Veteran Cavs guard Mo Williams is strongly considering hanging up his sneakers and retiring from the game, Joe Vardon of The Northeast Ohio Media Group reports. Williams’ balky knee, his desire to coach and the opportunity to go out as an NBA champion are weighing heavily upon him, Vardon adds.
There is also the chance, should Williams hold off on making a definitive decision regarding his future, that the Cavs could seek to trade him in a salary dump or waive him via the stretch provision, Vardon notes. The deadline to utilize the stretch provision is this Wednesday (August 31st), should the Cavs decide to go that route. Cleveland’s projected payroll for 2016/17 currently stands at $116,494,181, which is already over the luxury tax line which has been set at $113.2MM by the league. Williams is due to earn $2,194,500 this season, the final one on his current deal.
For Cleveland, purging itself of Williams’ salary would help alleviate some of its luxury tax burden this season, but it would also leave the team with rookie Kay Felder as the only true point guard on the roster behind starter Kyrie Irving. The Cavs still may re-sign unrestricted free agent shooting guard J.R. Smith, which would thrust the team deeper into tax territory. Not to mention the Cavs will still likely need to add additional backcourt depth should Williams be released or traded, which would increase their payroll and tax hit even further.
The 33-year-old appeared in 41 regular season games for the Cavs a season ago, averaging 8.2 points, 1.8 rebounds and 2.4 assists in 18.2 minutes per outing. His shooting line on the campaign was .437/.353/.905. Williams’ career numbers, should he decide to call it quits, are 13.2 PPG, 2.8 RPG and 4.9 APG. His career slash line is .434/.378/.871.
I think he if really does want to go out then he should. But if he really cares about the front office and ownership he should let those guys know so they can beef up their roster in time for start of the season. They’d no doubt find another PG should Mo retire but you want a guy that’s prepared for when Kyrie misses a game and should Felder be a disappointment his first year. They have more riding on him than it appears.
Not to disagree but rather throw this out instead. Say Mo has already been contacted by Griff to let him know he may be traded to get a “more youthful” backup PG. Mo really has enjoyed Cleveland and playing there and instead would rather retire.
Also, having Mo in the roster is the Cabs decision not Mo’s.
I can’t imagine that would be the case. It would be pretty easy to trade Mo given his contract but it would free them up from very much luxury tax and they would still want to go after someone for the same price as Mo or another unproven talent for about a million less, which isn’t much in tax terms. Your hypothetical would leave them with only two PG’s, one injury prone and another unproven in this league. Not to mention LBJ wanted him on the team and he was proven very useful until Kyrie came back later last season. I think this is literally about a guy that’s played with a dozen organizations in over a decade that’s finally won a ring and saved his money and may not want to go through a grueling 82 game season to having to find another team after this year is Felder is proven better talent wise.
KMarshall is available…Or Ty Lawson
Norris Cole and Mario chalmers more likely