NBA Rumors: Cleveland Cavaliers will need to overpay to keep Luol Deng
By Josh Hill
The Cleveland Cavaliers are in a bit of turmoil at the moment and are desperately trying to claw their way out of the losing hole they’ve found themselves in. A lot of the blame can be placed on fired general manager Chris Grant, a guy Adrian Wojnarowski from Yahoo! Sports details in his latest piece.
One of the moves Grant made before he was fired, was trading away the contract of Andrew Bynum to the Chicago Bulls along with a first-round pick in exchange for Luol Deng. Adding Deng hasn’t helped a single thing in Cleveland and it now looks like they’ll have to overpay to avoid embarrassingly losing him over the summer.
"To keep Deng in free agency this summer, the Cavaliers will probably have to exceed his market value. Letting Deng walk would be too embarrassing, considering how steep a price they paid to acquire him. Deng is a relentlessly positive person, but he hates losing and will be a premium free-agent target for several contending franchises."
Deng will likely sign with the Dallas Mavericks or some other contender in the offseason, meaning that unless the Cavs overpay to keep him, yet another one of Chris Grant’s terrible deals will have a long term effect on the team.