Cleveland/Chicago/Denver

[bgrep14]

Cleveland: Schroeder, Strus, and Merrill
Cleveland: Braun and Watson S&T (5/100M)

Denver: Braun and Watson
Denver: Schroeder and Strus

Chicago: TPE
Chicago: Merrill

Cleveland: get Watson and fills a gap they need to fill at SF although they’re eating years of Braun

Denver: Dump Brauns long term money for a couple expirings. Can probably move Strus for a cheaper worse player to save money and essentially get off Brauns contract

Chicago gets a unique skill set they don’t have today for nothing.

[Godaddycurse]

Denver isnt interested in using watson to dump braun

[toooskies]

Okay, now sign Harden and keep the Cavs below the 1st apron.

(Oh wait, you can’t.)

[psimanic1]

How does this help Nuggets to contend in any of next few years? I know Braun had bad season, but I think Nuggets will keep him to see if he can get back before they pay to dump him...

[pipfan]

I wonder if Chi is interested in Watson? I doubt it, but we could do a two part deal
1-Chi absorbs Nnaji for a future 2nd
2-Dillingham to a team for cap space, Okoro to a team for cap space, Watson to Bulls and a 1st to Den

Den saves A TON of $ and gets a 1st
2 other teams absorb expiring Okoro and Dillingham
Chi adds Watson to go with their core of Giddey/Matas/WIlson

Could add a twist on part 1, and send Noa E/L Miller for Nnaji, to give Den two young forwards, but then Chi doesn't send a 1st to Den in the 2nd part

Chi ends up with
Giddey/Jones
Powell/Watson
Matas/Watson/Swain
Wilson/Nanji/PWill
Claxton/JSmith/Collins

They could even have 2027 cap space available, with a core of Giddey/Jones/Wilson/Matas/Claxton/Swain-plus all their picks

[ecuhus1981]

Cleveland needs to add significant incentive to this deal. Chicago needs a 2nd start minimum, for facilitating the money by absorbing Merrill. Denver would probably be fine with a 1st, maybe just remove Strus and Braun.

[tsarcast]

if denver is dumping braun it's to keep watson

[ChettheJet]

The problems for the Bulls are that while Merrill is a 3pt shooter he's got a fairly long contract, they have just signed Powell to start, have Okoro on the roster and just drafted Dailyn Swain. Add to that Merrill has only had the one fairly strong year and he's 30 years old. That's not the direction the Bulls are really going. Now if you found a team interested in Okoro you might make the case that they could have Merrill give Swain time to get used to the NBA but right now even giving up nothing this isn't a good move for the Bulls

[jbk1234]

There's no feasible way for the Cavs to add Braun and Watson while retaining Harden. Even if it were theoretically possible with Harden taking far less money than anticipated, doing so would put them behind the 8 ball next summer as Mitchell's extension kicks in. It's not clear to me why the Cavs would want to trade places with Denver, get stuck with Braun, and have to trade a better player next summer.

[bgrep14]

There's no feasible way for the Cavs to add Braun and Watson while retaining Harden. Even if it were theoretically possible with Harden taking far less money than anticipated, doing so would put them behind the 8 ball next summer as Mitchell's extension kicks in. It's not clear to me why the Cavs would want to trade places with Denver, get stuck with Braun, and have to trade a better player next summer.

Cavs are 35 million under the 2nd apron without Harden. Why couldn't they just sign harden to 2/60M then do this trade? You can still aggregate and not go into the second apron. I don't think the Cavs are trying to go into the second apron anyways.

[jbk1234]

There's no feasible way for the Cavs to add Braun and Watson while retaining Harden. Even if it were theoretically possible with Harden taking far less money than anticipated, doing so would put them behind the 8 ball next summer as Mitchell's extension kicks in. It's not clear to me why the Cavs would want to trade places with Denver, get stuck with Braun, and have to trade a better player next summer.

Cavs are 35 million under the 2nd apron without Harden. Why couldn't they just sign harden to 2/60M then do this trade? You can still aggregate and not go into the second apron. I don't think the Cavs are trying to go into the second apron anyways.

There are all types of limitations on what Denver can do in a S&T if they take back a player. You have them taking back too much money. If Strus and Merill go to Denver, and the Bulls took on Schroder, maybe you can get the numbers to work, but the Cavs just have no business taking back Braun's escalating contract with Mitchell and Mobley's escalating contracts already on the books. You're trading yourself into a corner.

I also don't like adding Merrill, who is the only vet on a team-friendly deal on the roster. He was one of two role players who posted positive impact stats across the playoffs. The other one just signed with Philly.

[bgrep14]

There's no feasible way for the Cavs to add Braun and Watson while retaining Harden. Even if it were theoretically possible with Harden taking far less money than anticipated, doing so would put them behind the 8 ball next summer as Mitchell's extension kicks in. It's not clear to me why the Cavs would want to trade places with Denver, get stuck with Braun, and have to trade a better player next summer.

Cavs are 35 million under the 2nd apron without Harden. Why couldn't they just sign harden to 2/60M then do this trade? You can still aggregate and not go into the second apron. I don't think the Cavs are trying to go into the second apron anyways.

There are all types of limitations on what Denver can do in a S&T if they take back a player. You have them taking back too much money. If Strus and Merill go to Denver, and the Bulls took on Schroder, maybe you can get the numbers to work, but the Cavs just have no business taking back Braun's escalating contract with Mitchell and Mobley's escalating contracts already on the books. You're trading yourself into a corner.

I also don't like adding Merrill, who is the only vet on a team-friendly deal on the roster. He was one of two role players who posted positive impact stats across the playoffs. The other one just signed with Philly.

You could argue with they signed themselves into a corner with the Mobley and Mitchell contracts. Gotta make moves today when you have the talent and worry about the Braun contract tomorrow. Merrill was also horrendous in the playoffs he avg 7/1/1 not sure what games you were watching. Dude is debatably worse than Landry Shamet on a more expensive contract and older not sure how you consider 9M a year team friendly for him.

[jbk1234]

Cavs are 35 million under the 2nd apron without Harden. Why couldn't they just sign harden to 2/60M then do this trade? You can still aggregate and not go into the second apron. I don't think the Cavs are trying to go into the second apron anyways.

There are all types of limitations on what Denver can do in a S&T if they take back a player. You have them taking back too much money. If Strus and Merill go to Denver, and the Bulls took on Schroder, maybe you can get the numbers to work, but the Cavs just have no business taking back Braun's escalating contract with Mitchell and Mobley's escalating contracts already on the books. You're trading yourself into a corner.

I also don't like adding Merrill, who is the only vet on a team-friendly deal on the roster. He was one of two role players who posted positive impact stats across the playoffs. The other one just signed with Philly.

You could argue with they signed themselves into a corner with the Mobley and Mitchell contracts. Gotta make moves today when you have the talent and worry about the Braun contract tomorrow. Merrill was also horrendous in the playoffs he avg 7/1/1 not sure what games you were watching. Dude is debatably worse than Landry Shamet on a more expensive contract and older not sure how you consider 9M a year team friendly for him.

That's a very simplistic and flawed view of what Merrill brings. Merrill had a positive on/off and the spacing he brings is big part of that. He was the only role player the opposing team even accounted for with the ball out of his hands. He was the only player able to free up Mitchell against the Raptors on a ball screen because he was the only player they actually switched onto.

If the Cavs trade expirings for Braun now, they'll absolutely have to dump salary next summer. When you find no takers on Braun or Harden, guess who's going?