{"id":957567,"date":"2026-07-25T03:42:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-25T03:42:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/957567\/"},"modified":"2026-07-25T03:42:00","modified_gmt":"2026-07-25T03:42:00","slug":"cavaliers-jonathan-kuminga-reportedly-have-mutual-interest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/957567\/","title":{"rendered":"Cavaliers, Jonathan Kuminga Reportedly Have Mutual Interest"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Cavaliers<\/strong> and free agent forward Jonathan Kuminga<\/a><\/strong> have mutual interest in the former No. 7 overall pick ending up in Cleveland, multiple league sources tell Joe Vardon of The Athletic<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"After LeBron James<\/a><\/strong> decided to sign with Philadelphia, the Cavs may try to pivot to acquiring Kuminga, who\u2019s familiar with head coach Kenny Atkinson<\/strong> through their time together in Golden State, when Atkinson was Steve Kerr<\/strong>\u2018s top assistant.<\/p>\n

According to Vardon, the Cavs have been in communication with the 23-year-old and his Cleveland-based agent, Aaron Turner<\/strong>, throughout free agency.<\/p>\n

\u201cJonathan likes the Cavs, likes (coach) Kenny Atkinson, and (star) Donovan Mitchell<\/a><\/strong> likes him,\u201d Turner told The Athletic in a brief interview. Turner added that his client is a fan of the city and spent a couple months training in Cleveland during the 2025 offseason.<\/p>\n

The tricky part is figuring out what a contract would look like, Vardon writes. The Cavs are about $25.3MM beneath the first tax apron, per Yossi Gozlan of CapSheets.com<\/a>, and a little under $38MM below the second apron. Cleveland was the only NBA team to operate over the second apron last season and is unlikely to do so again in 2026\/27.<\/p>\n

As Vardon details, the Cavaliers could offer Kuminga a starting salary of $6.1MM ($12.4MM over two years) using the taxpayer mid-level exception<\/a>, which would hard-cap the Cavs at the second apron. That would theoretically give the team plenty of wiggle room to re-sign James Harden<\/a><\/strong>, one of several players whose free agency was put on hold until LeBron picked a team.<\/p>\n

Offering Kuminga more than the taxpayer portion of the MLE would hard-cap the Cavs at the first apron and would severely limit what they could offer Harden. Going that route could result in the team making a cost-cutting move or two.<\/p>\n

However, Kuminga wants to earn more than the mid level, according to Vardon, who hears the five-year veteran is hoping to land a deal in the range of $20-23MM annually via sign-and-trade. That would require cooperation from the Hawks<\/strong>, who declined their $24.3MM option on Kuminga in June.<\/p>\n

Several other teams have been linked to Kuminga as well, most notably the Lakers<\/strong>. Sources tell Vardon that Atlanta has been underwhelmed by Los Angeles\u2019 sign-and-trade scenarios, but Cleveland\u2019s potential offer would be more appealing to the Hawks. Max Strus<\/a><\/strong> and Dennis Schr\u00f6der<\/a><\/strong> are among the Cavs who have been floated as possible trade candidates this offseason, Vardon notes.<\/p>\n

Vardon suggests a reunion between Kuminga and the Hawks hasn\u2019t been ruled out either, adding that it would likely be a short-term agreement if it comes to fruition.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Cavaliers and free agent forward Jonathan Kuminga have mutual interest in the former No. 7 overall pick…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":957568,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[40],"tags":[23297,39463,18169,11434,204935,59157,1260,62,67,132,68],"class_list":["post-957567","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-dennis-schroder","tag-donovan-mitchell","tag-james-harden","tag-jonathan-kuminga","tag-kenny-atkinson","tag-max-strus","tag-nba","tag-sports","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116978552952780279","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/957567","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=957567"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/957567\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/957568"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=957567"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=957567"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=957567"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}