The Brooklyn Nets' persistent efforts to recruit the Cleveland Cavaliers as a third team to help them hammer home a trade for Dwight Howard are starting to pay off, according to sources close to the process.

Sources told ESPN.com that the Nets and Magic are cautiously optimistic that the Cavaliers will help them facilitate a three-way trade that lands Howard in Brooklyn.

As part of their due diligence the Nets and Magic have exchanged medical information on Howard, who had back surgery, and Brook Lopez, who had foot surgery, sources told ESPN The Magazine's Ric Bucher. Lopez would likely be headed to Orlando in any deal.

Free agent Kris Humphries would be one of the key pieces headed to Cleveland in the proposed deal.

The Cavaliers, however, have enough cap space to sign Humphries outright, so they have requested additional assets from their two prospective trade partners.

A key in any potential deal, sources said, is swingman Marshon Brooks, whom the Nets are offering to prospective third-team facilitators to make a Howard-to-Brooklyn trade possible.

Although the Nets have made Brooks available, sources say the Magic aren't interested and he's being shopped elsewhere, including Cleveland, to find a package that suits Orlando.

The Nets' weekend attempts to convince the Cavaliers to take on Humphries is the latest of several proposals Brooklyn has made to the Magic and, in fact, is not completely new.