Would a LeBron James Reunion Be Worth It For Cavaliers?

Death, taxes and LeBron James getting cryptic near the trade deadline.

The 39-year-old star understands the situation he's in at the moment. The Lakers are a game under .500 at 24-25, having just lost back-to-back games to meddling teams in Atlanta and Houston. He's also running out of time. While nobody knows how much longer James will play for, only 25 players in NBA history have played into their 40s.

The end of an era is near – hence James' cryptic Tweet featuring only the hourglass emoji. Time is of the essence if he is going to collect any more rings in the limelight of his career.

So what if he forced his way out to join a contender? Or what if the Lakers decided, you know what we need to start planning for the future and that doesn't include James for much longer – he has a player option for the final year of his current deal for 2024-25. Should the Cavaliers be interested in another reunion with Northeast Ohio's prodigal son?"

As always, it's a complicated question. 

On one hand adding James would thrust the Wine and Gold instantly into the championship conversation. Even in a later stage of his career, James is putting up offensive numbers that are comparable to the early 30s version of himself that returned to Cleveland in 2014.

LeBron is currently averaging 24.9 points per game on a whopping 52-percent shooting, while adding 7.5 assists and 6.5 rebounds per game as well. He's also having one of the best three-point shooting seasons of his career at the moment, knocking them down at a clip of 39-percent – the second highest mark of his career if it holds.

Those numbers line up pretty well with his age 31 campaign in 2015-16 – yes, the year Cleveland won a title. That season, LeBron averaged 25.3 points per game, 6.8 assists and 7.4 rebounds. He shot an equally efficient 52-percent from the floor. Ironically that was the second-worst three point shooting season of his career, knocking down just 30.9-percent of his long-range shots. 

For a team in Cleveland that could benefit from adding a dangerous wing scorer that can get his shot off from anywhere, LeBron remains one of the best in the game right now. And while there is a noticeable dip in his game on the defensive end, most of that is about effort and come playoff time he'll flip the switch as he always does.

Sounds pretty good right? One last ride with LeBron chasing championships. Well, like any NBA fantasy trade scenario, there are complications. First off, any team dreaming of pulling off a deal for Akron's own needs a lot of assets to do it and for Cleveland the cupboards are pretty bare.

Most of the Cavs' future first-round picks are owned by Utah, following the Mitchell trade in September of 2022. The Jazz have rights to Cleveland's 2025, 2027 and 2029 first rounders, and have the option for a pick swap in 2026.

The Cavaliers do have full control of their first-round pick this year but because of the Stepien Rule are required to use that selection. They do own a boatload of second rounders through 2029 that they could package together but this is LeBron James we're talking about.

So you're left moving a number of current players, which almost certainly means the Cavs current "core four" of Donovan Mitchell, Darius Garland, Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen will be broken up in some capacity. Throw in some other rotational players and now you're depleting one of the strengths of this team at the moment, their depth.

These scenarios are never as clean as fans hope they'd be.

There's also LeBron's age to consider. The roster assembled here in Cleveland by president of basketball operations Koby Altman, is youthful and has room to develop together for years to come. Each of LeBron's first two departures left the Cavs devoid of talent and Altman can't let that happen again by ravaging his roster to acquire the services of a player who could be sipping drinks with a mini umbrella full-time in a few years.

In that same vein, the pull of a potential title could be too good to pass up if a deal did somehow come together.

Ultimately, it's all probably pie in the sky. But it doesn't hurt to wonder.