Cleveland Cavaliers: Chance At Jamal Crawford?

By Joshua Howe | Aug 9, 2015

May 8, 2015; Los Angeles, CA, USA; Los Angeles Clippers guard Jamal Crawford (11) rallies the crowd against the Houston Rockets during the second half in game three of the second round of the NBA Playoffs. at Staples Center. Mandatory Credit: Gary A. Vasquez-USA TODAY Sports /

The Cleveland Cavaliers and Los Angeles Clippers have been in talks over Jamal Crawford, so sayeth the basketball Twitter news overlord Adrian Wojnarowski. And while we’re mentioning him, real quick, doesn’t Woj kind of remind you of Immortan Joe from Mad Max: Fury Road when he opens the flood gates to let all the ordinary people drink water?

I’ll let you sit on that one.

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Anyway, when the Cavs made the Brendan Haywood trade, they acquired a large trade exception (with the help of also trading Mike Miller’s contract) that they are most likely going to use before next season’s deadline. It seems that they might want to use it even sooner than that.

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Supposedly, Crawford likes the idea of joining the Cavs. He openly said that he wished he was a free agent so that he had the opportunity to pick and choose. Cleveland sure wishes he was a free agent too.

What would he bring to the Cavs? Scoring. Experience. Locker room presence.

Crawford is constantly in the running for Sixth Man of the Year and he’s won the award twice (2009-10 and 2013-14). You can see why, since he’s a scoring machine. He’s got one of the league’s best handles (especially crossovers), he can pull up from anywhere on the floor and he can drive when necessary.

He’s starting to slow down a little at age 35, but he’s been remarkably resilient for an older player. Last season he put up 15.8 points per game on 39.6 percent shooting from the field and 32.7 percent shooting from deep. He also made 90.1 percent from the free throw line.

Crawford is too old to be taking heavy minutes, and last season in Los Angeles didn’t bode well for his body. They were so thin that he was basically the lone bench player, trying to save that unit every night until he either ran out of gas or got hurt; and the latter did happen.

In Cleveland, the roster is much deeper. His role would be similar to a J.R. Smith one (Cleveland’s still trying to figure out Smith’s potential return). Come in, provide some bench scoring, go out. He would get many more open shots, what with the attention of the opponent spread out to multiple guys like LeBron James, Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving.

As is with many LeBron-led teams, if you can spot up, then you’re going to get good looks. Heck, Matthew Dellavedova even got those looks in The Finals! … Sorry, I’ll probably never get over that.

On the Clippers’ side of things, they’re likely looking to save some money. By moving Crawford, they’d save $16 million in salary and $10 million in projected luxury tax payments.

Besides, with the changes to their bench, they might not want Crawford there anyway. Lance Stephenson could expectedly take over his role, and he’s a much younger, far better defender who can take those minutes and do something good with them for the Clips.

It might seem like the Clippers are trying to give away Crawford for nothing, but that’s simply not true. Crawford has also been there for a few years now, and it might just be that their relationship is starting to come to a close.

For an NBA journeyman like Crawford, who’s played on six different squads, that shouldn’t be surprising. He won’t be able to wear No. 11 in Cleveland (it’s retired), but it would be welcome to see JC suit up for the Cavs.

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