Should the Cleveland Cavaliers keep Donovan Mitchell or trade him this offseason?

The Cleveland Cavaliers are possibly the most interesting team of the NBA offseason. Their main question revolves around whether Donovan Mitchell can lead Cleveland to a title. We’ll take a look at both sides of the argument; can he be winning cornerstone, or is it best to cut bait now? All statistics are sourced from Basketball Reference.

Donovan Mitchell has yet to miss the playoffs in his seven-year NBA career. That’s an impressive feat, considering that he came right into the league as a player who could bring his team into postseason contention. Statmuse has pointed out that in each of those cases, Mitchell’s teams with the Utah Jazz or Cavaliers have always been at top six seed in the playoffs.

Mitchell has been an NBA All-Star five times in his career, and was named to the All-NBA team during the 2022-2023 campaign. For his career, he’s averaging just a shade under 25 points per game, and shoots over 84 percent from the line.

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There’s not much doubt about what Mitchell can provide as a scorer. He scored a career-high 71 points in a January 2023 contest against the Chicago Bulls. The Washington Post noted at the time that he was only the seventh player in league history to score at least 70 points in a game.

Mitchell’s ability to put the ball in the basket doesn’t tail off in a major way in the postseason, either. The NBA’s website noted that during the 2024 playoffs, Mitchell was climbing the historical ranks of postseason scorers, both amongst his current peers and including legends of the game.

All of this sounds good on paper, but the Cavaliers have a decision to make, and they might need to make it soon. According to SpoTrac, Mitchell’s contract is guaranteed for the 2024-2025 season, but things get murky beyond that. The star guard has a $37 million player option for 2025-2026, and is an unrestricted free agent in 2026-2027.

Cleveland could ultimately do nothing this summer, and enter the 2024-2025 campaign with Mitchell on the team. However, it would be the final season he’s guaranteed to be on the roster, as there’s a chance he might decline his player option in order to seek more money in 2025-2026. Sports Illustrated believes it’s a near-certainty Mitchell would decline that option.

This means that the Cavaliers risk losing a player of Mitchell’s caliber for nothing at the end of next season. It could be a calculated gamble the franchise is willing take, however.

Despite Cleveland exiting the 2024 playoffs with a whimper against the Boston Celtics in round two, they have made progress in the last two years with Mitchell leading the way. The Cavaliers were knocked out in the first round of the 2023 playoffs by the New York Knicks, and gutted their way past the Orlando Magic to take a step forward this season.

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The New York Times put forth a scenario where the Cavs could convince Mitchell that Cleveland should be home for many years to come. The Cavaliers do have a solid young core to build around with Evan Mobley and Darius Garland, which should keep them relevant for years to come. Mitchell might have a tough time finding a more talented young duo if he left.

However, if Mitchell were to decline his player option and leave the team, it would be a disastrous situation for Cleveland if they weren’t able to get anything back for him. In the past, NBA teams have erred on the side of trading a player one year too early versus one year too late. Bill Simmons of The Ringer has called this phenomenon “pre-agency.”

If Cleveland was to trade Mitchell, it seems like they would have a lot of interest around the NBA. Bleacher Report thinks that the Philadelphia 76ers might be interested, while Sports Illustrated thinks the Los Angeles Lakers, Brooklyn Nets and Miami Heat would also sniff around.

Even though a Mitchell trade might be the right thing to do from a responsibility perspective, there seems like a good chance that Cleveland would be a worse team next season without his services. It remains to be seen whether the Cavaliers would actually sacrifice the 2024-2025 campaign in hopes that their team would be more sustainably competitive down the line.

While the interest in Mitchell is expected to be high if Cleveland wants to move him, they might also be stuck in a bad position if they waited to make a move. His trade value might be at its highest this summer, and might decrease in a few months if other organizations realize that Cleveland is backed into a corner.

CBS Sports wrote about Cleveland’s ability to offer Mitchell a four-year contract extension worth about $208 million. That’s still an awful lot of money for anyone to turn down, so it’ll be interesting to see if Mitchell believes that he will get a contract like that elsewhere. For what it's worth, The Athletic believes that Mitchell is likely to sign the extension to guarantee his payday.

Should the Cavaliers hang on to Mitchell in hopes of making a run in the East? Or is it time to part ways for a valuable trade package? Let us know what you think by leaving a comment!

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