Playoff Live Thread, ECF Game 2: Cavs @ Celtics
2018-05-15
Game two isn’t a must win; it’s a “man they really ought to win” if they want to come out ahead in this series. So the Cavs look to bounce back from possibly their worst game of the season (especially given the stakes). Fortunately, the Cavs aren’t playing on Sunday afternoon, where they tend to snooze like they’re watching the third straight hour golf tournament.
The Cavs plan to start Tristan Thompson at the five, and move Korver to the Bench. We’ll see if the Celtics counter with Baynes, but the Cavs should match Horford with Thompson all night. Hopefully, we’ll see some rotation minutes for Cedi instead of the painfully obtuse Jordan Clarkson.
Hopefully the Cavs hit the boards tonight, after getting outrebounded 48-40. Also key, getting to the shooters. Cleveland just left too many guys wide open in Game 1 (I’m looking at you, LeBron).
Also on deck, the draft lottery, where Nick Gilbert (bowtie made out of the Cavs’ championship floor pictured above) tries to play Leprauchan again, and get the Cavs into the top three. Prediction? Second pick, and a 109-105 Cavalier victory.
I love how in the postgame interview, when questioned about why Rodney Hood is still in the rotation, Lue says “because I said so.” What a joke. It’s not like Darius Miles is the only wing we have on the bench to take his spot. Good grief. Why do we carry a full playoff roster? And why is Jeff Green taking on ball handling duties? I wouldn’t mind more ball handling even for JR Smith over Green.
Oh how can I forget the infamous j r Smith
0-7 0 points 27 min played 3 reb 1 assist and an insurmountable number of defensive breakdowns
It was quite a performance. And don’t forget the coach, who kept putting JR back in.
Just when it got close in the 4th quarter — back in comes JR. Bricked 3 and flagrant follow in rapid succession. Ballgame.
Stat line of the night
G hill
33 min 1-4 fg. 3 points
1 reb 2 assists
How much worse does it get
Hill looking like he‘s over it
I’m very surprised they couldn’t win over a Celtic team of no Kyrie or Hayward. Non commitment to defense has been their downfall. Ty Lue has lost his mind on coaching on so many levels. This is his last year.
He wasn’t the same after the hit, no question. It’s unreal to me to hear Mark Jackson though, talking about Kobe and Jordan and how they would have dominated the game when Lebron has a 40 point triple double. Sure he defensive intensity was lacking in the second half, but my God, what do they want out of him?
Right after Jackson said that LeBron started asserting himself offensively and defensively, and almost got the Cavs back in it before JR and Green fumbled it away for good midway in the 4th. He wasn’t passive, he was being strategic with his energy. You’d think Jackson would know that about LeBron 15 years into his career. Kobe and MJ never had to pick their spots like LeBron has this season, he’s just not got enough around him. Remember that when Jordan retired for the first time those Bulls still won 55 games. If LeBron wasn’t on this team they wouldn’t… Read more »
Short memory, mark Jackson doesn’t remember Kobe’s Lakers blowing 3-1 lead to suns
Heartbreaker. Been here since 2011 until the last year. My work internet rejects this site so I got out of the habit of posting except at night after some games. This might be it for me. I could see the Cavs coming back to tie 2-2 and maybe even win the series but this team isn’t beating either West squad. If Lebron stays, that is great but I can’t see what these guys do as constructed to beat ANYONE in the top of the East or West in what is left of Lebron’s prime. Especially with all the bad contracts… Read more »
At least we’ll get to cheer Trae Young chucking 15 threes a game!
A reminder: Jeff Green is a limited player, to be generous, and he should not be playing big minutes in the playoffs.
Taking Isaiah Thomas off the Celtics was the biggest boost anyone could have given them. They would have had to pay him, and he would continue to wreck their defense. Now they;re a defensive juggernaut and a championship contender. I think they;re better suited to defend the Warriors than anyone. Just don’t have the offensive fire power to score enough.
Yep, Cavs did Ainge the biggest favor anyone has done him since the Nets trade. I was furious at the time, and I’m still furious.
I hear you and agree. Though I do believe Had we kept Kyrie, Cavs wouldn’t made it past 1 st round with a Kyrie on bench recovering from surgery. This is crazy
I would not have given the Celtics Kyrie and taken their huge problem IT off their hands. That’s my point. No way would I have taken the IT contract year/ injury off of Ainge’s hands. That would have been a dealbreaker unless Ainge wanted to really hand over assets, which he obviously did not want to do. Whatever Altman’s merits, he screwed up big time with that trade.
