The Love-Wiggins Deal Thread

[Camden [enjin:6601484]]

How's this for a blockbuster:

WOLVES get Wiggins (after Cavs sign him), Bennett, Thompson and Waiters along with the 3 nonguaranteed contracts the Cavs just traded for. -- About $23.7 million.

CAVS get Love, Martin and Brewer -- About $27.2 million.

Salaries match. Cleveland clearly becomes a win-now team. MN gets lots of young pieces to build around and nets about $7 million in cap savings this year. Wolves use the additional $7 million to buy out Shved and Moute to clear the two roster spots needed to incorporate the players from Cleveland and sign GRIII.

Sounds ideal to me. I'd send Bennett and Barea to Philly for Thad Young and call it done. Rubio-Waiters-Wiggins-Young-Pekovic with LaVine, Budinger, Robinson, Thompson, Dieng off the bench. I'd watch that team.

[Lipoli390]

lip, I'd do that of course...but I get the feeling that the Cavs will be keeping Thompson and the Wolves are likely to get Bennett as a stretch 4 if it's a 2 team trade. Just a hunch.

Hockey -- I'm getting the same vibe based on all the reports. Not a single report ever mentioning Thompson as part of any deal with the Wolves. LeBron mentioning Thompson in his letter. So my gut tells me you're right. But my head still tells me that it makes too much sense for both teams not to include TT in the deal. Thompson's agent (who is also LeBron's agent) has to be pushing hard to move TT to the Wolves where he can start in the last year of his contract rather than playing 15 minutes a game as Love's back up. The Wolves could also include Turiaf and the deal would still work from a salary perspective.

[mrhockey89]

lip, I'd do that of course...but I get the feeling that the Cavs will be keeping Thompson and the Wolves are likely to get Bennett as a stretch 4 if it's a 2 team trade. Just a hunch.

Hockey -- I'm getting the same vibe based on all the reports. Not a single report ever mentioning Thompson as part of any deal with the Wolves. LeBron mentioning Thompson in his letter. So my gut tells me you're right. But my head still tells me that it makes too much sense for both teams not to include TT in the deal. Thompson's agent (who is also LeBron's agent) has to be pushing hard to move TT to the Wolves where he can start in the last year of his contract rather than playing 15 minutes a game as Love's back up. The Wolves could also include Turiaf and the deal would still work from a salary perspective.

I don't know lip...if you're Thompson they could do a big man rotation with Love taking some time at center as well when they go small. I mean I get what you're saying with Thompson on the verge of a big deal, but the chance to play with LeBron and on a championship caliber team and getting a lot of publicity in the playoffs, he probably gets paid by someone anyway, and ends up healthier and with a ring. If I were Thompson, I wouldn't be pushing for a trade from that situation.

All this guessing though, we'll all find out soon enough.

Side note.... With the Bulls getting back in the mix.. Wonder if there's a chance they're just playing a lame duck trade partner in order to drive up the price for their Eastern Conference rival (to weaken the Cavs a bit) and that they actually want to see how all their pieces can play together as they currently are.

[Lipoli390]

Hockey -- Responding to your side note, I just don't see the Bulls as a serious contender for Love. The Bulls may be playing the tactical game you suggest or may just be taking a shot at getting Love in the event the Cleveland deal collapses for some unexpected reason. If the deal is just Taj, Butler and a future pick, Flip won't do it. Throw in either Mirotic or McDermott and I'm interested. Include both Mirotic and McDermott along with Taj and Butler and I'm very interested. But I don't see the Bulls going that far.

I think we both join a majority in thinking it's going to be Cleveland. Just a matter of who's included besides Love and Wiggins.

[mrhockey89]

lip, I agree that the Bulls aren't going to end up with Love unless Flip's absolutely committed to going the veteran route and absolutely loves McDermott and/or Mirotic. As long as the Cavs are willing to put Wiggins in the deal and top it off with the small side pieces that will appease Flip, it's their guy to lose.

[Monster]

lip, I'd do that of course...but I get the feeling that the Cavs will be keeping Thompson and the Wolves are likely to get Bennett as a stretch 4 if it's a 2 team trade. Just a hunch.

Hockey -- I'm getting the same vibe based on all the reports. Not a single report ever mentioning Thompson as part of any deal with the Wolves. LeBron mentioning Thompson in his letter. So my gut tells me you're right. But my head still tells me that it makes too much sense for both teams not to include TT in the deal. Thompson's agent (who is also LeBron's agent) has to be pushing hard to move TT to the Wolves where he can start in the last year of his contract rather than playing 15 minutes a game as Love's back up. The Wolves could also include Turiaf and the deal would still work from a salary perspective.

