The only thing holding up the finalizing of the Kyle Korver to Cleveland trade was the first-round pick involved. The Cavaliers had already traded the rights to their 2018 first rounder to Portland (for taking on the Anderson Varejao contract at the last trade deadline), which meant Cleveland couldn’t send one to the Hawks until 2020 (teams cannot trade first round picks in consecutive years, thank you Ted Stepien).
So Cleveland started talking to Portland about getting their 2018 pick back, handing over the Cavs 2017 pick — which works for Portland, this is considered a deep draft coming up. The deal has now been finalized, the Blazers confirmed. Here is the quote from the press release.
The Portland Trail Blazers have acquired an unprotected first round draft pick from the Cleveland Cavaliers in exchange for a 2018 first round pick, it was announced today by president of basketball operations Neil Olshey.
Portland now has two first-round picks in the coming draft.
This clears the way for the Korver trade to be finalized. Cleveland gets Korver, Atlanta gets a 2019 first round pick (with protections, but the Cavs should still be winning a lot of games then), Mike Dunleavy (who will be moved to a third team), and the dead-money contract of Mo Williams (he didn’t report to camp, but the Cavaliers kept his salary on the books for just this reason).
