How will Dwyane Wade fit with the Cleveland Cavaliers?
According to ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski, Wade has decided to sign with the Cavaliers when he officially clears waivers Wednesday after agreeing to a buyout with the Chicago Bulls.
Wade will be reunited with his former Miami Heat teammate and close friend LeBron James. But at 35, Wade isn't the same player he was when he last played with James in 2014, and how James is used has changed, too. Can Wade fit into a Cleveland offense predicated on spacing the floor around James?
Importance of spacing
Under former GM David Griffin, the Cavaliers clearly reached the conclusion that their best strategy was putting as many good shooters as possible around James to space the court for his drives to the basket.
Nearly every major move Cleveland made after losing to the Golden State Warriors for the first time in the 2015 NBA Finals improved the team's shooting. Midseason deals for Channing Frye and Kyle Korver gave the Cavaliers a five-out second unit with which James thrived, particularly in the postseason, while Cleveland let nonshooter Timofey Mozgov walk in free agency.
That philosophy was borne out in the Cavaliers' offensive performance. Here's how lineups including James that ranked in the team's top 250 by minutes rated offensively, separated by the number of teammates on the court who averaged at least one 3-pointer per 36 minutes.
If the criteria are changed to be more selective, lineups without at least two teammates who averaged two or more 3-pointers per 36 minutes tended to be less effective offensively.
Now, this evidence is not firm. Cleveland's offense didn't improve with additional elite 3-point shooters beyond two alongside James, and was slightly better with just two 3-point threats instead of three in the previous chart. Those caveats noted, perhaps the most interesting aspect of the first chart is this: None of Cleveland's top 250 lineups last season included James and only one other player who averaged at least one 3-pointer per 36 minutes. Yet just such a lineup might start the Cavaliers' opener on Oct. 17.
What will Wade's role be in Cleveland?
How Cavaliers coach Tyronn Lue uses Wade will go a long way in determining his fit. At this stage of his career, Wade's ideal fit is probably as a sixth man capable of running the offense when James is resting. Yet Wade has come off the bench just 11 times in his 14-year NBA career, so he might prefer to remain a starter, which would be problematic in terms of spacing.
Unless Lue is bold enough to start Wade at point guard while Isaiah Thomas continues to rehab his hip injury, starting Wade would mean teaming him in the backcourt with fellow poor shooter Derrick Rose, Thomas' replacement at the point. Combined, the two guards made 58 3-pointers last season at a 28.3 percent clip. With Tristan Thompson a fixture in the starting lineup, that would leave Kevin Love as the only starter besides James who made more than one 3-pointer per 36 minutes in 2016-17.
It's worth noting that 3-point shooting isn't the only way to create spacing. During his time with James in Miami, Wade excelled at using his ability to cut to keep wary defenders close to him. When Tom Haberstroh and I quantified players' gravitational pull on opposing defenders in 2014, we found Wade ranked surprisingly well. Yet Wade's athleticism was a big part of his success as a cutter, and as he's aged -- and spent more time playing with the ball in his hands -- Wade's scoring on cuts as tracked by Synergy Sports has declined precipitously in recent seasons.
Despite Wade's effectiveness as a cutter, by the end of James' time with the Heat, the team was more effective with him alone on the court and Wade on the bench -- particularly during the playoffs, as Tom Haberstroh highlighted in 2013. According to NBA.com/Stats, Miami barely outscored opponents when James and Wade played together during the 2013 and 2014 playoffs but dominated when James was alone on the court.
Add it up and the evidence strongly points to the conclusion that the more minutes Wade plays with James in Cleveland, the less happy their reunion will be.
So far I've focused solely on the offensive end of the court, which offers an incomplete picture. There's a reason that Thompson, a versatile defender and rugged rebounder, continues to start at center for the Cavaliers despite never having made a 3-pointer in his NBA career. Unlike Thompson, Wade won't be playing for defense. His minus-0.9 projection in the defensive component of ESPN's real plus-minus is slightly worse than incumbent shooting guard JR Smith (minus-0.7 points per 100 possessions) and far worse than newcomer Jae Crowder (plus-1.3).
While the question of whether Wade starts does matter because it determines how many of his minutes he'll play with James, the bigger issue is whether he finishes games, particularly in the postseason. That would mean leaving at least one and maybe two better options (Crowder and Smith) on the bench, depending on whether Lue goes small with Love at center and James at power forward.
There's no doubt Wade is a better player than whomever he replaces on the Cleveland roster. (The Cavaliers, who already had 15 guaranteed contracts, will likely trade one of them to avoid paying luxury tax on their salary.) Yet if adding Wade means playing him ahead of better fits, signing him could ultimately make Cleveland a less dangerous team in the playoffs.