It's that time of the year where we worry about the Cleveland Cavaliers again. After a slow start to the season, the Cavs pulled off a phenomenal 18-2 win streak before crashing back down to earth. The team has struggled since their Christmas game against the Warriors, losing 7 of their last 10 games. How much of this is due to the annual midseason Cavaliers slump? Every year, as we approach the trade deadline and the all-star break, Cleveland has notoriously experienced a midseason slowdown. Yet this time things feel a little different. The defense has been atrocious over the past 10 games, with opponents averaging 116.9 points in games against the Cavaliers, including two back-to-back 30 point blowouts. Outside of one dominating victory against Portland in the beginning of January, the team has looked disappointing, even in wins.

James himself hasn't looked great either. After coming out of the gates firing from three-point range and averaging 43% from three through the first 25 games of the season, James is now averaging just 19.5% in the past 10 games. His defensive effort has regressed and he's made some puzzling mistakes that are uncharacteristic of his typical performance. All of this begs the question of what's wrong with LeBron James? Is he fatigued and struggling to keep up with the demands of the season, protesting the team's play or is he simply coasting his way through the midpoint season? This team goes as far as James does and the team clearly takes their cues from their captain. This is none more apparent than on defense. As LeBron's defensive intensity has slipped, so has the team's overall defense. The Cavaliers have looked slow on close-outs and rotations, frequently letting themselves get beat. Love is in no way a defensive anchor but his job becomes nearly impossible when he has to support a floundering perimeter defense. With IT, JR Smith, Crowder and James all struggling to contain the perimeter, it's hard to blame Love for struggling as a rim protector in a position he shouldn't really fill in the first place. Isaiah's return has both helped and hindered the team. IT is clearly playing himself back into shape and is a long way away from returning to last year's form. His defense and size mismatch are already presenting issues. Still, when they get it right, it's fun to watch the first unit with another playmaker. It's even more fun to watch James cutting to the rim, sometimes we can forget how explosive he is as an off-ball cutting and rolling threat.

With the way the team is struggling, attention has turned towards upgrading the roster. Cleveland owns Brooklyn's 2018 first round pick, currently projected as the 7th pick, which it can use to bring in assets from another team for their title run. Some of the names that Cleveland has been linked to include DeAndre Jordan, George Hill, Marc Gasol, Lou Williams, Derrick Favors and Tyreke Evans. Shams Charania reported that the Cavaliers are pursuing a deal to acquire the Sacramento Kings' George Hill. Separately, Marc Stein reported that the Cavaliers might also be pursuing a deal to bring Los Angeles Clippers' DeAndre Jordan and Lou Williams. The question that must be asked is: Are these players good enough to elevate Cleveland to a championship? Nothing less will suffice for a team that has become accustomed to title contention and is uncertain about their star's status this off-season. With season-long rumblings about LeBron James' potential departure this summer, the team is making a risky bet with the Nets pick that introducing new talent and showing a continued commitment to contention will convince James to return to the Cavaliers next season.

Can a Rim Protector save the Cavs?

Cleveland is betting that they can bring in new talent to revitalize the team's play on both ends of the court. More importantly, the Cavaliers will hope that the Brooklyn pick will bring enough talent to put them on par with the Warriors and put them in position to win the Finals. The biggest name linked to the Cavaliers thus far has been DeAndre Jordan. Jordan is an elite rim protector, a trait desperately needed for the Cavaliers this year, capable of anchoring a defense and slowing down drives to the rim. The porous Cavaliers defense has looked like a disaster. Over the first 45 games of this season, the team posted a defensive rating of 109.8, ranking 29th in the league above only the Sacramento Kings. Points in the paint have been a particular issue with opponents averaging 46.8 points in the paint.

The blame for the interior defense falls partially on the Kevin Love experiment at center. Love has never been a rim protector in his career and there is no surprise that the interior defense is suffering by forcing him to anchor the paint and play a defensive style that he's never excelled at. However, the blame is easily extended to the rest of the team and its starting lineup in particular. Isaiah Thomas at 5'9 has been a defensive liability since the day he entered the league. Likewise, JR Smith and Jae Crowder have both been having a down year defensively, regularly giving up drives to the rim. Crowder, who was touted for his defensive abilities after last year in Boston, has yet to show that same effect consistently in Cleveland. LeBron James, for all his defensive prowess, has a tendency to turn it on and off. Earlier in the season, we saw James displaying the defensive tenacity that once garnered him DPOY consideration and 6 all-defense award nominations. Since then, James' bad habits have crept back out and he's had more than a few plays where he gets beat and stops trying, doesn't rotate or otherwise shows a complete lack of effort in both individual and help defense. His bad habits are infectious to the rest of the team, leading others to show a similar disregard and lack of effort on defense.

DeAndre Jordan
Jae C. Hong/AP

With so many systemic issues, it's hard to blame fans for hoping that a rim protector like Jordan can come in and correct the defense. But is adding Jordan enough to staunch the bleeding? Jordan is a playmaker on defense, but he cannot solve the team's perimeter woes. Matched up against the Warriors, how will Jordan help contain Curry, Thompson and Durant on the perimeter. Jordan is essentially a supercharged, taller Tristan Thompson, with the caveat that he can't defend the perimeter. This allows the Warriors to play the pick and roll switch, the same move that Lebron and Kyrie used to pull against the Warriors, by forcing DJ to switch onto Curry or Durant where he'll get exposed on the perimeter. Jordan's presence as a rebounder, however, cannot be ignored. The Warriors are exceptional at game planning around rebounding threats, one of the only exploitable weaknesses in their game. This is achieved by emphasizing group rebounding with a player boxing out the rebounding threat while the rest of the team attacks the board. In the Finals last year, the Warriors used this strategy to shut down Tristan Thompson and keep him off the boards. Cleveland fared reasonably because of James and Love's rebounding prowess but Golden State might have more success this year because there are usually other positional mismatches that they can exploit for rebounding. Curry, Thompson and Durant all have size mismatches over their Cavaliers counterparts. With Jordan Bell potentially replacing Pachulia and McGee, this strategy gets even scarier.

