Kings Interested In Iman Shumpert

10:27am: The would-be deal to send Shumpert to Sacramento is losing steam, Jones hears (on Twitter).

8:20am: The Kings would like to trade with the Cavaliers for Iman Shumpert, reports Jason Jones of The Sacramento Bee, who indicates that the teams are working off of a proposal that would have Ben McLemore and Kosta Koufos going to Cleveland and Timofey Mozgov joining Shumpert on the Kings. Shumpert was unlikely to be traded as of late Wednesday, as Jason Lloyd of the Akron Beacon Journal reported, but McLemore and Koufos are reportedly of interest to the Cavs. Cleveland has apparently explored trading Mozgov but met with rejection on that front from Sacramento.

McLemore and Koufos are also part of a deal the Kings are apparently discussing with Chicago involving Pau Gasol. Both Sacramento and Cleveland are working on multiple fronts, and its unclear how much of a priority either side is making the other. The Kings-Cavs proposal would be a money-saver for Cleveland, since Shumpert’s salary of almost $8.989MM and Mozgov’s $4.95MM pay totals about $3.1MM more than the combined salaries of Koufos ($7.7MM) and McLemore (close to $3.157MM).

The Cavs would save many times that amount in projected luxury tax penalties. However, it would be a wash in terms of long-term salary commitments, since Mozgov is the only one on an expiring deal. Shumpert is fresh off signing a four-year, $40MM deal in the offseason, at about the same time Koufos landed a four-year, $32.879MM contract with Sacramento. McLemore is in year three of a four-year rookie scale contract and the Kings are reportedly “desperate” to find him a new home as they work with his camp to find a trade partner.

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