The Cleveland Cavaliers traded Rakeem Christmas to the Indiana Pacers for a future second round pick to help make way for a Brendan Haywood trade and now the Pacers have signed the rookie to a four year contract after playing his college ball at Syracuse and being picked in the 2nd round by the Cavs this year.
The Pacers have made a number of moves this summer with the Roy Hibbert trade and signing Monta Ellis and now they have another young player joining the mix. According to ESPN.com, the Cavaliers traded Christmas to the Indiana Pacers for a future second round pick in the 2019 draft. The pick is from by the Lakers and gives the Cavs another chip to trade this summer. Brian Windhorst at ESPN reports that the Christmas deal was made to allow the Cavs to make a trade with Haywood.
The Pacers were happy top help out, as they only had to give up a second round pick to get a promising prospect from Cleveland. The Pacers traded a pick that could end up lower than where Christmas was picked, which was at number 36 in the second round. According the Cleveland Plain Dealer's Chris Haynes, the contract is a four-year, $4.5 million deal with Christmas and two years of the deal are guaranteed. The move wasn't tough for the Cavs, as the team was not even sure if they would have had room on the roster for the rookie.
The Cavaliers are focused on winning now and trading Haywood is going to allow the team to bring back more players, including potentially Tristan Thompson, Matthew Dellavedova and JR Smith. Christmas played okay at the Summer League and he came out of Syracuse after averaging 9.0 rebounds, 1.5 assists, 0.9 steals and 2.5 blocks per game. Christmas averaged 8.0 points, 4.5 rebounds and 1.8 blocks in the Summer League, but he did not shoot all that well and he will have to work on that in Indiana.
The Pacers released a statement and had quotes from Larry Bird saying that the team sees Christmas as a "solid player" after being a "contributor" for four years while playing at Syracuse. Bird added that the team looked at Christmas in the draft process and now he will get the chance to be a contributing player for Indiana after the team traded Roy Hibbert.
The Cavaliers reportedly are looking at the Blazers and 76ers as potential options for a Haywood deal after trading Christmas to the Pacers. The team is looking to make a trade exception and now they could do it by getting the second round pick and packaging it with Haywood. The Pacers now add Christmas to the roster that has Jordan Hill, Myles Turner and Ian Mahinmi along with Lavoy Allen at forward and center. Christmas will try and prove himself in camp to get significant minutes in the rotation. Hibbert being traded opens things up at center.
Check here for more on the trade with Christmas and the Cavaliers.
