While the Cleveland Cavaliers have not done a lot this offseason to build a championship caliber team around LeBron James, they have picked things up slightly over the last month. The Cavs traded away Kyrie Irving for Isaiah Thomas and now LeBron is talking about trying to get Dwyane Wade to join him in Cleveland. The latest move is not quite as significant but the Cavaliers added former Middle Tennessee State forward JaCorey Williams.
JaCorey Williams
JaCorey Williams played college basketball at Middle Tennessee State last season and won the Conference USA Player of the Year award with 17.3 points and 7.3 rebounds-per-game for the season.
He averaged a .533 shooting percentage from the field. Despite his great play and collegiate honors, no teams called his name in the 2017 NBA Draft.
Williams is a 6-8 forward who also played three seasons for the Arkansas Razorbacks before transferring to Middle Tennessee State in his final college season. He only averaged just under 12 minutes a game in Arkansas so it was a smart move to transfer to a smaller college to show what he could do as a starter.
Williams picked up notice from the defending NBA champion Golden State Warriors and signed a deal with them after the NBA Draft to play on their team in the Summer League. He played in four games for the Warriors and averaged 2.5 points and 2.5 rebounds in eight minutes per game.
Instead of signing with the Golden State Warriors, JaCorey Williams has decided to sign with their Eastern Conference rival Cleveland Cavaliers. According to reports, the Cavs want to develop Williams in their G-League affiliate, the Canton Charge.
What about Dwyane Wade?
The addition of JaCorey Williams fills up the Cleveland Cavaliers 20-man roster.
This means there is no more room to sign any other players without releasing someone. However, that was going to have to happen anyway if the Cavs wanted to sign Dwyane Wade.
While JaCorey Williams is part of the 20-man roster, he is not part of the 15 players that have guaranteed contracts. In order for the Cleveland Cavaliers to sign Dwyane Wade, they will have to waive or move one of the players with fully guaranteed contracts if they want to add him to the team.
Dwyane Wade will become an NBA free agent when he clears waivers on Wednesday. At that time, the Cleveland Cavaliers will join teams like the Miami Heat, San Antonio Spurs and Oklahoma CIty Thunder is going after Wade.
