Following a less-than-stellar 2017 NBA Draft, the Denver Nuggets look towards free agency and it looks like they are being aggressive in their efforts.
The Nuggets are now being connected to a player they failed to acquire at the trade deadline, only he wouldn’t be donning the baby blue and gold in this deal.
Marc Stein of ESPN.com cited league sources who said the Indiana Pacers, Cleveland Cavaliers and Denver Nuggets have discussed a three-way deal that would send Paul George to the Cavaliers and Kevin Love to Denver.
League sources: Cavs, Pacers and Nuggets have discussed a three-way deal that would land Paul George in Cleveland and Kevin Love in Denver
— Marc Stein (@TheSteinLine) June 25, 2017
As Denver did during the 2016-17 season, Cleveland has long pursued a trade to land George, despite the All-Star being adamant about wanting to play in Los Angeles. George has said he has no intent in playing beyond his current contract, which expires in June of 2018.
With Cavs potentially acquiring George, they’d be trading away their All-Star power forward Kevin Love. Love is coming off of a year that he averaged 19 points and 11.1 rebounds per game. Stein says that Denver was involved in “serious talks” for Love on draft night.
Stein also says that Wilson Chandler and Emmanuel Mudiay are known to be available, as well as Kenneth Faried.
In the proposed trade, it is unknown who else could be included in the deal but ESPN.com’s Chris Haynes said one version of the deal could also send Kenneth Faried to the Cavs.
Faried is coming off of an up-and-down year where he was in and out of the starting lineup, he played in only 61 games and averaged 9.6 points and 7.6 rebounds a game. In Faried, Cleveland would be adding an aggressive rebounder to play alongside Tristan Thompson.
On draft night, Nuggets new General Manager said his pitch to possible free agents would be to tell them that they’d be a good addition to a young roster, a talented one. Kevin Love next to Nikola Jokic would be a great start.
