Cavs get their man: Antawn Jamison

By BRIAN WINDHORST

Cleveland gave up Zydrunas Ilgausas in a three-team deal.

CLEVELAND — It was going to take a special opportunity to get the Cavaliers to trade franchise pillar Zydrunas Ilgauskas.

That chance came Wednesday amid a wild day of negotiations for the team’s front office as they attempted to upgrade their roster ahead of today’s trade deadline. With two deals on the table, one for the Phoenix Suns’ Amar’e Stoudemire and one for the Washington Wizards’ Antawn Jamison, the Cavs had to make a decision.

When the dust had settled, the Cavs took Jamison in a three-team trade that also involved the Los Angeles Clippers.

The team agreed to send Ilgaukas, the Cavs’ 2010 first-round draft pick and the rights to Slovenian forward Emir Preldzic to the Wizards. The Clippers sent the Cavs journeyman point guard Sebastian Telfair and the Clippers get former Cavalier Drew Gooden from the Wizards.

It is uncertain whether Jamison will be in uniform for the Cavs’ game tonight against the Denver Nuggets. For the trade to go through, all six players must report and pass physicals or have their physicals waived by the receiving team. This could slow down the process of the trade becoming final.

The move, said some close to the team, came with a bit of a heavy heart. It gets the Cavs the sweet-shooting big man they have been looking for since last summer. Jamison, a former All-Star and Team USA member, is averaging 20.5 points and 8.8 rebounds for the Wizards.

The Cavs have been targeting Jamison, 33, for months, ever since a slow start plus legal problems for Gilbert Arenas ruined Washington’s once-promising season.

But Ilgauskas, in the final year of a contract that pays him $11.5 million this season, is the franchise leader in rebounds, blocks and games played.

It wasn’t an easy decision to move Ilgauskas or to decide which player to move him for.

According to sources, the Cavs pressed the Suns to take or leave an offer they presented last week for Stoudemire. A year after a potential deal for Shaquille O’Neal was pulled off the table by the Suns just before the trade deadline, the Cavs wanted to give themselves time to pursue another deal this time around.

The Suns, it is believed, allowed a deadline the Cavs had put in place to pass. It is not clear how close the two teams ever came to making the deal, sources said. The Cavs then moved on to acquire Jamison.

There were three key facets that got the trade, which started to come together on Monday, to work.

For the Cavs, getting Jamison and holding on to prized forward J.J. Hickson, who the Suns wanted for Stoudemire, was attractive.

For the Wizards, getting the Cavs to take on the two years and $28 million left on Jamison’s contract will put them under the salary cap this summer and accelerate their rebuilding process.

For the Clippers, it clears $5.5 million in salary-cap space for this summer, when the team plans to be a player in the free-agent market. Telfair has a $2.7 million player option for next season that he is likely to exercise.

It has long been speculated that the Cavs would hope to trade Ilgauskas, then he’d seek a buyout of his contract so he could return. These deals are allowed but cannot be pre-arranged and Ilgauskas would have to wait 30 days from the trade becoming official before re-signing with the Cavs.