In exchange for Kyrie Irving, Cleveland acquired Isaiah Thomas, Jae Crowder, Ante Zizic and two draft picks, making them a deeper team according to former Cavs GM David Griffin.
The Cavs are clueless about Thomas’ availability heading into the 2017-18 campaign, but Griffin thinks the franchise did extremely well in the trade and is now a better squad than when he was running its front-office.
Griffin says Cleveland will improve defensively next season.
Per ESPN‘s “The Jump”:
“I think [GM Koby Altman] did exactly what he needed to do to protect his player,” Griffin said Thursday. “He did what he needed to do to be strong for the organization, but in aggregate everything that he and Ty Lue is saying made it very obvious that this is something that could be a longterm thing.”
“I think they’ve done a really good job of getting more defensive versatility with the Crowder piece. Jeff Green is a nice acquisition at minimum that’s going to be a versatile piece for them as well,” Griffin added. “I think Derrick Rose gave them the ability to withstand something like this in a Kyrie trade. They made it so they can do a lot of different things. So they are deeper, they are more versatile.”
