Cavaliers nab redundant piece in Channing Frye
Stay on top of all the deals that went down on deadline day with theScore's NBA trade tracker.
As any contender should, the Cleveland Cavaliers made an upgrade at the trade deadline.
They grabbed Channing Frye for Anderson Varejao and a future first-round pick. That wasn't the answer, however. Far from it.
To be clear, Frye's a solid big man who represents an improvement in Cleveland's frontcourt. Varejao went from underrated defender to albatross contract in a matter of months, and although he's no great shakes, Frye can actually play.
In 17.1 minutes per game, Frye averaged 5.2 points and 3.2 rebounds while shooting 39.7 percent from deep. That's not nothing. He's a capable stretch forward who can play both frontcourt positions. His contract runs through 2016-17, which gives the Cavaliers some cost certainty in the event Timofey Mozgov walks in the offseason.
The problem isn't Frye himself - it's how he fits into Cleveland's plans.
As of right now, the Cavaliers have an elite stretch-four in Kevin Love. His name got bandied about in trade talks, but nothing materialized. That leaves the Cavaliers with a redundancy, as a Frye-Love frontcourt leaves far too much to be desired on defense.
Finding minutes for Frye will be difficult, as the Cavaliers already have too many power forwards. Tristan Thompson's featured in the Cavaliers' top-six lineups this season, and there's still Mozgov's place to consider. There are also instances when LeBron James slots in at the four.
Frye's predecessor, Varejao only played 10 minutes per game. While that's due in part to the 11-year veteran's shortcomings, it also underlines the logjam in the Cavaliers' frontcourt.
There simply won't be many minutes for Frye.
There's also an opportunity cost of trading for him. The Cavaliers have traded just about every draft pick they have to build this team, and their 2018 first-rounder was pretty much their last asset.
They should've used it to address their biggest area of need: the wing. The Cavaliers still only have two two-way players on the wing (James and the struggling Iman Shumpert), and that won't nearly be enough in a Finals rematch with the Golden State Warriors.
Granted, luck could smile upon Cleveland and a squad other than the Warriors could make it out of the Western Conference. Matching bizarre small-ball schemes is much less of a worry against the San Antonio Spurs, or even the Oklahoma City Thunder. The fact remains, however, the Cavaliers are much weaker on the wing than they ever were up front.
Wings were hard to come by on the free-agency market, but that's what they needed - not another power forward stuck behind the $65-million combination of Love, Thompson, and James.