The Cavs have finally found a taker for Brendan Haywood and his $10.5 million non-guaranteed contract. The minor shocker is that they’ve traded away Mike Miller as part of the deal.
Per the NBA’s chief news breaker, Yahoo Sports’ Adrian Wojnarowski, the Cavaliers have traded Haywood and Miller to the Portland Trail Blazers along with two future second-round picks. The Cavaliers received some cash in the deal, and also receive a sizable trade exception — or rather, two separate ones for Miller and Haywood’s two separate contracts — which they can use to take on more salary than they send out in deals for up to one year.
The story of the trade, as told in Wojbombs:
Cleveland has traded Brendan Haywood and Mike Miller to Portland, league source tells Yahoo Sports.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@WojYahooNBA) July 27, 2015
To be accurate on trade exceptions, they cannot be combined. Cleveland will have two exceptions — $10.5M and $2.85M.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@WojYahooNBA) July 27, 2015
Wojnarowski initially reported that the Cavs would receive two draft picks from the Blazers, but that would make precious little sense — the salary-dumping team is generally the one sweetening the pot with picks, and that’s the case here.1 The Akron Beacon Journal‘s Jason Lloyd and ESPN’s Brian Windhorst corrected that report, saying that the Cavs will send Portland two picks: the better of the two second-rounders they have in 2019 and their own second-rounder in 2020.2
Cavs sending Haywood & Miller plus better of 2019 2nd round picks from Lakers & Wolves they own plus their 2020 2nd pick.
— Brian Windhorst (@WindhorstESPN) July 27, 2015
Miller’s inclusion is a surprise given his long-standing friendship with LeBron James, but according to Lloyd, James gave the move his blessing in part so Miller can get a chance to play significant minutes elsewhere.
LeBron OK with Mike Miller trade, per source, who said Miller wanted out and a chance to play again. #Cavs receive trade exceptions for both
— Jason Lloyd (@JasonLloydABJ) July 27, 2015
Miller may be bought out by Portland — Haywood will surely be waived — but the current CBA would not allow him to return to Cleveland for at least a year. Per ESPN’s Marc Stein, Memphis, Dallas, and Oklahoma City may all be interested in Miller’s services.
With this deal done and Rakeem Christmas shipped off to Indiana, the Cavs look to be setting the stage to end their impasse with Tristan Thompson, and perhaps J.R. Smith and Matthew Dellavedova as well.
This story has been edited
- Woj later amended his report.
- I have included Windhorst’s tweet here as it was more clear than Lloyd’s.
