The Cavaliers selected a point guard and pitch man.
Moments after the team selected Collin Sexton with the No. 8 pick in the NBA draft Thursday night
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”Man, LeBron, let’s do it,” Sexton said during ESPN’s telecast from the draft in Brooklyn. ”Let’s do it. I’ve seen you needed a few extra pieces this past season, and let’s do it. Let’s go back to the Finals.”
The Cavs believe Sexton – and perhaps a few more tweaks to their roster – will help convince James there is no reason for him to leave home for the second time in his career.
”I hope,” said general manager Koby Altman, adding the club has no plans to trade Sexton. ”I think the pick along with our youth and our momentum as a franchise, for LeBron and for everybody, I think there’s a real energy here. And I think the talent level of Collin I’m almost sure LeBron recognizes.”
Sexton averaged 19.2 points and 3.6 assists as a freshman for the Crimson Tide, and the 19-year-old also led the school to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2012. He’s confident, a proven scorer and he addresses a major need for the Cavs, who traded All-Star point guard Kyrie Irving to Boston last year and spent all season trying to replace him.
Cleveland coach Tyronn Lue started eight different point guards during the regular season.
Despite their issues at guard, James led the Cavs to their fourth straight Finals
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Cleveland used the pick to draft Sexton – previously owned by Brooklyn – that it received from the Celtics in the Irving trade.
The Cavs’ front office led by Altman entered the draft in the dark on James’ plans. The three-time champion must notify the team by June 29 on whether he intends to opt out of his $35.6 million contract for next season – a move he is expected to make.
Altman said he has had ”really good dialogue” with James’ management team.
”LeBron has more than earned the right to approach his contracts the way he does,” Altman said. ”He’s done that before, so this is nothing new for us. We want to respect his space during this process. We don’t take him for granted. We love him, this city loves him. He means the world to us and this franchise.”
Sexton has been on Cleveland’s radar for some time. The Cavs scouted him throughout the season, and the day after they lost Game 4 in the Finals, Sexton worked out at the team’s facility and owner Dan Gilbert referred to him as a ”very intriguing draft prospect” on Twitter.
”Loved the substance and character that he was about, and then he came here and had an unbelievable workout,” Altman said. ”And what was really encouraging about the workout is he actually shot it a lot better. It looked more pure, looked more natural, and his work ethic I know is going to be even better. I don’t want to put too much into the workout, but it helped. And then you feel people, like
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While Sexton certainly improves the Cavs’ backcourt and adds a young player capable of breaking down defenders, there is no guarantee it will do anything to impact what James will do.
In the meantime, Sexton has his fingers crossed that he and James will soon be teammates.
”He’s one of the best players to ever play basketball,” Sexton said. ”Just being able to come in and learn from him, it’ll be big for me and big for my growth.”
James will factor family and his quest to win more championships into his decision. The 33-year-old has been unusually quiet on social media since the Finals ended, and he has given no hints about his future.
If James doesn’t stay in Cleveland, there’s a strong chance he’ll look to join the Los Angeles Lakers, who have salary-cap room to sign two maximum contract players. James already owns two homes and a film production company in Southern California.
Based on his wardrobe for the draft, Sexton may have had an inkling Cleveland was going to take him. He wore a crimson-and-black tuxedo jacket that perfectly complemented the wine-colored Cavs cap he was given before taking the stage to shake hands with Commissioner Adam Silver.
Sexton burst on the national scene last season with several strong performances, including a 40-point game against Minnesota when Alabama had to play 10 minutes with just three players because of disqualifications.
He went on to be named the SEC’s top newcomer and a first-team all-conference selection.
”It just shows all my hard work paid off,” Sexton said. ”I just grinded, started from the bottom and came back up to the top. That was the biggest thing, just show people what I can do.”
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The countdown to the Patrick Mahomes II era in Kansas City began the moment the Chiefs traded up to select the strong-armed quarterback in the first round of last year’s draft.
Officially
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Practically, it has already reached zero.
The Chiefs agreed to trade veteran quarterback Alex Smith to the Washington Redskins late Monday, a deal that will become official with the start of the new league year on March 14. In doing so, the Chiefs made a bold statement that they’re ready for Mahomes, a prolific passer during his college days at Texas Tech, to assume the starting job for the foreseeable future.
Mahomes dazzled coach Andy Reid and his staff during training camp, making the kinds of downfield throws that Smith could never accomplish. And when he made his regular-season debut in Week 17, when the Chiefs were already assured of the AFC West title and the No. 4 seed in the playoffs, he not only played well but returned in the fourth quarter to lead the winning drive against the Broncos.
It was the kind of performance – and the kind of moxie – that made Reid draw comparisons to another of his prot锟絞锟絪 from his days with the Packers: Brett Favre.
Those are big shoes to fill. Then again, so are the ones Smith is leaving behind.
For all the angst he caused fans by going 1-4 in the playoffs, Smith succeeded in stabilizing a franchise that had been turning over quarterbacks for years. He went 50-26 as a starter and made a couple of Pro Bowl appearances, setting a slew of franchise records in the process.
”Alex, you are the definition of a true leader and your professionalism helped me grow as a player
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”Can’t say enough about the type of friend and teammate Alex Smith has been since getting to Kansas City,” Chiefs fullback Anthony Sherman said, adding ”the Sherman family will miss the Smith family.”
Yet the Chiefs knew they were going to move on from Smith in part because of the hefty price tag that came with the final year of his contract. And his strong performance last season made Smith a hot commodity with at least five teams along with the Redskins.
That bidding war, even this early in the offseason, drove up the Chiefs’ asking price.
They wound up solving more than one problem in the trade with Washington: The Chiefs, drained of draft picks by previous trades, got a third-round choice in April; they acquired Kendall Fuller, one of the league’s top slot cornerbacks and a potential starter on the outside opposite Marcus Peters; and they freed up nearly $16 million in salary cap space to make additional moves in free agency.
Kansas City now has a pick in the second round and two in the third, along with selections in the later rounds, which could be used to address other pressing issues on defense.
Fuller certainly addressed one of them. He was a first-round talent who dropped to the third round coming out of Virginia Tech because of injury concerns, yet has played to a first-round grade – and stayed healthy – during his first two seasons with in the league. Scot McCloughan, the former Redskins general manager who drafted him in 2016, said on Twitter shortly after news of the trade broke: ”I would never have traded Kendall. He can play inside and outside
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He’s also a bargain. Fuller will count $647,500 against the salary cap in 2018 and $750,000 the next season, giving the Chiefs a starting-caliber cornerback at a discount rate.
The Chiefs are expected to free up additional cap space by restructuring or moving on from some of their veterans, such as linebackers Tamba Hali and Derrick Johnson. That in turn gives them some financial flexibility to sign some of their young stars to long-term deals – Peters and wide receiver Tyreek Hill, for example – or pursue help for their shortcomings in free agency.
They could still use help in the defensive backfield, linebacker and pass rush remains an issue, the offensive line needs additional depth and the wide receiver corps could use another target.
Now that the Chiefs have found a trade partner for Smith, the work in those areas begins.
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