Good News For Your Weekend: Smith Likely To Re-Join Cavaliers

Very Quickly: In Brian Windhorst’s (excellent) beat blog, he made it clear that Joe Smith could be close to obtaining a buyout with the Thunder and re-joining the Cavaliers. Windhorst’s quote:

“ATLANTA — Joe Smith could be just days away from providing the Cavaliers with a needed talent injection.Multiple league sources said on Saturday that Smith and the Oklahoma City Thunder are making progress in buyout talks and there is a favorable chance the sides will come to an agreement by Sunday’s midnight waiver deadline. It has also become clear that the Cavs would be Smith’s top choice if all the terms can be agreed on.

If all the hurdles can be cleared, Smith would be put on waivers on Monday and become an outright free agent by Wednesday morning.”

About an hour ago, a source with the Cavaliers who posts on RealCavsFans.com and has given only accurate information in the past posted the following:

“From what I just gathered from a phone call I just had with a person who should be pretty up to date on where things stand right now ….it looks like all system’s are pretty much go for Joe Smith to be ready to join the Cavs around Wednesday of this coming week.

Pretty much all hurdles have been crossed and financial aspacts agreed upon. Not sure when the announcement should be coming down the chute, but, what I was told is that it looked like all the figures jived, and we’re set to acquire Joe Smith.

THAT WHAT I GOT … Looks like Joe’s our guy, folks.”

I feel less reporter-y and cool to give this story from a source that is freely available to be seen on his own website rather than make a number of mysterious phone calls to employees like I was one of the good guys on the last season of The Wire, but it’s a huge piece of info and that’s how I’ve managed to find it. Some very fast analysis because I haven’t eaten anything yet today:

-This is absolutely fantastic from a Cavalier standpoint. Joe would immediately step in as the Cavs’ most versatile big, stretching the floor on offense, being athletic enough to dive, catch, and finish inside, and quick enough with his feet and smart enough with his positioning to flash out on offense. I’ve said this before, but he brings a ton of stuff to the table without taking anything off, which is so rare in a big man. 

-Chemistry: definitely not an issue, as by all accounts Joe is a great guy and has already made a run with this team before. 

-Does this give Ferry more leverage in the upcoming Anderson Varejao negociations this off-season? I’d say Ferry definitely thinks he does, but I worry he’ll overplay his hand and try to skin Dan Fegan’s sheep twice with this. I’ll worry about that when it happens. 

-It’s kind of a bummer this couldn’t have gotten worked out sooner to familiarize Joe with the team, but it’s clear that Presti thought he was going to be able to get something back for Joe at the deadline, but like everyone else with assets got nailed by the economy collapses’ effect on trading. Actually, if Joe was here the whole time JJ wouldn’t have made any progress. So scratch that. 

-A quick warning to say that Joe isn’t playing as well with OKC this year as he did for us last year, while he played strong basketball in Chicago before coming here the first time. Hopefully this will be the Joe we remember. 

-Windhorst did allude to a-this is a quote-“Suprise” name who could be becoming available after a buyout. I personally am going to just wait and see what happens in the next week, but if you want to speculate be my guest. I’m the type who enjoys Lost on a week-by-week basis instead of posting on quantum physics message boards to figure things out. Is there a better actor on TV than Michael Emerson as Benjamin Linus? These are the things I can talk about forever. I’m digressing.

–My more mysterious and journalist-y sources say that had the Suns known Amare was injured, they would’ve pulled the trigger on the Shaq deal. Mull on that if you care to. What are the odds it would’ve taken us this long to get a true Shaq-Kobe fireworks display? 

-I’m not sure if I feel 100% pure knowing how badly we’ve ransacked the now-Thunder and Bucks to get our current rotation- this deal means we turned Damon Jones into Mo Williams. Danny Ferry, I will never say anything bad about you. I do this as much out of fear as reverence.