In two years, the Cavaliers’ Anderson Varejao could be a trading chip similar to Brendan Haywood, according to Terry Pluto of The Plain Dealer. The frequently injured Varejao received a contract extension last summer partially for that purpose, Pluto reports. His salaries of $9.6MM for next season and $9.3MM for 2016/17 are fully guaranteed, but the $10MM he is scheduled to receive in 2017/18 is not guaranteed, making him an attractive pickup for a team looking to shed salary. Haywood, who had a non-guaranteed salary of $10,522,500 next season was dealt to the Blazers along with Mike Miller for trade exceptions worth $10.5MM and $2.85MM and was subsequently waived by Portland.
There’s more news out of Cleveland:
- With the trade exceptions in hand, Greg Swartz of Bleacher Report identifies five players who could be useful pickups between now and February’s trading deadline. They are the Pistons’ Danny Granger, the Nets’ newly signed Andrea Bargnani, the Wolves’ Kevin Martin, the Magic’s Channing Frye and the Lakers’ Nick Young.
- The one-year deal between the Cavs and Matthew Dellavedova is equivalent in value to his qualifying offer, but it also includes a 15% trade kicker that he’d receive if he waived his de facto no-trade clause, as Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders shows (Twitter link).
- James Jones is indeed making the minimum on his one-year deal with the Cavs, according to Pincus.