important than passing though.
I live in a world where we traded a guy who can’t get off the bench for two players that are probably better than him, a project, and a first round pick. Boooooom
ok first rounder definitely sells me. Not like it was bad to begin with!
Sweet deal. Grant using that cap space wisely. Its not a blockbuster, but I’d much rather see speights out there than Lueur/Walton. And a 2015 first round top 5 protected pick thrown in? Wow Memphis sounds like they are on their way to Sacramento if they are that desperate to save money.
Love the trade, but with the glaring question of – if we don’t resign Ellington or Speights, our net is a first rounder, right? Isn’t the last thing we need right now more first rounders?
But again, it’s not like Leuer was doing anything for us. It makes us better in the short term, and, depending on how things move from here, the long term too.
What I THINK will happen is we’ll eventually try to flip some of these pieces for a bigger name in a larger trade. But we’ll see…
It’s a nice trade for the Cavs. Hopefully this is one of those trades where a young player puts it together by being on a different team. God knows the Cavs have been on the other end of that trade a few times with Hickson, Green, and Shannon Brown.
So Speights plays backup C (I would imagine), Jones at PF. For now, I would think they keep C.J. starting, and have Ellington come off the bench. It’s possible they have Dion play point. Maybe not a great outside shooter yet, but he can create for others.
HOLLINGER!!!!!
Wow – he does a salary dump and I GUARANTEE you they are going to turn Leuer into a rotation player.
But I’m happy with this trade. Cavs don’t know how to use Leuer (or choose not to) – so basically they got something for nothing.
Kevin, congratulations – we all know the real reason why this trade happened. Hollinger listened to our podcast yesterday. When I brought up his own scouting report he suddenly remembered how promising Leuer was in his rookie season and couldn’t understand why he was waived after such a good season. So now he’s seeing the same thing happen in Cleveland he’s thinking – “there’s only 3 people in this world that truly appreciate Jon Leuer: Me, some dude named Kevin Hetrick, and Leuer’s mom. I’m gonna make him into a rotation player and show off my advanced stat moxie.”
I assume this is related, Jones to the D-League yesterday: http://www.nba.com/cavaliers/releases/jones-assign-130121
So, the cost of “buying” the Memphis 1st round pick is on the order of $5 mill? And, assuming that Speights and Ellington aren’t retained beyond this year, we get Selby (or waive him) for Leuer?
That’s the long-term. The short-term is much nicer, as we add at least 1, maybe 2, rotation guys to make the rest of this season much more palatable.
I’m positive they can turn Leuer into a rotation player. But I am still skeptical that they can do anything other than “try to hide him” on defense from what I read about him when we picked him up off waivers. Even if he can develop, it seems like he wasn’t going to do it with the Cavs for whatever reason, ala the Danny Green situation.
Either way, we basically picked up a bunch of salary for what will likely be a 10-20 pick in 2 more years. That’s a fleecing as long as it doesn’t make us good enough to move our pick from top-5 to 6-10 this year.
Didn’t we find this out last year? The cost of a late 1st rounder is around 6 mil.
But I’m cool with that. As long as we package them.
Mallory, 1st rounders are valuable as assets, Chri Grant’s goal to accumulate as many assets as possible in the hopes to package them to improve the team.
Also, we gave up John Leur, I wouldn’t have cared if they cut him from the roster, let alone turn him into 2 upgrade players and a 1st rounder.
also, THIS TRADE MEANS NO MORE LUKE WALTON MAYBE EVER.
Witmi I completely agree – something for a guy who played minimal time and was clearly not a part of the future is awesome. I agree, he’ll hopefully package many of these assets for something big. That’s what we need right now.
It’s too bad we couldn’t somehow get Gay. That would’ve blown my mind.
@pete – more like a 20-30 pick if you ask me. Memphis is a very good team.
@ Tom
Probably. but considering it’s a 2015 pick, who knows how things could change.
Would’ve been fun to read the Hollinger analysis on this trade …
HAHA Aksel – that literally made me laugh out loud.
Sample of what it would’ve said “The Grizzlies absolutely fleeced the Cavs. Stupid idiots (except Kevin Hetrick) had no idea how amazing Leuer is. A++++++++”
Wow. I think we all may be over-analyzing a no-brainer, small impact trade.
Leur was not playing for us, so we parlayed him into a big guy who can protect Zeller’s minutes for the remainder of this year (very important – TZeller is about to have a heat attack out there), a 1st rounder in 2015, and a couple of pieces that may or may not be in our long-run plan. What’s not to like?