People keep saying that…if we had kept Kyrie, he’d be out now with knee surgery anyways. Not true. Kyrie, if we hadn’t traded him, would have had surgery at the start of the year. By now, he’d be playing. The time away I think could have cleared the foul air in the room and repaired the LBJ relationship. It was a mistake to panic trade him, in retrospect. Hard decision to make at the time though.
https://twitter.com/AkronJackson/status/996590729735626754?s=20
Weird game because despite LeBron’s big numbers, he didn’t seem right after the blow to the head. I have to wonder how thorough the concussion check was and why he was sent back out for the end of the half instead of taking that time plus halftime to get a better read on his condition.
Cavs staff: “Uh Lebron, you wanna have a concussion?”
Lebron: “Hell no! I am going back in.”
Lue: “Oh thank god, he might save my dumbass like he did in 2016.”
He never considered burning a couple of time outs to give Lebron some time with staff to ice or work on neck. Lue is allergic to using time outs in 1 st half . We had 6
Didn’t look like himself, whether he was concussed or whatever…
So…Ty Lue plans to keep playing Rodney Hood. Now that is sure smart. As noted by others below, Hood looks terrified of the stage. Jason Lloyd wrote in The Athletic that another team’s gm told LLoyd after the trade that Hood wasn’t cut out for the bright lights. Looks about right.
Well Lue needs to protect Hood from playing garbage time. Otherwise Rodney might pout on the sidelines, and storm out of the Q in a hissy fit. Priorities!
Well maybe he won’t play anymore, but in fairness, Lue can’t throw his player under the bus and completely destroy his confidence.
I have no idea how your starting SG has zero points and a lot of defensive breakdowns. How is that production playable?
Maybe the Cavs can hire Casey /s
Hmmm
At this point, does it really matter who gets to the finals? Kevin Durant ruined basketball and no one can beat the Warriors, especially this schizophrenic Cavs team. This isn’t that fun anymore.
It feels like when the Yankees buy up all the best players to purchase a championship, which I know is ironic being the Cavs having the highest payroll.
It is fun to win as much as possible in the playoffs while this team is still capable of doing so. Read, while this team still has LBJ.
So JR upgraded to a flagrant 1, add the double tech, does that mean he can be suspended game 3? Please?
JR and TT make 15 mill per year for the next two seasons, by the way.
ohhh dude, that’s just the beginning of our insane contracts. Tip of the iceberg.
Actually TT makes 18m per year average through 2020, Hill 18.5 and Clarkson 13. Add JR and you’ve got four guys who take up 2/3rds of the cap of whom only one is dependably playable and is not a star. The math is a problem. Green is gone, but what to do with Hood is not as straightforward. Granted he has been awful, but if they let him walk all they have left to spend is 1/2 the taxpayer’s MLE (the other half was spent on Cedi last year), which is about $2.6 million and trade exceptions worth $2.5 million… Read more »
If Lebron goes the team is built for the tank.
This is the Jeff Green I expected to show up in the playoffs. He stinks. I hope he’s elsewhere next season. Maybe stretch pay JR, trade Love for a 1st, trade Hill for a 2nd. Trade Korver for a 2nd. Fire Lue, Fire Corby. Blow it up!!!
Jeff Green should be done for this series, but Lue thinks he’s awesome, so there will be plenty o’ Jeff Green. At least for two more games.
new starting lineup
Calderon
Cedi
TT
Love
Lebron
Bench
Zicic
Green
Clarkson
Maybe Hill
It was LeBron, KLove and KK against the Celtics offensively. The Celtics are doing a great job defensively on Hill and Jr. Maybe the Cavs win the next game but the Celtics are definitely going to win the series.
All we can hope is that the front office gets rid of Lue immediately.
For better or worse, Cavs probably win the next two, because Lebron is too good.
Well he just got a 40 point triple double and the Cavs still got blown out.
