Recap: Rockets 106, Cavs 92
2014-02-02
Free Casspi!
The Cavs are terrible, but they are also streaky. Tonight’s game was very reminiscent of a game last week against the Mavericks, where it seemed like the Cavs were going to be blown outta the gym, only to fight back with a significant run before succumbing to unforced errors.
1st Quarter: Mike Brown opted for Jarrett Jack to start in place of C.J. Miles. I guess the logic is that Jack forces Kyrie to play off the ball more. So even though Miles is the only player on the Cavs that has a positive +/- on the season, and the Cavs are -9 pp48 with Jack on the floor, it’s….ok it doesn’t really matter. Try anything.
Dwight Howard can still abuse a team that has no post defenders. He went 7 of 7 in the first quarter and even made a free throw, bringing back memories of his insane FT shooting in the ’09 playoffs.
The Rockets got whatever they wanted on offense. They only took 3s and shots in the paint. The 3s they mostly missed, the paint shots they mostly made, and the Cavs were down 31-23 at the end of 1.
2nd Quarter: Hey, Omri Casspi can play basketball! A young, confidence guy that plays scrappy D, rebounds, and can work as a stretch 4 in certain situations. Who saw this coming? Casspi’s 2 free throws capped off an 8 point quarter for him and pushed the Rockets lead to 19 with 6 minutes remaining in the 1st half. At this point it looked hopeless, but the Cavs actually battled back behind some spirited play from Luol Deng and Dion Waiters.
Dion started to enter the “Dion Waiter’s Zone” near the end of the half and drained a big 3 to cut the lead to 6. He finished with 15 points in the quarter. Unfortunately, James Harden drained a 3 at the buzzer to push the lead back to 9 and the long halftime pause took the fire out of Dion’s hot hand.
3rd Quarter: Waiters’ must have transferred his hot hand back to Luol Deng, who came out firing to start the 3rd. The Cavs actually went on an 11-0 run to start the quarter which was very encouraging. And then they fell apart, converting only 4 field goals over the final 9 minutes of the quarter. Their 2 point lead vanished quickly and they never seriously threatened again. Dwight Howard and James Harden pushed the lead back out to 11 to end the 3rd – almost every shot was in the paint.
4th Quarter: The Cavs needed another trip to the Dion Waiters’ zone, but they never got it. The game didn’t reached blowout status, but it never felt within reach. The Cavs’ defense held the Rockets to 45 points in the 2nd half but they couldn’t score enough to capitalize. Henry Sims got a lot of burn tonight in place of the injured Varejao, and he played valiantly, but there just wasn’t enough offense.
Shot Selection: Check out the shot chart. I think the Rockets took 6 shots tonight that could be classified as mid-range. The Cavs, conversely, took a lot more than that.
Notes:
-Henry Sims did an admirable job tonight. He finished with 7 points, 6 rebounds, and 2 blocks in 21 minutes of action.
-Tristan Thompson is a good rebounder and he puts together some decent box scores from time to time, but he just hasn’t seemed like an impact player this season. His defensive rating has gotten worse each month. He finished with 6 points and 7 rebounds in 35 minutes.
-Dion had an amazing first half (19 points), and was completely absent in the second half. Pretty typical Dion. He finished with 19 points on 14 shots in 26 minutes, which are nice numbers. I’d like to be encouraged by his improved mid-range shooting, but he needs to attack more. It’s not a state secret, but for Dion to become a solid player he really needs to figure out how to finish and draw fouls. Being able to attack and stop the clock is a steadying force for a player and a team. The Cavs have no steadying forces right now. Their best offense comes from hot-handed perimeter shooters, which can vanish as quickly as a coach calls timeout.
-Kyrie seems to be in a shooting slump the last few games. He did manage to score 21 points and dish out 7 assists, but only on 8-19 shooting. He also coughed it up 6 times.
-Luol Deng was the Cavs’ MVP tonight. He was steady all game and finished with 24 points on 10-19 shooting. He and Waiters had some decent chemistry in the 2nd quarter when they made their run.
