00:00Our next guest, Cavs reporter, NBA reporter, once upon a time did a little thing called
00:06sports talk in this town as well, which is why we're going to ask him about Miles Garrett here.
00:10Chris Fedor joining us on the Wise Heart Right We Make It Right call, Kyle Wright Hotline.
00:14Fedor, welcome to the show, bud.
00:16Hey, what's going on, guys?
00:18How are you?
00:18Oh, just talking about another Browns catastrophic trade.
00:22I guess we can, you are a Clevelander.
00:24You grew up here.
00:25You've spoken about the Browns.
00:27I know you don't cover them firsthand anymore, but thoughts on the Miles Garrett trade?
00:32Well, it's my son's favorite player, and he just recently got a Miles Garrett jersey.
00:37So trying to explain to him after his nap this afternoon that Miles got traded and why Miles
00:43got traded was very, very difficult for me.
00:46But I think it's easier to understand if you're not a four and a half year old.
00:50Did you just explain value?
00:52The Browns are in have kind of forced them down this direction.
00:57Um, they aren't competitive right now.
00:59They aren't going to be competitive in the near future.
01:02They don't have an answer at quarterback.
01:05So you're just spinning your wheels, having one of the best defensive players on your roster.
01:10Um, and if you can cash in and extricate some value for him that may be able to help you
01:16get closer to what your ultimate goals are, which is actually competing on Sundays.
01:21Um, I have no problem with them doing this.
01:24I think it's a poor reflection on the organization.
01:27I think it speaks to how far away they are from actually being competitive.
01:31And there's a lot of people to blame for that.
01:34But when you have a valuable piece like this and you can get what you got from the Rams,
01:39I think you do explore it.
01:41And it gets you in a better position to ultimately get the answer at quarterback, which is what
01:47this organization needs.
01:48And if they don't have it, they're not going to go anywhere.
01:50Why is it you think that they did it now instead of doing it last year when the value was
01:55higher?
01:56I don't know.
01:56Poor management.
01:58I think, honestly, I think the answer, I think the answer to everything Browns related is they
02:03don't do things properly.
02:05They don't have a great grasp on what they're doing.
02:09Um, so I think it's incompetence.
02:11I think that's the answer.
02:12And you don't want that to be the answer, right, as a fan.
02:15But I think it's the answer.
02:17I think they miscalculated things.
02:19I think they misjudged things.
02:21I think they mis-evaluated what they were going to be able to do last year from a win-loss
02:27perspective.
02:28I think they have an owner who, you know, thinks one way on Tuesday and thinks another
02:33way on Friday.
02:34Um, and I think it's very, very difficult for this franchise to be successful as long
02:39as that guy is calling the chops, unfortunately.
02:42The Browns are mismanaged.
02:46That's a good note.
02:46I like these notes.
02:47Writing this one down there.
02:48All right, Chris, I'll be honest with you.
02:50I've talked about the Miles Garrett trade for the better part of four hours.
02:53I've thought about it for the better part of, oh, this entire weekend and today.
02:58So I guess I'm going to try and start this in a fragmented place, uh, considering we
03:04now have to switch to the Cavs.
03:06Um, Sam Amick, uh, wrote that the Thunder would be interested in Evan Mobley.
03:12Do you think there's any, any overlap there on what the Thunder might be willing to give
03:16up and what the Browns might consider in a hypothetical Evan Mobley trade?
03:22Do I think there's overlap?
03:24Um, to some degree, yes, I think so.
03:27Um, because if you just look at the structure of, of the Cavs roster, um, where is the weak
03:35point on the roster?
03:36Like what's the thing that would benefit them the most moving forward?
03:40Um, and it's obviously two way wings, um, but more defensive minded pieces that you can
03:46put alongside Donovan Mitchell and James Harden.
03:49Um, so if you look at Oklahoma city, you know, we're not talking about Chet Holmgren.
03:54And here, we're not talking about Shaguel is Alexander.
03:57We're talking about their quote unquote expendable piece, which is Jalen Williams, right?
04:01It's a guy that the Cavs were interested in in the draft a couple of years ago.
04:05They thought they were going to draft him.
04:06And then all of a sudden Oklahoma city moves up in front of them and then takes him.
04:10Um, but that type of player is the one that seems to be missing from this roster.
