CLEVELAND, Ohio — In this episode of the Wine and Gold Talk podcast, Ethan Sands, Chris Fedor, and Jimmy Watkins discuss the recent surgery of Darius Garland and its implications for the Cavs.
Takeaways:
Darius Garland underwent surgery for a severe toe injury: Cavaliers guard Darius Garland underwent surgery for what was described as a severe case of turf toe that he suffered at the end of the regular season and aggravated in Game 2 against Miami. The injury, which sidelined him for much of the playoffs, was more serious than initially reported, requiring surgical intervention after rest and rehabilitation failed to resolve the issue.
Garland’s recovery timeline creates uncertainty for the start of the season: According to the team’s statement, Garland is expected to make a full recovery in approximately 4-5 months and “resume basketball activities by the start of training camp.” However, sources clarified that “basketball activities” could mean limited work like shooting or dribbling rather than full participation. Multiple sources indicated he might miss the beginning of the regular season, creating a significant gap in the Cavaliers’ backcourt.
The injury impacts potential trade discussions involving Garland: While the injury complicates potential trade scenarios involving Garland, it doesn’t necessarily eliminate interest from other teams. As Jimmy Watkins noted, teams might view this as an opportunity to discount his playoff struggles, but it could also reduce potential trade packages. Chris Fedor pointed out that teams regularly trade for injured players, citing examples like Brandon Ingram and Isaiah Thomas, suggesting Garland’s market value remains significant despite the injury.
Ty Jerome’s free agency becomes more critical for the Cavaliers: With Garland’s uncertain timeline, re-signing backup point guard Ty Jerome becomes an even higher priority for Cleveland. Jerome’s familiarity with the system and proven ability to run the offense makes him particularly valuable now. However, his leverage in contract negotiations may have increased significantly, potentially complicating the Cavaliers’ salary cap situation as they balance other free agent decisions including Sam Merrill, Dean Wade, and Isaac Okoro.
The Cavaliers have limited options to address the point guard position: Due to their salary cap constraints, the Cavaliers can only sign external free agents to minimum contracts. Potential targets mentioned include Spencer Dinwiddie, Monte Morris, Malcolm Brogdon, Dante Exum, and Kyle Lowry. However, the hosts emphasized that none of these options would fully replace what Ty Jerome provided, let alone serve as a “Costco version of Darius Garland,” highlighting the team’s limited flexibility in addressing this need.
Donovan Mitchell will likely shoulder increased playmaking responsibilities: Similar to when Garland missed six weeks last season, Donovan Mitchell is expected to slide over to point guard and take on increased playmaking responsibilities if Garland misses time. While this is a viable short-term solution, the hosts expressed concern about putting additional miles on Mitchell over an extended period, potentially affecting his availability and effectiveness for the playoffs, which remains the team’s primary focus.
The Cavaliers’ injury reporting practices were criticized: The hosts criticized the Cavaliers organization for their lack of transparency regarding player injuries, noting this is the second consecutive year they’ve been vague about injury severity (referencing Jarrett Allen’s injury last season). Chris Fedor explained that while the team believes they’re protecting players and gaining strategic advantages, this approach often backfires by creating external criticism and questioning of players’ competitive integrity, as happened with Garland during the playoffs.
Garland faced unfair criticism during the playoffs due to injury ambiguity: The podcast highlighted how the Cavaliers’ vague injury reporting led to Garland facing unfair criticism from fans, analysts, and even franchise legends during the playoffs. Garland himself expressed frustration, stating “nobody knows what I’m going through.” The hosts argued that greater transparency would have alleviated some of this criticism and protected the player’s reputation, suggesting the organization’s approach to injury reporting needs significant improvement.
The injury could affect the Cavaliers’ early-season performance: While the Cavaliers remain focused on playoff preparation rather than regular season success, Garland’s absence could put them “behind the eight ball” in the race for top seeding in the Eastern Conference. The hosts noted that while home court advantage isn’t everything, as demonstrated this past season, it would still be beneficial for their playoff positioning, making the first few weeks of the season potentially challenging without their All-Star point guard.
