Brendan Haywood to be Cleveland Cavaliers ‘rim protector’
By Bryan Rose
The Cleveland Cavaliers have been in search of a center for quite some time and were said to have trade interest in a veteran player, but nothing ever manifested.
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It’s not known who exactly that player was though the Cleveland Cavaliers did recently sign former New Mexico star Alex Kirk which may be an indication no further immediate moves are coming. However, Kirk doesn’t figured to be involved in the rotation much, unlike Brendan Haywood who Cavs head coach David Blatt expects to clog the middle on the defensive end.
"Logan Pysher (@turntupGEE): How do you plan on fixing rim protection problems? / MD(@mddela): Lots of good forwards, but no one true center. Who will Cleveland play at the five?Blatt: “Right now, we’re hoping Brendan Haywood is going to make progress coming back from his foot injury, and if he does that’ll be a big plus for our team. As far as other roster decisions, our team is in the best of hands with David Griffin.”"
For Cleveland this is more of a move out of necessity than want as they’d likely prefer to have somebody a little more talented as their rim protector. That said, assuming Brendan Haywood is healthy, it is a role he can fulfill though it’s doubtful the Cleveland Cavaliers will allow such to go on for an extended period of time as they’ll continue to monitor the trade market.
In a temporary stance though, a healthy Brendan Haywood can handle the role and when paired with Alex Kirk, will at least create a big body in the lane at minimum.