I don't know lip...if you're Thompson they could do a big man rotation with Love taking some time at center as well when they go small. I mean I get what you're saying with Thompson on the verge of a big deal, but the chance to play with LeBron and on a championship caliber team and getting a lot of publicity in the playoffs, he probably gets paid by someone anyway, and ends up healthier and with a ring. If I were Thompson, I wouldn't be pushing for a trade from that situation.

All this guessing though, we'll all find out soon enough.

Side note.... With the Bulls getting back in the mix.. Wonder if there's a chance they're just playing a lame duck trade partner in order to drive up the price for their Eastern Conference rival (to weaken the Cavs a bit) and that they actually want to see how all their pieces can play together as they currently are.

I agree with what Hockey is saying about TT. The Cavs can use him as a 3rd big behind Love and Varejo. Besides we know Varejo has a problem staying healthy and having TT would be handy in case he went down for adeent chunk of time. They probably would rather roll with TT than some random vet dude they are gonna sign off the FA pile which might be lacking at this point idk. If I'm TT I wouldn't mind playing with Lebron and Love for a year then decide what I wanted to do after that. He will get to play.

[TheGrey08]

If my math is correct once Wiggins signs which is rumored to happen tomorrow..

Wiggins/Thompson/Bennett/Lucas/Thomas/Murphy/Dellavedova/picks (20,383,477)
Love/Brewer (20,421,563).

Plus the Wolves can throw in another 5.2m. If Haywood is thrown in (or flip a couple of those expirings for an extra 1.5 mill) then that lets the Wolves throw in Martin too if the Wolves really want to dump him. If they don't throw in Thompson then we're left with Love/Brewer for Wiggins/Bennet/filler/picks.

[worldK]

How's this for a blockbuster:

WOLVES get Wiggins (after Cavs sign him), Bennett, Thompson and Waiters along with the 3 nonguaranteed contracts the Cavs just traded for. -- About $23.7 million.

CAVS get Love, Martin and Brewer -- About $27.2 million.

Salaries match. Cleveland clearly becomes a win-now team. MN gets lots of young pieces to build around and nets about $7 million in cap savings this year. Wolves use the additional $7 million to buy out Shved and Moute to clear the two roster spots needed to incorporate the players from Cleveland and sign GRIII.

Wolves starting five: Rubio, Waiters, Budinger, Thompson and Pekovic.
Wolves rotation bench guys: JJ, LaVine, Wiggins, Bennett, Dieng

Wolves will take this deal in a heartbeat but the cavs might not. 1 thing that the cavs are looking at is adding a rotation big. Varejao aint reliable health wise and haywood may be done as a player. If they give us both TT and bennet then they are going to be short on bigs.

Thats why I think they may look to hold onto TT. As hockey mentioned. TT and love could play together in the frontcourt. Varejao could start but TT can log 25-28min easily as the main backup big.

The only vet center that the cavs could sign is okafor but they only have the minimum. If they are all in in competing for the title they need another rotation big in there. Hence why they may prefer to keep TT and go with him and love on occasions.

More realistic trade would be wiggins(signed), bennet, waiters and the non guaranteed contracts and a 1st for love + brew/bud/jj or a combo of shved and turiaf.

[worldK]

If my math is correct once Wiggins signs which is rumored to happen tomorrow..

Wiggins/Thompson/Bennett/Lucas/Thomas/Murphy/Dellavedova/picks (20,383,477)
Love/Brewer (20,421,563).

Plus the Wolves can throw in another 5.2m. If Haywood is thrown in (or flip a couple of those expirings for an extra 1.5 mill) then that lets the Wolves throw in Martin too if the Wolves really want to dump him. If they don't throw in Thompson then we're left with Love/Brewer for Wiggins/Bennet/filler/picks.

Big ten, how can the wolves throw in another 5.2m in this scenario? Whats the rules on this as I though you can only go over 15% in terms of matching salaries. Im not that sure on the rules so maybe you can explain it for me.

[Camden [enjin:6601484]]

Personally, I don't see how we come out of this with Thompson AND Bennett. It just doesn't make sense for Cleveland to give up both; one of them should come off the bench for them and Thompson would be the guy.

I think it'll be Wiggins, Waiters and Bennett with a first rounder (along with Lucas, Thomas, Murphy) coming to Minnesota for Love and Brewer. That makes the most sense for both teams. Hopefully Flip could then turn Bennett into a starting caliber PF via trade with the ideal target being Thad Young. That team would be perfectly set up to be a run and gun type team. Could probably win 30-35 games next year.