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Ethan Sands: What up, Cavs Nation? I’m your host, Ethan Sands and I’m back with another episode of the Want and Gold Talk podcast. And joining me per usual, you know you love him. Chris Fedor, Jimmy Watkins. And in a summer full of a lot of questions we unanswered today, and it was about Darius Garland and the severity of of his great toe injury that he suffered at the end of the regular season and that he then aggravated in game two of the first round against Miami. Sidelined him for a good majority of the rest of the playoffs. Now, we know it was more serious than anybody could have alluded to and he tried to tell us in a couple of interviews, nobody knows what I’m going through. And now we know that he had to undergo surgery on that toe. And guys, I don’t want to mess up wording or anything because the email we got was a little cryptic, a little bit confusing. And I know Chris, we’ll get into you and having to go behind the scenes to get some clarity on that. But the email reads his status will be updated as appropriate. Following a progression of treatment and rehabilitation. He in approximately four to five months, Garland is expected to make a full recovery and resume basketball activities by the start of training camp. And guys, I’m going to start here four to five months from now. It’s not training camp. Four to five months from now is the beginning of the regular season where we’re trying to figure out whether or not Darius is going to miss the first 10 games of the season or, or if he’s going to be back doing something. And I know Chris will clarify, but it gives off the vibe of at some capacity he’s going to be doing something. But like what that is, we’ll have to wait and find out. Chris, what’s the lowdown on the situation with Darius from behind the scenes perspective?
Chris Fedor: Well, I think a lot of this is going to depend on how he heals and how his toe responds to this particular surgery. But to give a little bit of background, guys, how could I put this? At the time that Darius re aggravated his toe injury in game two, people inside the organization were informed that it was going to be longer than two weeks that he was going to be up and that was relayed. So that’s from the very, very beginning of it all. And then he tried to play through it. They’re down.02 in the series. He comes back, he tries to play through it. He’s obviously not nearly as effective as he usually is. He was clearly limping all over the floor. He didn’t have the same speed, the same stop start, the change of direction. When I walked out of the arena with him following Game 5, he was the last person to leave the arena. I asked somebody close to him if I could just say goodbye to him because I wanted to thank him for everything throughout the course of the season. I wanted to thank him for his honesty, his candor, and all of the times that he met with the media, even times when he didn’t want to. So when we were walking out of the arena, he was walking very, very slowly, very, very slowly. And it was clear that, you know, this was something that was going to linger a little bit into the off season. And Darius and the Cavs got together and they all decided, okay, let’s just let this thing rest. Let’s do some more treatment, let’s do some more rehab and see if. If the pain will go away. Naturally, it didn’t. Darius was still feeling pain. He was still in discomfort. So he got together with the Cavs and other doctors, and they all decided that surgery was the best way to alleviate this issue and maybe make it so that it doesn’t pop back up next season. I think there was some worry inside the organization, from what I was told, that if they didn’t treat this this way, if they didn’t go through with the surgery, that there was a possibility of this popping up again at training camp, regular season, once he really started to increase the basketball activities in a really physical manner that’s different than. Than a normal off season workout or, or something along those lines. So surgery wasn’t the number one option. It was not. It. It never is with a player. Players don’t like surgery, especially when you’re talking about toes and you’re talking about feet and stuff like that. So they wanted to see if it was going to heal on its own. It did not. They decided to do the surgery. And yeah, the wording’s a little bit complex and a little bit convoluted. And I called four sources actually on this one, because I said, wait a minute, hold up. But you have four to five months. But then in the next sentence, it’s about training camp. So the thing that I was told is that the basketball activities portion of this is very important because that doesn’t mean full go. That doesn’t mean the first day of training camp, he’s going to go five on five or something along those lines. They’re going to let this thing heal. They’re going to let him recover from the surgery. And basketball activities could mean shooting on a basket all by himself. Basketball activities could mean going through a walkthrough on the floor as opposed to going full speed in a training camp practice. Basketball activities could mean dribbling on the side basket all by himself with one of the assisting coaches. Basketball activities could mean doing like change of direction drills without a basketball in his hands. It could mean a variety of different things. So I think they were purposeful, vague, because I think there are a lot of different things that play into it. But the thing that everybody agreed on, all the sources that I talked to throughout the course of today is that they would not be surprised if he was not ready to go at the start of the regular season to play regular season basketball games from the very outset. That’s something that I think everybody thinks is a real possibility of him missing time at the beginning of the regular season.