A lot of the team's success with Jordan would depend on the lineups Tyronn Lue runs against the Warriors. Not discounting any players like JR Smith that will probably be moved in a Jordan trade, will the team run an IT-Crowder-James-Love-Jordan starting lineup? or will they try to stagger Love into the second unit and shift into an IT-Smith-Crowder-James-Jordan lineup? Jordan certainly inserts more lineup flexibility for the Cavaliers but his presence also presents potential matchup issues when lining up with the Warriors. Adding a big body like Jordan is sure to impact the team's spacing issues too, much as Thompson's return has impacted the second unit's spacing that was enjoyed when Channing Frye filled the center spot. Jordan is a definite upgrade for the Cavaliers at the center position and has the potential to help alleviate the team's disappointing defense. However, every move the Cavaliers make needs to be examined with the Warriors yardstick and it is uncertain whether Jordan alone would help or hinder in a potential finals series against Golden State.

Lou Williams
USA TODAY Sports

Perimeter Help

A DeAndre Jordan trade would be more interesting to consider if it included Lou Williams. Williams is a top six man of the year candidate and would add a compelling scoring punch to a team that relies on explosive offense to beat opponents. Lou-Will is averaging 23.4 points per game this year for a Clippers team that has been ravaged by injury. Over the past two months, he has averaged 26.9 ppg and 5.9 apg on 45.1/42.8/91.8 shooting. With key injuries to Griffin, Gallinari, Teodosic and even Jordan himself, Lou-Will has somehow managed to lead this team to an 18-10 record over the two-month stretch.

Lou Williams, clippers
Harry How/Getty Images

The issue with Williams would be integration. Where do you play Williams to both maximize his scoring contribution and limit his defensive liability? Playing Williams as a bench scorer would be an ideal option but the team's scoring woes are more pervasive among their starting unit where Jae Crowder and JR Smith collectively haven't been able to hit the broad side of the barn from three. However, if the Cavaliers insert Lou-Will as the starting shooting guard, they'd be looking at an unenviable IT and Williams backcourt (5'9 and 6'1 respectively) ripe for teams to take advantage of defensively. Would Cleveland double down on their offense is greater than defense strategy? If Williams plays off the bench, the team would have to bump one of Dwyane Wade, Derrick Rose or Calderon from their bench squad, assuming JR Smith is included in the trade, a backcourt rotation that has been very effective for Cleveland's second unit. Lou-Will would provide an excellent scoring punch to the team's occasionally deficient offensive playmaking. However, we have to ask the question again, will he help against the Warriors? Surely, Williams' scoring abilities would help put the Warriors second unit on their heels when they come in to give slow down the Cleveland offense but Williams represents an immediate height disadvantage that would be easily exposed by the 6'7 Klay Thompson. Not to mention, a trade involving DeAndre Jordan and Lou Williams would definitely require more assets than just the Brooklyn Nets pick.

LeBron James, Lakers
Mike Faccioio/ESPN

Bracing for Departure

What happens if the Cavaliers trade the Brooklyn pick for immediate help and LeBron James leaves this summer anyway? James' departure is a real possibility that the team needs to consider seriously this trade deadline. The Brooklyn Nets pick, currently projected at 7th, is a key piece for the team's rebuild if James leaves this summer. That pick could potentially turn into a young prospect like Trae Young, Collin Sexton or Jaren Jackson Jr. and become the first piece of a new Cavaliers future. If Cleveland trades the pick for DeAndre Jordan or another player like Marc Gasol, the team could be left in a very realistic scenario where they lose in the playoffs and heads into the summer with James eventually leaving the team. While some would argue that it is the team's responsibility to maximize the talent around James given his contributions to the franchise and the fact that he's given the city its first championship, trading the franchise's chance at finding a future star doesn't seem prudent.

On the other hand, not trading the pick might be wise even if the Cavaliers expect James back this off-season. Holding onto one of the top picks in the draft until this summer would give the team leverage in negotiating their future with James. If the team goes all-in this season by trading the Nets pick and loses, they will have very little opportunity to improve the roster this summer. The team will have traded away their pick and will remain capped out, locking out any real opportunities to make a splash in free agency. Cleveland would be walking into a negotiation with few ways to convince James that they can retool and come back stronger for the 18-19 season. By retaining their pick, the Cavaliers opens up options to explore draft, trade or even sign and trade situations to improve the team. The team would be able to take that opportunity to negotiate with James over his future with the team and have the chance to sell him on the possibility of a more competitive team in 18-19.

The Cavaliers are preparing to head into yet another tumultuous off-season already headlined by rumors of LeBron James' departure. Although team and fan pressure to perform are rising, it would be best for the team to stand pat and hold onto its Nets pick until after the playoffs when they will have a better picture of James' decision and their competitive standing in the league before making a decision on how to best maximize the value of their pick.