Donovan Mitchell on Cavaliers: ‘We’re championship contenders when we’re healthy’

This offseason, Cleveland spent championship-level money on its core four players. The Cavaliers extended Donovan Mitchell with a three-year, $150.3 million max contract, Evan Mobley with a five-year, $224.2 million max contract, and Jarrett Allen with a three-year, $90.7 million deal. All that on top of the five-year, $197.2 million extension Cleveland gave Darius Garland a year ago.

That’s a massive bet on a core that has won 51 and 48 games the last two seasons, finishing with the four seed both years and advancing out of the first round once. Are the Cavaliers better than that? Mitchell thinks they are and told Marc Spears of ESPN’s Andscape about it.

“We’re championship contenders when we’re healthy. I feel like last year we grew in a lot of ways. We played a lot of different ways. Now during that stretch, we went on, obviously D.G. [Darius Garland] and Evan [Mobley] were hurt. But we found something that really can help bring us to the next level. So now the trick is how do we continue to implement that style of play over 82 [regular-season games] and then the final 16 [playoff] wins. But the development is part of the reasons I decided to sign because I believe in our development. I believe in the hunger and the will that we have as a group.

“And so, for us, I believe we’re cherished contenders when healthy. But at the end of the day, I can tell you this, we got to go out there and continue to prove it on a daily basis. We haven’t done anything.”

That is precisely what a franchise should want its best player to say — Mitchell talks about loving the city and wanting to win there in this interview. Cavaliers fans should be ecstatic.

For Mitchell to be right, for Cleveland to be a contender and a threat to Boston — or at least on par with Philadelphia, New York and, maybe, Milwaukee — a few things have to go right. Mitchell hit on the first one, they have to stay healthy. That’s true for every team in the league, but the Cavaliers haven’t in recent years, and it has become harder to trust that they will.

Second, and the most critical one: Evan Mobley has to step up his offensive game and become an…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/donovan-mitchell-cavaliers-championship-contenders-203116831.html

Author : NBC Sports

Publish date : 2024-09-27 20:31:16

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