Ethan Sands: Jimmy, I know we’ve talked a lot about different things when it comes to Darius Garland in the summer. That’s already taking part because as Chris mentioned, they waited almost a month from when they got bounced from Game 5 against the Indiana Pacers in the Eastern Conference semifinals. So make this decision. What do you think this says or does for the trade conversations that we’ve had about Darius Garland and the injury and what that could mean for how other teams look at it, especially with how vague what the Cavs PR and the organization came out saying and what that could mean for him in not only this next season, but in the remainder of his career. Because obviously the surgery is supposed to prevent this, but this is still something that could pop up for the remainder of his career if not taken care of properly.
Jimmy Watkins: It’s tricky. I’m up two minds on it. On the one hand, if you’re a team that wants to trade for Darius Garland, you look at this piece of news and you say, okay, well, we’re wiping away that Pacer. Serious. We can’t put that on his playoff resume. That’s not fair. Last year we know that he was dealing with the fallout from another injury. So I think that’s probably the glass half full way to look at it. Like, we still haven’t seen what this guy can do on the biggest stage with more experience and his health, his good health, the other side of that. And by the way, let’s just reiterate, Darius Garland went healthy over 82 games because that’s pretty much all we got with him being healthy. 82 games and a playoff series against the Knicks, which was more of an organizational failure than A failure on any one player’s shoulders. He is a lightning rod for your offense. He’s a head of the snake type point guard. He can inject, he can control the game. He’s. He’s not quite white. Tyrese Halliburton, when it comes to dictating pace and involving teammates, that certainly he’s that kind of guy. He’s an amplifier of his surroundings in those situations. He’s a guy that if it breaks down, he can go get you one, too. That’s a very valuable player to have as well as a $40 million player. The other side of this is that it’s very hard to trade for a guy who’s injured. It’s very hard to trade for a guy that we don’t know what the plan is for him next season. It’s very hard to trade for a guy. Any trade for Darius Garland. I would think a team acquiring him would want to extend him as soon as possible. It’s very hard to negotiate an extension when you don’t know what he looks like in the fabric of your team yet. And the hope, as always, after surgery, that it doesn’t flare up again. But like, toe injuries are one of those things that historically, they can become a trend. And you want to nitpick it even further. This is like two years in a row where Darius Garland has had different, random, unfortunate injuries, but still two years in a row. And that when you’re making big picture decisions in this cap environment, his next extension is going to be big boy money. All of this stuff matters. All of this stuff matters. So it complicates the trade conversation, to say the least.
Chris Fedor: Yeah. I think the other side of this, though, is if. If you’re a team that had interest in Darius Garland before today, you still have interest in Darius because of all of the things that, that you like about him to begin with. And. And I think you take him for his strengths and you take him for his weaknesses. Right. And those are very, very apparent. It does throw a different variable into the mix. There’s no doubt about it. But the teams trade for injured guys all the time. The Toronto Raptors traded for Brandon Ingram, didn’t play, his ankle was not working properly, and they traded for him. The Cavs traded for Isaiah Thomas, who at the time had a torn labrum in his hip. And. And that was part of the Kyrie Irving deal. Now, the trade got a little bit delayed because they wanted to do a little bit more research on it and they wanted to get a little bit more clarity. On that particular injury. But he had a busted hip and the Cavs still traded for him. So it definitely happens throughout the course of NBA history and even recently where teams will trade for injured guys or guys coming off an injury and they just have to do their due diligence. They have to do all the kind of conversations that, that you need to have with agents, with members of the front office, with other people around the NBA to try and get as much information as possible. But I certainly don’t think that this is going to stop the interest in teams trading for Darius Garland. And I certainly don’t think it’s going to stop the Cavs from, from being open minded to the possibility, emphasis on possibility, of trading Darius this off season.
Jimmy Watkins: You don’t think that it might not shrink a package on the margins? On the margins. Let’s say it’s intriguing, young player and like pretty close to the full package of picks. You know, two or three firsts. If I’m another team, I. It’s a little bit gross business, but I might be trying to keep one of those firsts now. I might be trying to do that at the very least. I mean, the Isaiah Thomas trade is one example. But Isaiah Thomas was never even close to the same player after that hip injury. That is not comparable to this situation. People have toe injuries all the time. They have surgery on their toe all the time. They come back all hunky dory. Isaiah Thomas had a hip injury. He lost more than half a step. He didn’t have half a step to lose. As a dude who was one of the smallest dudes in the league, that’s not the same thing. I’m just saying that’s where this can go wrong. That’s why you want to do all that due diligence. So again, yeah, I’m with Chris. Conversations can still happen. I think it decreases the chances of a trade, though. I will say that however high you thought the odds were before, I think teams are going to be more careful now. And the Cavs need to be bowled over by an offer. They need to get something that they think is a no brainer. Yes. Or close to it. Something that makes them markedly better. And it’s harder to get that when the player you are trading is injured.