But role players play better at home
season is over.. technically we play 2-3 more but it’s done.. Lue has destroyed this team… his love for Green and JR and not playing better players on the bench.. just wow…
how Lue still has a job it’s beyond me…
I would fire Lue just to fire up the team… i bet we would win the series if GM/Owner fired Lue tomorrow and let Drew take over the series… 100% win
this next game will tell true identity of Cavs and whether this team really wants to make the Finals….if Calderon or Cedi don’t get minutes, we know exactly that Lue is stubborn and ignorant and just wants to ‘see if things happen’….team has been in similar situations, but I think Lue is just not seeing whats wrong and wanting to make changes. Quite alarming, even novice basketball fans realize changes to rotation need to happen
I think the true identity of this team has been apparent for the whole year. They’ve consistently been out coached, out hustled, play no defense, take a shump every third quarter, give up huge leads, and wait around for their only good player to save them. I don’t think we can expect anything different. Hill, Nance, Osman, Korver – decent role players if used properly with a good coach. Thompson, Smith, Hood, Calderon, Green, Clarkson – Basically garbage that, with a good coach, could give you 5 quality minutes in spots. This team is LBJ, a little bit of Kevin… Read more »
Sadly a fair assessment. My rose colored glasses are off
Agreed !
Jeff Green: -17, 5 turnovers, 6 points, 28 minutes.
JR Smith: -6, 0 for 7, zero points, 27 minutes.
JR – 27 minutes , 0 points.
Green – 28 minutes, 5 turnovers, most minutes of the bench group, -17 +/-
and Lue used Green at the PG spot LMAO.
Almost unfathomable to have a starting guard tandem score just 3 points.Thx Hill and JR
but thats where our reserve backcourt came in and saved us
hood had a rebound, for example
The “save the season” trade is proving as disastrous as the initial one for Irving. Hill, Hood and Clarkson have been awful, except for Hill vs Toronto. And Nance doesn’t get PT. But Cavs have that Brooklyn pick !
Hood has really surprised me how bad he is.. scared…worse than my 10 yr old son in BB… JR is JR.. when he’s off, he’s way off… pathetic human being… Green chucks the 3s and gets one or two.. but he’s lost out there on D..
Lue is the worst NBA coach i’ve seen in 30 years of being a fan… absolutely insane what he does or doesn’t do
Byron Scott was worse, unfortunately.
I seriously don’t believe the Cavs can win this series. LeBron just played a great offensive game and they still got blown out.
Rodney Hood always looks like he’s terrified of the moment.
If Lue doesn’t go to young guys in next game, Gilbert should just fire him and let Drew take over, I mean whats the difference…Lebron and Love go crazy and then we still lose by double digits cause Lue can’t take JR out of game completely or Jeff Green or George Hill…I mean Calderon Cedi Nance or Zicic is way worse than what we’ve seen in 2 games? Next game is Lue’s legacy, will he be the coach that somehow won a title with Lebron than completely destroyed it two years later? Bad legacy if you ask me…think Cavs can… Read more »
There’s no way CavsDan will keep Lue as a coach after Boston sweeps us.
The problem is CavsDan is hiring the next one as well. Mike Brown, Byron Scott, Mike Brown, David Blatt, Ty Lue. You’ll notice a trend there.
Me thinks Boston is just a better coached, more cohesive team. They seem to just be a better team than the cavs, not due to personnel, but just because of execution and coaching. I could see them stealing a game from gs if they are taken lightly.
Absolutely they could.
Totally agree.
Lue wasted a historic performance from LBJ.
Tough to win when you dont play your best players
Cavs are done. Stick a fork in them. It was nice knowing you LeBron. It’s back to the days of blowing draft picks.
I’ve seen some bad games by Lue.. but this is his “best” FU game I’ve ever seen…. just gave the game away in 2nd half w/ bad rotations… JR…Green.. Korver should have played a lot more in 2nd half…
for a team that’s in EC finals, they look like Phoenix Suns tonight…
Man, I wish they fire Lue in the middle of the series.. I guarantee we would win the series if they did
My god a Celtics vs Warriors final is going to suck so bad.
Garbage time equals Rodney hood time
If I was James, I might be tempted to opt out before Game 3. Do the Cavs deserve the mocking “….game three is Saturday in Cleveland…if necessary?”
Its unreal this is cedi’s first minutes
This is the best non-lebron lineup we’ve played all night. Sub Zizic for Green and we’re golden.
How do we lose a game where LeBron and Kev combine for 60+ points?
They were playing against JR and Green.