Exploring the Cleveland Cavaliers' Offseason Options, Part 1: Sacramento's Kevin Martin

Remember back in the day when Danny Ferry was trying to land then-Kings point guard Mike Bibby but kept running into problems with hard-nosed Kings President Geoff Petrie?Well, Ferry would be wise to start talking to Petrie again. And this time, the stakes would be much higher.One of the big weaknesses of the Cavs that was exposed in the Orlando series was the lack of a legitimate second scoring option and size on the perimeter. Of course, 20-points-per-game shooting guards who are in excess of 6'6" and in the prime of their careers don't fall from the sky.But Sacramento has Ohio native Kevin Martin.You see, the Kings were the worst team in the league this past season. They have tried to build around Martin after giving him a monster five-year contract extension back in 2007, but they have failed miserably to do so. This past season, they were a league-worst 17-65. Instead of winning the draft lottery and landing a guy like Blake Griffin to pair with Martin, the Kings dropped out of the top three and ended up with the fourth pick.In fact, since making the playoffs as an eighth seed in 2006 before getting dumped by San Antonio in the first round, the Kings have been 33-49 in 2006-07 and 38-44 in 2007-08 before their horrid season this past year. And after getting rid of guys like Bibby and Ron Artest, there is little doubt that it will be quite a long, long time before Sacramento is relevant again. Which brings us to Martin.The Kings have mistaken Martin for a franchise player. He is not. He is, however, the perfect sidekick for a big-name superstar. He missed a lot of games the past two seasons with injuries (ankle, groin), but the 6'7", 185-pounder averaged 24.6 points while shooting 41.5 percent from 3-point range in 51 games this past year. Despite playing in just 51 games, he hit 115 treys, which would have had him well over 150 three's for the year if he played in all 82 games. Martin, however, hasn't played in 80 games in a season since the 2006-07 season. Even then, though, he averaged 20.2 points while shooting 47.3 percent from the floor and 38.1 percent from 3. It was definitely his breakout year and the year that earned him that big contract extension.But ever since the Kings decided to make Martin their cornerstone, they began their run of missing the playoffs. This is a team that used to be a fixture in the postseason in at least some capacity. But their miss in '07 with 49 losses was their first absence from the playoffs since 1998. And in a brutally competitive Western Conference where teams usually need close to 50 wins to just make the playoffs as an eighth seed, Sacramento's misery seems likely to continue for a long, long time.Martin, who is only 26, hasn't even been an All-Star in his career (and remember, neither was Mo Williams until he came to Cleveland), and he's on the books in Sacramento through the 2012-13 season, during which he'll make $13 million. He's due $10.2 million next season, and it could be in the Kings' interest to draft his replacement with the fourth pick in June and move him for another draft pick and some cap flexibility.You guessed it: that's where the Cavs come in.Petrie has a reputation as a hard-nosed negotiator who only does deals where he is the clear-cut winner, but lately he's had to bite the bullet in the Bibby and Artest deals. All Petrie gained from those trades was cap flexibility, draft picks, and young players. Why, will you look at that: the Cavs can offer all three!Should the Kings use the fourth pick to draft a shooting guard to replace Martin (like Arizona State's James Harden, Memphis' Tyreke Evans, or USC's DeMar DeRozan), they could use a young power forward to pair with him. And although Sacramento drafted Jason Thompson with the 12th pick last year, the Cavs can offer J.J. Hickson as a power forward should the Kings move the 6'11", 250-pound Thompson to center. Cleveland can also give up the 30th pick in this draft. On top of that, they can give up Sasha Pavlovic's non-guaranteed contract at $5 million. It would also be in the Cavs' best interest to cough up Daniel Gibson, who has been up and down since his breakthrough 2007 postseason but is only 23-years old.Hickson, Pavlovic, Gibson, and the 30th pick for Kevin Martin? Sign me up.Ferry can't afford to keep being cute. I know he likes Hickson a lot. And I know he hates giving up draft picks, since his tenure in San Antonio showed that guys like Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili can be had late in the draft. But this is crunch time. The team needs talent now. There is no way in hell they can afford to wait for Hickson or some 30th pick who may or more likely may not pan out.Mo Williams was a good player with good stats hidden on a bad team in a bad market in Milwaukee. LeBron turned him into an All-Star and, believe it or not, a household name. Kevin Martin, a good player with good stats hidden on a bad team in a bad market in Sacramento, would blossom into an All-Star in Cleveland.Oh, and he's better than Mo. LeBron could turn Martin into a superstar. He could become what Scottie Pippen was to Jordan.For the Kings, it gives them cap flexibility with Pavlovic's contract, where they can only give him the $1.5 million he's guaranteed and save the other $3.5 million instantly. They get a young piece in Hickson, another draft pick, and a good young role player in Gibson. Assuming they draft a star guard with the fourth pick, they would have a solid young nucleus parallel to what's being put together in Oklahoma City and Memphis.Meanwhile, in Cleveland, you're definitely talking about 70 wins (come on, that's only four more from this past season). The only player that contributed to the 66-win season in that trade would be Gibson, who is replaceable. You're still keeping all of your starters, then moving Delonte West to the bench as the sixth man. You have a backcourt featuring explosive scorers in Martin and Williams, two guys that combined to average 42 points this past season (24 for Martin, 18 for Williams).Yes, you'd still have issues up front with Zydrunas Ilgauskas, Anderson Varejao, and Ben Wallace's rotting corpse. But you still have the midlevel exception to work with, as well as Wallace's own expiring contract for 2010. That becomes more and more valuable as the trade deadline approaches. Having two 3-point guns for a backcourt as explosive as that to put around LeBron James? You're talking about a team that would be hard to beat as well as a joy to watch. And I'd be far more comfortable putting a 6'7" Martin on a 6'10" Turkoglu than 6'3" Delonte West.There would, however, be one problem with bringing Martin to Cleveland:He wouldn't be able to wear his #23.But that, for sure, would only be his problem.