Ethan Sands: Not to put words in Chris’s mouth, but I think that’s something that he has reiterated on this podcast. Like the Cavs would have needed to see something that would have made them exponentially better without Darius Garland on the roster. Now that just becomes even more difficult because of the injury, but it’s interesting. And Jimmy, that’s exactly the way of thinking that I had of how if a team was going to still want Darius, the package might get smaller, they might not add in as much of a fluff piece because you don’t necessarily know what you’re getting on the back end, all these things. Chris, I want to ask you a more difficult question. I’m going to be very careful of how I word this, and I talked to Jimmy about this slide slightly before the podcast began. This is the second year in a row that the Cavs organization, which is renowned as one of the best, most well structured, well ran in the entire NBA, have had a player who was not designated throughout a series, designated throughout a playoff run as a sprain or a strain. Not broken, not pierced, whatever. Obviously I’m referencing Jared Allen from last year, us being told it was a bruise grip. Come to find out that it was a pure strip. Now you have Darius Garland having a toe sprain, which you don’t necessarily usually need surgery from a sprain. It feels more severe than that. Why would that be the case and do you think it’s a negative mark on the organization that it is not the only time that it’s happened?
Chris Fedor: Well, I asked numerous people throughout the course of today if it was a broken toe and they said no, it’s very, very similar to a severe case of turf toe. That’s the way that it was explained to me multiple times and sometime does require surgery. I’m not a doctor. I don’t know the answers to these things. I, I think the Cavs, I think they have a certain way of handling injuries and it isn’t always the best. And we’ve talked about that on this podcast. I think they could be more transparent. I think they could take away some ambiguity. I’ve had multiple conversations with multiple people inside the organization about why they approach it the way that they do. Me giving my opinion on that being the case, me talking about the benefits of them being more transparent. I asked Kobe Altman during his end of season wrap up press conference if he had any regrets, if he would have done anything differently when it came to listing Darius as questionable over and over and over again. He didn’t want to get into it. So they think they’re protecting the player. I don’t think they’re right in that, but that’s what they think. They also think there’s, you know, a strategic advantage when listing a player a certain kind of way in a play. Playoff series. I don’t think they’re right about that either. I just don’t think it makes that much of a difference. I think Rick Carlisle and the Indiana Pacers knew that Terry Speakers was dealing with the toe injury, and even if he did play, it wasn’t going to change things significantly because he wasn’t going to be All Star Darius Garland in the playoffs. He wasn’t. He wasn’t going to be the guy from the regular season for the Cavs in that series against Indiana, not playing through the injury that he was playing through or trying to play through the injury that he was trying to play through. So I think they’re wrong in the way that they go about this, and I think it would benefit them greatly to be more transparent. Now, one of the things that they will say is that people inside the organization know the truth, the players in the locker room know the truth. And everything else is just noise, noise that they have to deal with from the outside, from people that don’t have the full picture. And they think as long as people inside the locker room and Darius’s teammates understand the severity of it and what he’s going through, that it’s not going to create problems internally. It’s just going to be external noise. But I think any time you leave it open to a player being criticized by the fan base, by other analysts around the NBA, by former players, by former Cavaliers, I think anytime you open it up for that, and you do open it up for that by listing him a certain kind of way, questionable means that people are going to dig into it and ask questions about it and wonder what’s going on. Right. And the minute that you list it as day to day or questionable or don’t provide the full context of everything that’s going on and aren’t as transparent as some other organizations around the NBA, it is going to lead to questions, it is going to lead to doubts, and you are opening the door for that to happen. And it can be hard on a player. I mean, Darius Garland even talked about it following one of the games against the Pacers. Nobody knows what I’m going through. You know, everybody has an opinion on this or that, but nobody knows what I’m going through. Well, there’s a way to pass along the information so that everybody is on the same page and has an understanding of what you’re going through. And I think it alleviates some of the criticism that a player would receive. And if you’re an organization like the Cavs, I would think that you would want to alleviate some of that. Right. I think you would want to take away a player having to deal with that kind of stuff and what it can mean to them from a mental standpoint.