Agreed Hot Sauce – total no brainer.
Also, trade machine says we’ve now added one more win! http://espn.go.com/nba/tradeMachine?tradeId=aeou7j3
@ Mallory
It would have been nice, but really no chance of the Cavs getting him. The point of the trade for Memphis was to keep him.
I’m a little surprised about Jones being sent to Canton. Looking at the roster, it’s still needs a PF/C to come off the bench. I wonder if Scott could put Casspi at the 4. He’s pretty thin for that, but he is aggressive. Put him in, let him go fight for some rebounds.
Why does everyone assume Speights is out ofter this year? Hoopshype has his contract next year gauranteed… or are they missing something? http://hoopshype.com/salaries/memphis.htm
Grant need to start packaging all these 1st round picks into a great player one like a Cousins, or Love.
Scuzz, Walton was getting minutes over Jones before, its no wonder why Jones was sent to the D-League before him.
Walton’s not done playing yet, but at least he won’t be our first big off the bench (God I hope)
Is there a market for Speights this year? A contender looking for a big man that can rebound and score a little off the bench? I believe he must be traded straight up (1 for 1) because he was just required, but couldn’t there be a team with an extra wing, but lacking size that might trade for him?
Love the trade. Especially since all three guys coming in are young (25 and under) and not old, broken down slow vets that take up minutes that should be reserved for players who can grow. Speights may not be a defensive stalwart, but he’s got a nice PER. Ellington looks like he can light it up if he’s got someone to pass him the ball (Cavs def need more spot up three ball guys), and Selby is a 21 year old project/relative unknown. All that AND a first rounder. Kudos to Grant on very shrewd move.
Wonder if new guys will be available for tonight’s game?
SwIrving,
I suppose. Hopefully, Jones isn’t there for too long. Would rather see Speights and Jones as the second unit front-court.
@EvilGenius – I doubt they are available. The trade isn’t even finalized yet.
This trade is great for the Cavs. Both guys address needs; more depth, needed skill sets, maintaining the cap flexibility.
Speights and Tristan have different strengths and hopefully make them a productive pair . Speights is a shooter/floor spacer but weak defensively but a tremondous rebounder. Hopefully he flourishes in extended minutes. I could see him being a the third big man on a really good team. Hopefully the Cavs and he can make progress towards both sides of that scenario.
Ellington is growing into top tier shooter and from what I’ve read is a good defender. Seems like a great backcourt compliment to either Waiters or Kyrie. It seems crazy that just a few months ago he seemed like the next great 6th man in the nba when he hit 7 threes against Miami and now he’s being dealt for cap space.
As for Selby he’s talented but who knows what situation he needs to show it.
The first rounder is a little luck away from being a lottery pick as Memphis could easily catch a bad break or two and finish with 47-49 wins and be just out of the playoffs with how competative the West has been in recent years. If it is at the end of the round the Cavs can always package it to move up or look at draft and stash type projects like Splitter.
Chris Grant reaffirms his status as the best sports exec in Cleveland. Not sure what we will do with all these first rounders but Byron obviously wasn’t using Leuer so hardly a loss.
Cousins for Luke Walton , heat/laker 1st rounder, Cavs 1st next year and this new griz pick…what do you all thinkg about this
Kyle – love the idea – we’d probably have to include TT or Zeller though. And take back something like Salmons.
Someone just tweeted that Josh Selby is going to Milwaukee. So maybe this trade is more complicated than we are aware right now
i would prefer to keep TT he has shown a ton of improvemet this past month but i do think this is the year we see Grant pull the trigger on something huge so with that in mind i wouldnt mind giving them Zeller
Or that might have been an error – thinking that Jon Leuer was still on Milwaukee or something? I dunno. Here is from 10 minutes ago.
http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/8868058/memphis-grizzlies-cleveland-cavaliers-agree-multiplayer-trade-sources-say
http://espn.go.com/nba/tradeMachine?tradeId=bazlsa9
WOO! +1
Cavs now have six 1st round pics and seven 2nd round picks from now until 2015 they need to start cashing in on all these extra picks
Why wouldn’t we keep Speights?? HoopsHype says his contract goes through 13/14.
he has a player option after this year
He picks it up based on how Scott uses him for the 2nd half of the season and what he thinks his market is ( Sessions anyone?). So no sure thing.