Cavs: Isaiah Hartenstein should be an off-season priority

Isaiah Hartenstein may leave the Cavs this offseason.

The Cavs may be without a potential building block this offseason, as both NBA writers, Zach Low and Sam Amico are reporting that Isaiah Hartenstein may reject his veteran’s-minimum player-option in order to pursue a better deal in free agency. They believe his strong, albeit brief, showing with the Cavaliers may be enough to get him more money, even if it’s just from Cleveland.

Hartenstein was acquired from the Denver Nuggets in the JaVale McGee trade, and since landing in Cleveland has put up 8.6 points and six rebounds per game for the Cavs, giving him a career-high in points per game in a given season.

He’s also shown to be an extremely effective defensive player for the Cavaliers. Maybe not the most offensively dynamic, sure, but for the players at his position (center) on the Cavs, who played 425+ minutes, Hartenstein has the best defensive RAPTOR score of himself, Larry Nance Jr., and Jarrett Allen.

Isaiah Hartenstein is too promising for the Cavs to give up on.

Jarrett Allen has shown that he may not be the big-time player the Cavaliers thought he was. Still an upgrade over Andre Drummond, no doubt, but is he the new focal point of the defense? Hardly. That’s in no way to indicate the Cavs should move on from Allen, it’s simply a statement that he’s not proving his financial worth defensively, so if he wants a big contract, it’d be smart for the Cavs to let him move on and pursue that elsewhere.

Hartenstein could be a good piece of the puzzle moving forward, even if Allen is retained. Having the combo of Allen and Hartenstein off the bench could be exactly what this team needs. That’s an impressive one-two combo of defensive low-post players. Not exactly something that Cleveland can easily reduplicate.

That’s why it’s imperative the team tries to lock down Hartenstein long-term. These types of opportunities don’t come around often.