When the Cleveland Cavaliers won the draft lottery on May 20, earning the first-overall pick for the third time in the last four years, most basketball fans groaned at the unlikeliness of the feat, while loyal fans of the Wine & Gold ran off laughing hysterically into the night. What started as a 1.7 percent chance to win the lottery had, just like that, turned into a (potentially) franchise-altering stroke of luck.
It’s no secret that Cleveland has been a hot mess since LeBron’s departure. In the four seasons since “The Decision”, they’ve gone a league-worst 97-215 and are the only team in the NBA to fail to crack 100 wins.
They’ve been so desperate to simultaneously get out of the shadow of the LeBron-era and lure LeBron back home in one of the next two off-seasons (when he can become an unrestricted free agent) that they’ve ended up bungling the whole operation:
They hired and fired the same coach, twice; they failed to quell the Kyrie Irving-Dion Waiters beef; they gambled on Andrew Bynum; and they traded away a first-round pick in this year’s draft (via the Sacramento Kings) and four future second-round picks for a pair of players—Luol Deng and Spencer Hawes—both of whom are now UFAs and will be expensive to keep in Cavs’ uniforms. There have been other missteps along the way, glaring in hindsight, but recounting them is starting to feel pretty grim.
Instead, let’s focus on how this year’s pick has the potential to help usher in a new era in Cleveland, and how one player, in particular, may redefine the next decade-plus of Cavaliers’ basketball:
Enter Joel Embiid.
His story is already well known, but let’s run through it quick anyway: The twenty-year-old was discovered at a basketball camp in Africa by current Timberwolves forward—and fellow Cameroon native—Luc Richard Mbah a Moute. Embiid only started playing basketball in 2010, but he’s come a long way, both physically and talent-wise, since then. He grew up a volleyball player and on his dunks and swats you can still see the middle hitter in him making an approach or timing up the close on a block.
He’s listed at seven-foot-one, 265 lbs., yet he moves with an incredible grace and his natural instincts resemble those of much more experienced players. Just look at how he dominated at home against Oklahoma State back on Jan. 18. In his lone year at Kansas, Embiid averaged 11.2 points, 8.1 rebounds, 2.6 blocks and 1.4 assists, and shot 63 percent from the field in 23.1 minutes per game. He was named the Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year and was one of the thirty finalists for the Naismith College Player of the Year award.
There are some health concerns surrounding him, however, which complicates the Cavaliers’ decision. He suffered a stress fracture in his back in late February that kept him out of the Big 12 tournament, as well as the NCAA tournament. However, if you watched the above video of his draft workout, which took place roughly two weeks ago in Los Angeles, you have to admit his back looks pretty good.
If you’re David Griffin, the Cavs’ GM, with your organization insisting it’s in “win-now” mode, how do you go about making that mandate a reality? Most teams that have success in the post-season do two things in particular: play defense at a top-10 level and get buckets in the half-court. The Cavs haven’t been able to do either in years, but the addition of Embiid would give them a defensive anchor to build around and a natural shot-blocker to clean up behind their occasionally weak perimeter defense. He would also give them a capable low-post scorer, who’d be devastating in the pick-and-roll with Kyrie Irving. Embiid has a reliable mid-range jumper, he’s an underrated passer and he shot nearly seventy percent from the stripe in his lone year in college. He’d be an immediate contributor on both ends from the get-go and it’s scary—like Anthony Davis scary—to think how dominant he could be in a couple of years.
According to ESPN.com, Embiid will meet with the Cavs in the coming weeks to conduct a physical. The Cameroonian’s camp has said that he won’t visit another team until the Cavs are given a chance to determine if they will select him with the top pick, however, Cleveland has insisted that they will not make a commitment prior to June 26 and also plan to meet with other prospects, including Andrew Wiggins and Jabari Parker.
It will be interesting to see whether Embiid meets with any other teams before the draft because it could tip Cleveland’s hand, but it’s hard to imagine, if he’s healthy, that the Cavs will pass on him.
Cleveland hasn’t made a whole lot of sense over the past few years, but let’s hope they can get this right and get themselves out of the lottery. Because if they don’t, we might have to watch them land the No. 1 pick again next year. Then who’d be running off, hysterically, into the night?