04:16So if you're looking for something, um, outside the organization that you can bring here that
04:22can make you different in terms of play style, in terms of roster makeup, in terms of, um,
04:29strategical things that you can do.
04:31So Jalen Williams certainly fits that particular mold, but, but I think the Cavs, this decision
04:38related to Evan Mobley is clearly the most difficult one that Kobe Altman has ever encountered
04:45since he has run the Cavs.
04:46And look, like when he got the job, when he was elevated to general manager and David Griffin
04:52left, he encountered the Kyrie Irving situation and he had to figure out what am I going to
04:57do about Kyrie?
04:58Kyrie doesn't want to be here.
04:59Kyrie doesn't want to play another second with LeBron James.
05:02Kyrie wants out and Kyrie's threatening all these different things.
05:07And Kobe had to deal with that.
05:09And that was very, very difficult in the situation that the Cavs were in because they were still
05:13competing for championships and they were still going to the NBA finals.
05:17So he had to figure out, okay, what's the right way to go about the Kyrie thing.
05:21Now you're talking about Evan right now.
05:23And this is even more difficult than that decision because this shapes the future of the franchise.
05:29And this is the hardest thing that Kobe has had to decide when it comes to his tenure with
05:35the Cavs because it was relatively easy-ish to trade away all the stuff that they did for
05:41Donovan Mitchell because they didn't have a player like Donovan Mitchell and they needed
05:44a player like Donovan Mitchell.
05:45It was relatively easy-ish to trade away Darius Garland despite what he meant to the franchise,
05:51despite the fact that he was the longest-tenured Cavalier at the time, despite the fact that he
05:55was a success story from a top-five pick into an all-star, into this franchise focal point,
06:02this fan favorite, all of those different things.
06:05This is difficult because on one hand, your roster doesn't make sense from the standpoint
06:12that you do not have somebody that you can call the best player on a championship team.
06:19You don't have that.
06:20There's nine years of evidence that says Donovan Mitchell can't be it.
06:24There's five years of evidence that says Evan Mobley's not yet ready, and he's not on the
06:29Donovan Mitchell championship timeline.
06:31Not yet, anyway.
06:32Maybe he gets there.
06:33Maybe he doesn't.
06:33But Evan is also a protection from going into rebuild land.
06:39Beyond the fact that the Cavs still believe in Evan Mobley greatly, and they still see him
06:44as a potential star in the future at some point, at one point, this organization said
06:51that he was going to be a future Hall of Famer, and they had coaches going around calling him
06:54HOF and stuff like that.
06:57He protects them from going down a path that Dan Gilbert does not want to go down, that
07:03nobody inside this organization that already went through the rebuild and came out on the
07:07other side wants to go down.
07:09So it's not as simple as saying, well, we're in this timeline of Donovan Mitchell.
07:14And we're far away from the New York Knicks and the Oklahoma City and the San Antonio Spurs,
07:19and how do we get closer?
07:21It's no, what's the cost of trying to get closer?
07:25And is that cost a little bit too much for us to go all in on Giannis, who's 31 years
07:31old, who might be a one-year rental, who has this leg problem that he's dealing with,
07:37calf, knee, all of that kind of stuff.
07:39And if Evan Mobley is the only path to that guy, but he's also the only path to a Donovan
07:47Mitchell future that doesn't include tanking for draft picks, that's a complicated decision
07:52for somebody like Kobe.
07:54I have a real question coming up, but they don't still call him HOF, right?
07:57At some point, that's got to go away, and that's also a little awkward.
08:01Well, the coach who was overseeing his development that did call him HOF is no longer here.
08:10So I don't know if the new person that is overseeing Evan Mobley's development has inherited
08:15calling him HOF every single day.
08:18It was more of a motivational tactic.
08:20You can kind of see where they were going.
08:21But I don't think Andrew Olsen, who is the shooting coach for the Cavs and the guy who
08:26is overseeing Evan's next step of his development, I don't think he adopted that tactic.
08:31In fairness, there's a very low bar for the Basketball Hall of Fame.
08:34That's true.
08:35Evan could very clearly clear that.
08:37You buy one of the deluxe tickets, and they get you right in there.
08:40All right, Chris.
08:40It's also like, what do you do internationally with Team USA?
