The Cavaliers may have a real puzzle at power forward as the new season opens, and Mario Hezonja is right in the middle of it.
Hezonja is back in the NBA after a long run overseas, and the version Cleveland is evaluating looks nothing like the one that entered the league in 2015. Back then, he was a 6-foot-6, 190-pound forward trying to figure out the pro game as a teenager.
Now, as cleveland.com beat reporter Chris Fedor put it on the Wine and Gold Talk podcast: “He was a child at the time that he came into the NBA,” cleveland.com beat reporter Chris Fedor said on the Wine and Gold Talk podcast. “And now he’s coming back as a man, a seasoned man who has played against some of the highest level competition outside the NBA overseas.”
The body change is hard to miss. Hezonja is listed at 6-foot-9 and 260 pounds, which makes him heavier than Jarrett Allen, the Cavaliers’ All-Star center. That size gives Cleveland something it hasn’t had much of at the position: a forward who can absorb contact, hold his ground and give the offense a different kind of look.
Host Ethan Sands said teammates and coaches have been emphasizing that exact point: “you’re not going to be able to move him off his spot [offensively], but he’s also going to be able to wall up against some of these bigger guys [defensively] as well.”
That kind of profile matters because the Cavaliers already have a very different look in Evan Mobley, who is more finesse than brute force. Hezonja offers another lane entirely. He can operate in the post, absorb physical matchups and help Cleveland slow things down in the half court, potentially alongside James Harden, whose game is built around a similar pace.
Fedor drew a comparison to Dean Wade, the versatile forward who earned minutes with his feel for the game and ability to fit into different situations. Hezonja would fill a similar kind of utility role, only with power instead of Wade’s skill-based edge. The idea is the same: give Kenny Atkinson another answer when the matchup calls for something specific.
That decision tree gets even clearer when the other options at power forward come into focus. Fedor pointed to Nae’Qwan Tomlin or Peyton Watson, and made the contrast plain.
“If Kenny says I need a little bit more physicality, I need a little bit more bulk, I need a little bit more power, then that’s his own,” Fedor said. “Now if Kenny says I need some more energy, some more activities, some more length athleticism, then that may be more Nae’Qwan Tomlin.”
There’s also a clock attached to the whole situation. Sands noted that Hezonja is on a non-guaranteed contract and said, “his trigger date that it will become a guaranteed deal is November 15th.” So training camp, preseason and the early part of the regular season are all part of a longer tryout.
And this won’t be a simple plug-and-play assignment. Hezonja’s role in Cleveland will be very different from what he handled in Real Madrid’s EuroLeague setup, and that’s something Hezonja, Atkinson and president of basketball operations Koby Altman have all acknowledged. At age 31, he’s facing a different kind of test in the NBA than the one he left behind overseas.
Still, for a team looking for more physical depth on the front line, a 260-pound forward who can’t be shoved out of position is worth a serious look. The contract gives the Cavaliers a straightforward out if it doesn’t work. But if it does, they may have found a useful answer at one of their biggest question marks.
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