Kyrie Irving has left the Cavaliers via trade, and the team must decide how they will proceed. They must decide if they will pay Isaiah Thomas the money he will be owed in a max contract, and they must determine if Thomas can take final shots in games. It is well-documented that Kyrie took the most important shot in the history of the Cleveland Cavaliers, and he is now a Boston Celtic. It is more likely that he will drive the dagger in the Cavaliers in 2018, and the Cavaliers may have to rebuild completely.
Isaiah is not the same player
Irving and Thomas are not the same player, and the Cavaliers did not get an even Trade in return.
They received a massive number of prospects and pieces, but they did not get Irving in return. They must determine how they will use Thomas as it relates to clutch shots. Will LeBron stand back while Thomas scores 30 points a game? Will Thomas be given the ball to take the final shot? Will he be the clutch player on this team? I believe they only have one season to make this right before the team is blown up, and I would hate to see Thomas' contract year wasted on ondecision and poor coaching.
Who else leaves?
I do not honestly believe that Kevin Love will stay in Cleveland, and I have no reason to believe that he will want to stay is LeBron leaves. That makes the upcoming season interesting because the Cavaliers could go into selling mode at any time.
They could trade Love out of the blue just because they know that they cannot keep him, or they will trade him because they are secretly rebuilding. They must determine what they will do for years to come while they are hoping that LeBron can drag them to another title.
Sadly they have no chance
I do not believe for one second that the Cavaliers could beat the Warriors, and I do not even believe they will beat the Celtics to et out of the weastern conference.
This harsh reality will push the Cavaliers into a tailspin that could see the team start to fall apart before the season ends. I could see rumors of max deals for Thomas coming from half the teams in the league, and I could see a situation in which the team starts to in-fight because they know LeBron is leaving. Many of them came there to play with him, but it is pointless if they are not going to win a championship.
This trade sank them too early
Irving asking for a trade has ended the Cavaliers season before it started. Grandiose notions of winning one more title before LeBron goes to LA have gone out the window with this one transaction.