Jimmy Watkins: So.
Chris Fedor: So I don’t think they handle injuries as well as they. They could and as well as they should. We’ve talked about it on this podcast. They do a lot of things right in this organization. There’s a reason why people look at them for the next three to five years as maybe being the best situation in the Eastern Conference. There’s a reason why people are looking at them going into next year and they’re third or fourth in terms of title favorites. Because there’s a lot of things that they have done. Right. To get themselves to that point. Right. So I don’t think we can overlook those things. But they don’t do injuries well, at least when it comes to passing along the information that I think would be beneficial.
Jimmy Watkins: They don’t do injuries well is understating it. We’ve talked about this before. This is so dumb. I have a question before I talk about how dumb this is. Chris. How could this possibly be perceived as protecting the players when that case is made to you? From what standpoint is that case made? How are they protecting the players? By listing them with murky injury statuses?
Chris Fedor: By not sharing the full extent of what the injury is.
Jimmy Watkins: So it’s a HIPAA law kind of deal?
Chris Fedor: Basically, yes. Okay, well, protecting a player’s privacy, sure.
Jimmy Watkins: That’s playerless.
Chris Fedor: Good players. In some cases, players don’t want all of the information out there, so they think it’s helping by withholding that and keeping it in the family.
Jimmy Watkins: Okay, that part of it is fair. But you can do both. You can do both.
Chris Fedor: That’s true.
Jimmy Watkins: You can protect a player’s privacy and you can communicate to the world what’s going on here. Like, you can give us an estimate of a timetable. Like, you look at what just happened with the heirs gone now. Is it a murky timetable? Is it a confusing timetable? Is it yes and yes. But we have an understanding of what’s going to happen with this injury.
Chris Fedor: Yeah.
Jimmy Watkins: And during playoff time, we’ve dropped on the fourth. The scouting that goes on during the playoffs is so advanced, there’s just no edge that can be gained from somebody maybe playing, maybe not. Like every team assumes that the other team’s going to be full strength if someone’s questionable. And if not, okay, we know their backup just as well.
Ethan Sands: Rick Carlisle literally did it. He literally was. Like he was in his press conference and he goes.
Jimmy Watkins: He’s gonna point.
Ethan Sands: You know Darius is playing. We all know Darius is playing, right?
Jimmy Watkins: And then Bryce has won. The Pacers won anyways. The Pacers won that game anyways. Wow, what a leg up that provided for the Cavs. And ty Jerome lost $15 million over the course of that series. What a curveball you threw. I mean, he might have. This is another gross thing. I might have gotten some money back today. We can talk about that later on. But I just think when we start opening the door for. Okay, forget fans for a second. You want to call fans external noise, I’ll hear that out. We have franchise legends calling these dudes out. The road trip. And pod, correct me if I’m mistaken, did that not start as like a Cavs property? Like an in house podcast with Ali Clifton? Now they’re out here throwing spears at Darius Garland. And oh, by the way, not just Darius Garland, Evan Mobley and DeAndre Hunter as well. Basically saying, like, it can’t happen. Someone’s gotta go out there and play. Like, I guess it’s just a former player rite of passage to just call younger players soft. I guess that’s just. That’s just what it is. But again, fans, external noise. I disagree because we are talking about people questioning a player’s competitive integrity. I think that goes beyond external noise. I think to pretend like people aren’t on their phones all the time. You have millennials and Gen Z players in your locker room. Let’s get real. No one is ignoring the external noise to that degree. Like, you can’t. You can’t help but open your phone and see what people are saying about you at that.
Chris Fedor: At that level.
Jimmy Watkins: Okay.
Ethan Sands: Darius got caught arguing with fans on Twitter because he got caught like Loki Josie at one of the halftime shows. And you don’t think the 25 year old DG’s on his phone.
Jimmy Watkins: Kyp, know your personnel, Know your personnel. This goes beyond that. These are voices with more authority. These are voices that people trust. You have muddied the water to a degree where now Richard Jefferson and Channing Fry shouldn’t have done what they did. But the water was muddy enough where they felt compelled to say something like that. And now you have distorted your. One of your best players. Right. Reputations. You can call that outside noise. I would call that bad interpersonal relations with your players. And as we all know, that stuff really matters in the NBA. In no league do the players wield more influence and power over their franchises. So, yeah, yeah, they’re not very good at this.