-Tyler Zeller seems tougher this year than last year, and I’m happy about that. He also seems like a good dude, which this team may need now more than ever if the reports out of the locker room are true. He was the only Cavalier tonight with a positive +/-, posting +1 in 27 minutes. He had his hands full with D12 and almost fouled out, but he was scrappy.
-Jeremy Lin was pretty linsane tonight. He posted a triple double in under 30 minutes. He gets into the paint at will.
-Dwight Howard is still a load. Somehow he was outrebounded by two different point guards on his own team, but he finished 10-12 from the field and made 6 of 8 free throws. (I’m going to look up Howard’s career FT numbers against the Cavs.)
-Patrick Beverly, much like Jeremy Lin, was all over the court. Credit the Houston guards for wreaking havoc and feeding their top scorers. Beverely had a Rondo-esque 10 rebounds, 8 assists, 5 steals, 1 block, and zero points.
-James Harden and Terrence Jones combined to go 18-31 from the field.
-Omri Casspi was active in his 18 minutes. He scored 9 points on 6 shots and grabbed 3 boards. He’s posting a career high PER with the Rockets.
The season seems like a lost cause. Reading about the small separation from the 8-seed has gotten more irritating than hearing about Tristan Thompson’s double-doubles. Pretty inconsequential numbers, in my opinion. Nothing is really working, at least not consistently, and the rumblings from the locker room have approached seismic levels. #ontothenextone
Also I want to clarify that all my Kyrie hate is not unfounded, I’ve given him a lot of rope. I met him at the auto show and he laughed at my joke about him missing the next game with a cold. And you know what, that asshole missed the next game with a cold. My issue isn’t about him not being that great of a leader, he’s younger than I am for crying out loud. LBJ for the longest time had a Varejao type on the court leadership and didn’t really become a real leader until he was around… Read more »
I like the choice in George Karl ( LET’S GET A MOVEMENT STARTED ) even if not a coach a high priced consultsnt—after all Cleveland is where Karl got his 1st coaching job——if you are old enough to remember those days/ years were also rather dismal
@korey Honestly that was just a frustration post. I just don’t like to be told we are going to get to the playoffs and then have them not make it, not because they aren’t capable but because they aren’t even trying anymore.
@ Ben
Normally I would agree. But MB has lost the team. Once they start tuning him out, can he really win them back?
As far as a new coach, George Karl would be a good choice.
Calm down. Calling people trolls is over the top. Please read Jason Lloyd’s aticle ALL THE WAY THROUGH FIRST. Read it again please just to digest to complete dysfunction of this team from top to bottom. Coach: No control whatsoever on the team and even with his own coaching staff telling players one thing and screaming at players when they execute those instructions. He has no control over Irving (WHEN GET THIS) Jack’s main purpose is to basicially babysit Kyrie from playing 4-1 during games. That’s why he’s getting so many minutes. Never mind the coach doesn’t have the best… Read more »
The team has given up on this bozo. Fire him and let Boylan or George Karl run the team. Mike Brown can’t develop young players. These guys showed more improvement under Byron Scott and that is simply unarguable.
“Guys, Chud is not going anywhere. You don’t bring in a coach, sign him to a multi-year deal, and then fire him in his first season. It just isn’t going to happen. ” Ok, Ben, so I took some liberties with your comment I quoted. The Browns did it on the last day of the season when nobody expected it to happen. I don’t see Dan Gilbert doing it but there is precedent for it, maybe not anywhere else in the sporting world but definitely in Cleveland. Always in Cleveland. And for all those of you making hypothetical trades and… Read more »
Guys, Mike Brown is not going anywhere. You don’t bring back a coach whom you already fired once, sign him to a multi-year deal, and then fire him in his first season back. It just isn’t going to happen. That being said, my previous love for Mike Brown was based on playing defensive players first and/or turning guys into defensive plus players. The dude turned Pavs and Z into good defenders. That was magic. But this time around he isn’t doing it. He listened to the stupid criticism and bailed on his own plan. Livingston would have fit in perfectly… Read more »
My Fix
KI and TT to the wolves for Rubio and Budinger/Dieng/picks.
