{"id":602054,"date":"2026-02-14T03:36:19","date_gmt":"2026-02-14T03:36:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/602054\/"},"modified":"2026-02-14T03:36:19","modified_gmt":"2026-02-14T03:36:19","slug":"rampant-speculation-about-lebron-james-returning-to-cavs-this-summer-continues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/602054\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Rampant speculation\u2019 about LeBron James returning to Cavs this summer continues"},"content":{"rendered":"

The rumors about LeBron James returning to the Cleveland Cavaliers<\/a> after this season have been somewhat non-stop since he played against his former team last month. In the last month, there was a report that the Cavs would welcome James back<\/a>, The Athletic said a return to Cleveland would be the \u201cobvious destination<\/a>,\u201d veteran reporter Jason Lloyd said LeBron will be playing in Cleveland next season if anywhere<\/a>, and Donovan Mitchell and James Harden are rumored to be recruiting him<\/a>.<\/p>\n

We have one more rumor to add to that list.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

On Friday, ESPN\u2019s Tim McMahon<\/a> said on NBA Today that there\u2019s \u201crampant speculation\u201d around the league that James will sign with Cleveland for a potential retirement tour this summer.<\/p>\n

Support us and Let \u2018Em Know with Homage!<\/a>\"\"<\/p>\n

Anything bought from the links helps support Fear the Sword. You can also shop all of Homage\u2019s Cavs gear HERE<\/a>. The link to the 2016 championship shirt HERE<\/a>.<\/p>\n

At this point, it feels like LeBron will be returning home to Cleveland unless he retires after this season. What that would look like from a salary perspective remains to be seen.<\/p>\n

The Cavs are currently over the second apron. They would not have access to the full mid-level exception unless they got under both aprons and then cut additional salary to carve out a spot for that exception. There\u2019s also the possibility of a sign-and-trade if the Cavs get below the first apron. Or, James could opt to sign for a minimum contract.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

It\u2019s pointless to speculate too much on the finances at this point. There\u2019s numerous scenarios for making this work from a cap perspective. If both sides want James to play in Cleveland, they\u2019ll find a way to make it happen as they did back in 2014.<\/p>\n

Even though LeBron is 41 years old, he\u2019s still playing at an exceptionally high level. He recorded a triple-double<\/a> in his last outing in the Los Angeles Lakers<\/a>\u2018 win over the Dallas Mavericks<\/a> on Wednesday. On the season, James is averaging 22 points, 7.1 assists, and 5.8 rebounds on .502\/.305\/.746 shooting splits in a mostly supporting role alongside Luka Doncic.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ll see how this plays out. In the meantime, we can rest assured that there\u2019s going to be plenty more rumors about James returning to Cleveland between now and July.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The rumors about LeBron James returning to the Cleveland Cavaliers after this season have been somewhat non-stop since…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":602055,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3772],"tags":[7,306,305,193,3846,149,864,560,2286,192,185,150,508,6,66128,80355],"class_list":{"0":"post-602054","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cleveland-cavaliers","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-cavaliers","10":"tag-cleveland","11":"tag-cleveland-cavaliers","12":"tag-clevelandcavaliers","13":"tag-dallas-mavericks","14":"tag-donovan-mitchell","15":"tag-james-harden","16":"tag-jaylon-tyson","17":"tag-la-clippers","18":"tag-lebron-james","19":"tag-los-angeles-lakers","20":"tag-luka","21":"tag-nba","22":"tag-nbae","23":"tag-rampant-speculation"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116066897055695210","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/602054","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=602054"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/602054\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/602055"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=602054"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=602054"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=602054"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}