Ethan Sands: So Jimmy, you mentioned a point that I was going to get into about the importance of Tide Jerome and then also potentially getting another ball handling guard, depending on how the severity of the healing process looks for Darius Garland. Sure you have a few months, you don’t have four to figure it out who you’re going to sign in the off season, but obviously the priority of Ty Jerome being added back to this roster, I feel like we’ve talked about it being one of the top priorities for this team already, but now it might be priority number one for the Cav to get Ty Jerome back. Because if you’re a Kobe Altman and you’re like, well, we don’t know when Darius is going to get back, hey, we didn’t believe in Craig Porter Jr. Playing the playoffs, but I know you’re in your third season, time for you to get some real minutes. I am a big Craig Porter Jr guy, but it does not feel like this organization is ready to do that. Even though there are some people in the organization, as Chris has mentioned in previous podcasts, who are big Frank Porter Jr guys too. But Kenny Atkinson might not be that comfortable putting him in these kinds of situations when he knows that in the playoffs he’s not going to get those same opportunities. And the reality of this next regular season, as much as everybody’s going to say it doesn’t matter, they’re going to be planning and practicing and training for the playoffs from day one, game one, that’s all that’s been on everybody’s mind. That’s all that was on everybody’s mind from last year when they got caught up in the 64 win season. Right now it’s okay, the regular season doesn’t matter. Let’s put ourselves in the best place for the playoffs. So the question is Ty Jerome coming back? How important is that? And are there any free agent guards that you would be like, hey, you would make a couple of good spot minutes instead of great points. Porter Jr. Chris, what you think?
Chris Fedor: Yeah, I mean, I think that’s what it is, right? I, I think based on their current roster composition, what happened last year when Darius missed six weeks, Donovan Mitchell took over, he slid over one spot and he ran the offense. Now is that a viable solution for an entire regular season? No, but we’re not talking about the entire regular season. We’re talking about a couple of weeks in early October and there will be plenty of time for Donovan Mitchell in to maybe make up for that on the back end. Like, I don’t think this is a situation that is going to lead to the Cavs running Donovan Mitchell into the ground and making him physically and mentally exhausted by the time the playoffs roll around. But can he do it for a couple of weeks? Can he just slide over one spot, increase his responsibilities, change the position that he plays? Of course he can. And that’s part of the beauty of having what the Cavs believe is a dynamic backcourt, one of the best backcourts in the NBA. When those two guys are together, they feel like the offense is going to be nearly unstoppable and it’s going to make up for some of the defensive limitations. The other benefit of it is you have two ball dominant guys that if you take one out of the mix, you just increase the responsibility for the other one and you still have what you believe is enough viable playmaking, enough viable shot creation. You could potentially run the offense through Evan Mobley at the beginning of the season a little bit more and dabble with that sort of thing. So obviously, when you have any kind of uncertainty with an injury like this in the off season, Ty Jerome being the backup point guard, Ty Jerome being a free agent, sure. I would say that that increases the Cavs desire a little bit to bring back Ty because they have a familiarity with him, because they know he can run the offense, because they know that he can thrive in this particular system. Whereas if you’re talking about another free agent, there are some variables there. You might think that he fits in your system, you might think he’s able to run Kenny Atkinson’s offense effectively because of that particular player’s skill set, but you just don’t know because you haven’t seen it. So, yeah, Ty would give them a lot of comfort. Right. Part of the six man responsibility is stepping up into a bigger role and showing that you can take on more responsibility, showing that you can handle a bigger workload and still be the productive player that you were coming off the bench. So the camps came into this off season and I was told that Ty Jerome was a priority of theirs, somebody that they wanted to reset. Ty wants to be here. The Cavs want him to be here. It’s about is Dan Gilbert willing to spend in the luxury tax? It’s. It’s about what other options are out there for Ty Jerome. It’s about what is the contract going to look like, how comfortable are the Cavs with that, and what are the other options out there. So if we get into that last part, what are the other options out there? Yeah, I mean, there are guys for sure. Maybe Guys that the Cavs could get on the minimum. Maybe Spencer Dinwiddie. He might be a minimum guy.
Jimmy Watkins: I also pulled up Spencer Dinwiddie’s Spotrack page.
