The Cleveland Cavaliers have been incredibly aggressive in their pursuit of the NBA championship trophy. With the Golden State Warriors putting the LeBron James team to shame twice this NBA season, it looks like an upgrade is necessary for the Kyrie Irving squad. Moreover, the Boston Celtics, Atlanta Hawks and Toronto Raptors present tangible threats to the Cleveland Cavaliers' dominance in the Eastern Conference.
Since the start of the NBA season, the Big Three of the Cleveland Cavaliers have been the target of rumors. However, NBA trade rumors are primarily centered around Kevin Love. To date, the future of James and Kyrie Irving with the basketball team looks secure. It is the former Minnesota Timberwolves star who appears to be unable to get away from the speculations regarding his exit from the team.
While the Cleveland Cavaliers are adamant in their denial of the NBA trade rumors regarding Love, reports surface that the JR Smith squad is not completely discounting potential deals. According to Marc Stein of ESPN, the Cleveland Cavaliers will not trade Love for a draft pick or a blockbuster deal. Rather, the NBA team will only seriously entertain calls that also offer another "star" of Love's caliber.
"[L]eague sources say that the Cavs have made it clear to interested teams - starting, of course, with the Love-hungry Boston Celtics -- that they'd covet a star in return if or when they do reach the point of letting Love go and not a package of draft picks and role players like the Celtics are offering," disclosed Stein.
Sports analysts believe that this condition is reasonable. That is, it would not be wise for the Cleveland Cavaliers to acquire a bunch of basketball stars below Love's level. If King James and his team intend to match the Stephen Curry's raging Golden State Warriors or Kawhi Leonard's San Antonio Spurs.
Meanwhile, another set of rumors is making the rounds. The Cleveland Cavaliers are reportedly shopping two of its bench stars, Timofey Mozgov and Iman Shumpert. With the strong starting lineup of the Cleveland Cavaliers, they were initially thought as the more likely winners over the Golden State Warriors. However, injuries hampered their run and eventually cost them the golden opportunity to beat the Klay Thompson squad. With this in mind, the Cleveland Cavaliers are said to be searching for stronger and more efficient stars off the bench in exchange for Mozgov and Shumpert.
"Sources say that the Cavs, though, have been more and more active in recent days in pursuing upgrades to their bench, with center Timofey Mozgov and swingman Iman Shumpert - both in the midst of down seasons after their midseason arrivals in 2014-15 - said to be available," shared Stein. He added, "Players who interest Cleveland, sources say, include dream target Kyle Korver (who would naturally be very difficult to pry from Atlanta) and Kings reserves Ben McLemore and Kosta Koufos."
At the moment, no official confirmation has been given by the Cleveland Cavaliers with regard the future of the stars involved in the NBA trade rumors. Hence, James advised his teammates to focus on the succeeding games and tune out of the speculations.
He said via Cleveland.com, "What I do is, when I come into the practice facility every day, there's sports anything on, I turn it off, because I don't need that venom in my guys' minds, or whatever's being talked about, if it's good or bad." King James added, "We need to have our blinders on from everything to the outside. There's so much talk for us about what we should be, we should do this, we shouldn't do that."