08:43And what did you do in high school?
08:45What did you do in college?
08:46Yeah.
08:47Did you average 14 points per game in the NBA?
08:49Chris, you kept mentioning what the Cavs and laying out the Cavs version of this.
08:53What would you do?
08:54If it was your decision, you call it the hardest decision since Kobe Altman has been here.
08:59What would you do?
09:01I would do it, but I'm not the one who would have to deal with the ramifications of rebuild
09:07land if it goes that direction, right?
09:09I think the hard thing for Kobe in this front office is that everybody that is currently here
09:17with the exception of one front office member had to go through the darkest times of this
09:22organization in a post-LeBron world, right?
09:25They went through the John Beeline nonsense.
09:27They went through the, you know, 19 win seasons, no direction, no culture, no hope whatsoever.
09:37And it took a lot.
09:39It took a lot to get to this point where they're relevant again and they can be competitive again.
09:44Now, we can argue about how competitive they are and how competitive they are compared to
09:51some of these other teams around the NBA, but they're going to go into next year and
09:56they're going to be considered one of the championship betting favorites again.
10:00Not the favorite, but one of them, right?
10:03So there is a sense of we have accomplished something.
10:06We've gotten somewhere.
10:08We've done some things right to get ourselves to this point.
10:12And because everybody had to go through the dark times, there's this idea of, you know,
10:19let's be proud of the things that we have done because we saw how hard it was to get away
10:24from that.
10:26Now taking that next step becomes a little bit more complicated because sometimes you have
10:32to be a little bit more ruthless.
10:33You have to take your emotions out of it and things like that.
10:36And if you're taking an unemotional decision, then it's just easy to say, well, Evan Mobley,
10:43when you drafted him, the idea was for him to eventually become Giannis or a player like
10:48Giannis.
10:49And he hasn't become that, but you can go get that.
10:53You can get what you ultimately want Evan Mobley to become.
10:56And he's available right now.
10:58And Milwaukee's interested in the package that you would be giving them.
11:03And Giannis fits Donovan Mitchell's timeline.
11:06And Giannis can be the best player on a championship team.
11:09And Giannis has won a championship.
11:12And Giannis has done things in the playoffs that James Harden has never done, that Donovan
11:17Mitchell has never done.
11:18So the idea of it, yeah.
11:20If I'm just looking at that, I'm saying, yes, sign me up for that.
11:27But I don't have to deal with all the potential ramifications of what happens if this all goes
11:33wrong.
11:33And I think anytime you're in an organization, you have to weigh those two realities against
11:38each other.
11:38But if it's me, I'm doing it.
11:41Because the view that I have of Evan Mobley and what he can ultimately become as an offensive
11:48player, I think it would take too long for him to become that.
11:51And there's no guarantee that he does become that.
11:54And I think you have to maximize this opportunity that you have with somebody like Donovan Mitchell.
11:59So if it's me, even though it is a risk with Giannis and he may leave after just one year
12:05and there are injury things that you have to worry about and he's on the wrong side of
12:0930, I think it's too tempting to say no to that kind of deal.
12:14He is the kind of player from a mental perspective, from a positional fit perspective, from a stylistic
12:23perspective that the Cavs need if they're going to take the next step as an organization.
12:28Chris, great stuff as always, buddy.
12:31I'm going to keep this mismanagement thing from the Browns.
12:33I'm going to keep track of this to make sure that you're right on this.
12:36I think you might be onto something.
12:38I know.
12:39I might be.
12:39I don't know if there's, you know what?
12:41I don't know if we have enough evidence of that yet.
12:44I think we need like two or three more blunders before we can actually definitively say that
12:49this organization, this Browns organization is mismanaged.
12:54Analytics needs a bigger sample size.
12:56This is so true.
12:57Analytically, they won the trade.
12:58Oh, I think, yeah, I think the joke online today was, uh, uh, analytical, analytically
13:03Jared versus nine and nine and what, 18 versus better than miles Garrett.
13:08And then it's the Atkinson gift.
13:12All right, Chris, be good, buddy.
13:15Thanks, Chris.
13:16Chris feed or cleveland.com NBA in Cavs reporter on the wise heart.
13:20Right.
13:20We make it right.
13:21Call Kyle right hotline.
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