Chris Fedor: Yeah, he might be a minimum guy. Right. Monte Morris, if he wants to show that he can still be a backup point guard in the NBA, he might be a minimum guy. He’s got playoff experience. He’s somebody who was a prominent backup. Kind of has fallen out of rotations recently. I don’t know what kind of number Malcolm Brogdon’s going to get. I would think more, but he’s 33 years old. It might be a situation where he’s willing at this stage of his career, given all the money that he’s already made in previous contracts. Might, emphasis on might in big, bold letters. Might be willing to latch on somewhere and possibly ring chase in the right opportunity in the right system. Dante Exum is somebody else that we talked about. I think there’s motivation for Dallas certainly to bring him back, given the uncertainty with Kyrie Irving. I would think that those are the ones that stand out to me. And maybe Kyle Lowry. Is there anything left there? Maybe. Possibly. But those are the names that you’re talking about because the Cavs can’t do anything outside of this organization other than just sign guys for minimum contracts. That’s what they’re limited to based on their current salary cap situation. So nobody that they could go out and sign for the minimum is going to give them what what Ty Jerome gave them, let alone be a Costco version of Darius Garland. Spencer didn’t. We might be the best one out there.
Jimmy Watkins: Malcolm Brogdon is. That’ll get people real fired. That’ll give people real fired. And by the way, that might is colored by a career littered by injuries. And who knows how he, you know, who knows how he ages as a result of those injuries. But I mean, yeah, I mean, pie in the sky ideas if gigantic if Malcolm Brogdon is available for the minimum. That’s a dude who could like, legit help you now and later. Once upon a time, Malcolm Brogdon was a playoff guy.
Chris Fedor: He was.
Jimmy Watkins: When? When healthy, of course. But anywho, Ty Jerome, it’s really a matter of like, how hard does Ty Jerome’s agent want to negotiate? Is he repped by as Mark Bartlestein? Chris. So it’s like a joint?
Chris Fedor: I would say technically, yes. I would say technically, yes. But there are other people in that agency that handle more of the Tai Jerome related stuff. I’ll probably put it that way. I think that’s the best way to put it.
Jimmy Watkins: Well, if you want to play some hardball, your team tied Jerome today. Made it a lot easier for you to play some hardball. You still have to go out there and get that other offer, get somebody again. We’re probably thinking Brooklyn or tmx. That frees up cap space that we don’t see right now. If you can get that offer, you can. Before this, before Darius Garland was missing four to five months, the Caps could look at Ty Jerome and say, we like you a lot. We’re not sure we can replace what you do on the minimum, but at the end of the day, there is a number that we just can’t get to here. If you can get. I don’t even know what it would be at this point. More than 15, 16 million. Best of luck to you and hope you can make the best of your career. Everyone in Cleveland’s still rooting for you, but that might just be out of the price range now. I don’t know, man. Because you lose Ty Jerome and Darius is out for the number one. That creates an inherent tension with Darius’s return. They’re going to be pressure for him to come back, which is not what you want, especially given what we just talked about for 15 minutes about injury status listings. Number two, you’re putting more miles on Donovan. That’s not what you want to do. Obviously, we’ve seen the residual effects of that the last, you know, two years before this, and you’re putting yourself behind. I mean, the Caps are still very regular season. They still are a very deep team. Like Craig Porter Jr. Is capable of handling backup point guard minutes. He’s not going to give you Ty Jerome. You’re going to have to reconfigure how you run that second unit because a lot of times Ty Jerome’s just cooking out there, there. But you might put yourself a little bit behind the eight ball on the. On the race to the top of the east, which, of course, as we saw this year, doesn’t mean everything, but it would still be nice to have home court advantage next season. So I do think Ty Jerome, there’s an opportunity for Ty Jerome to make some. Some money here, as gross as that sounds. I understand that that’s gross, but this is business. There’s. There’s a business aspect to everything in this life. And one of the business aspects of the Darius Garland injury situation is that Chadron holds more power at the negotiating table. That’s just reality.
Chris Fedor: So the only problem with that is. And you’re right. But the only problem with that is there aren’t a lot of cap space teams out there. So his negotiation would come if he can find a cap space team that would give him more than the mid level exception. That would be his hope. Other than that, the Cavs can offer him very similar to the mid level exception teams. The mid level exception teams. That pool is a lot deeper and it’s probably a lot more appealing. Dallas, Golden State, those teams are a little bit more appealing than Detroit, than Brooklyn. I don’t think Chicago is going to have the space because they have their own decisions that they have to make. I’m their own guys. I also, I don’t think Memphis is going to have the space because all indications are they’re going to try and rework something with Jaren Jackson Jr. I don’t even think Detroit’s going to have the the space. They have other more pressing needs. They’re going to be a Miles Turner team. They’re going to be a Nas Reid. It doesn’t mean they’re going to get Miles and it doesn’t mean they’re going to get Nas, but they’re going to try. That’s where their focus is going to be. And then it’s resign Malik Beasley. It’s figure out what you’re going to do with Dennis Schroeder. It’s figure out what you’re going to do with Tim Hardaway Jr. So they’ve got their own free agents and there are some other positions that I think they would prioritize more than Kate Cunningham’s backup. So really we’re talking about Brooklyn.
Jimmy Watkins: By the way. Spin zone. You can make the case now if you’re the Cavs. Even with for these mid level exception teams, one of their biggest sells his role. Well, Ty Jerome’s role just got bigger here. Ty Jerome’s role just got bigger now. Like what really like for the at least the first couple of weeks or so. Not that different. I mean the difference between Ty Jerome and Dallas and Ty Jerome, by the way, Dallas, I’m not sure I’d want to give my Kyrie Irving keys to Ty Jerome. But you do you Nico. Nico will do him by the way. We know Nico will do him.
Chris Fedor: Dallas, San Antonio, all valid options.
Jimmy Watkins: But now this is the Cavs have more to sell. Tyrone too. That’s signs of that are true. Yes. It’s probably just Brooklyn. What is Brooklyn doing with its money? For as few caps based teams as there are, there are also equally few Appealing big money, free agents. And sometimes, sometimes when that happens, we have classes like this. Of course there will be trades to be sought after. There’s a lot of crazy rumors about big names getting moved, and if Brooklyn wants to try and get involved in that, I would applaud it to try and do. I don’t know what else Brooklyn’s doing. So you got to try to do something. But sometimes you get left holding a big bag of money and you have to give it to somebody. You have to give it to somebody so that that possibility is on the table. And by the way, that the bag of money doesn’t have to be that big. As we just discussed, like, Brooklyn can do some stuff, still have a bunch of money left over, get left holding it and say, well, let’s see what Ty Jerome looks like in a bigger role and let’s see if the Cavs will actually, you know, like that’s a distinct possibility, even if it’s kind of the only possibility.
Ethan Sands: I think those are all great points and I think the names that you guys dropped for the free agents is extremely intriguing, even if they are coming with big bold letters tied to them. And obviously I think Ty Jerome, as I mentioned, it should be the number one priority for the Cavs after this injury. Even if that does make things a little bit more tricky when it comes to Sam Merrill’s money or Dean Wade, Isaac Koro’s money and figuring out where they’re going to end up this coming season. Because obviously if somebody wins in the business of the NBA, unfortunately somebody has to lose and that’s talking money. And obviously Brooklyn is going to be looking for people that they can drop off or dump money on, as Jimmy was talking about. Cavs may have a few players to help out with that.
Chris Fedor: Or they could take the space and use it, like you said, to parlay that into draft capital. Like, okay, you want us to be a dumping ground for your bad contract, quote, unquote, bad contract relative term in the NBA. Attach a future first round pick to it, whoever it is that you’re sending to us. Attach multiple second round picks to whoever it is. Attempt that you’re sending to us. That is an option that some of these early stage rebuild teams often use and take advantage of.
Ethan Sands: Well, guys, this conversation spurred multiple ideas in my head for future podcasts that will come this week, but for this one, that will do it. That’ll wrap up today’s episode of the Wine and Gold Talk podcast. But remember to become a Cavs insider, interact with Chris, me and Jimmy by subscribing to Subtext. This is where you can send in your weekly hey Chris questions. We missed you guys last week. We’re going to get it in this coming week. We got so much to discuss, even after the Darius Garland surgery injury that we talked about today. So let us know your thoughts on the different trips, trade opportunities, the different free agents and all these different things. But the only way to do so is if you sign up for a 14 day free trial or visit cleveland.comcavs and click on the blue bar at the top of Faith. If you don’t like it, that’s fine. All you have to do is text the word stop. It’s easy, but we can tell you that the people who sign up stick around because this is the best way to get insider coverage on the Cavs from me, Chris and and Jimmy. This isn’t just our podcast, it’s your podcast. And the only way to have your voice heard is through subtext. Y’ all be safe. We out.
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