Fire MB and try to get Tom Izzo again, or some assistant that is respected around the league.
Trade Jack and Clark and future pick to Philadelpha for Evan Turner and Spencer Hawes
Send Spencer Hawes to OKC for a future pick and something to make finances work (KPerk?)
Send Anthony Bennett to the D-League and call in a shooting coach, personal counselor (special support staff)
Get rid of Alonzo Gee.
I think this solves almost all our problems, too bad its a fantasy.
JHill,
You are getting further and further away from Cavs fan/commenter and closer to just being a troll.
You legitimately want us to trade Kyrie for Kendall Marshall and a mid level 1st round pick and then an expiring contract to help them save money?
Dude, I’m sorry but I used to read your comments and think he has some pretty good points if I agreed with you or not … Now I just think you are Jemele Hill trolling us from Detroit.
Henceforth, any analysis or opinion of the progressions, faults, or ceilings of any current Cavs player is irrelevant. In this mockery of a team program run by Mike Brown, in which virtually every core player has shown regression from the previous year, and there is inconsistent (at best) to zero (most likely) semblance of an actual system or team identity, us mere mortals cannot possibly know what the real value of each player is. The sad part is, because Mike Brown is at the top of the totem pole, and Dan Gilbert’s personal best friend, these players will start to… Read more »
Also get them to take Jarrett Jack too.
Trade Kyrie for Any combo of LA’s expiring deals and Kendall Marshall and their pick. Draft Dante Exum and James Young, then with our other pick trade down and get Doug McDermott who will inevitably fall because he is just way too damn white. I like that team more than I do the one I’ve been watching.
Alright, apparently there are tons of things wrong with the Cavs locker room according to the ESPN Rumor Blog titled ‘Why Deng might leave the Cavs.’ If this is true this is sad and Mike Brown needs to leave, Dion needs to leave and a bunch of other scrubs need to leave including CG.
http://insider.espn.go.com/blog/nba/rumors/
We need a true point guard. I don’t care if he scores 6 points a game as long as he can create things and make everybody else better.
How about this?
Dion Waiters (and a little bit of this) for Ricky Rubio (and a little bit of that – which may include Pekovic).
That would give us a backcourt of Rubio and Kyrie. (Can either play defense? If not, we just have to outscore everybody.)
Not sure if there are new rumblings coming out of the locker room. If I’ve said it once I’ve said it a million times, trading Kyrie is stupid. Even though PG is the deepest position in the league and you never see a PG win a ‘ship. Still having the best or 2nd best PG in the East is valuable. Obviously if he says I’m not signing with you then you gotta mix things up but trading him because he hasn’t played the best basketball (still all star game number though) the last couple months is dumb. Trading Dion? Eh,… Read more »
Livingston played hard and was happy to be given the opportunity to display his talent to the rest of the league . . . but he never was going to stay here. That’s my impression.
Underdog – based on what? In my opinion he could have been had on the cheap. Just give him a multi-year deal around $2-3 million I’ll bet he downloads the zillow app for his phone instantly. The idea that a guy that was cut and bounced around 3 different teams (long after he stopped missing games due to injury) would feel entitled to take a vet minimum to play for a contending team is CRAYZEE. He’s 28. The Cavs could have easily retained him in my opinion. Until some report comes out that he wanted nothing to do with Cleveland… Read more »
I wonder if some of the locker room issues that seem to follow Dion is maybe because he is vocal. Maybe he is in there calling people out. He has his flaws and I’m sure can be a diva but he seems to be the only one to play with a fire. Andy brings passion and energy but no one seems to exude toughness besides Dion at times. Ill be sad if he gets traded but I’ll cheer for him wherever he goes.
why did we spend so much money on j.j. when we had a better point guard here already in SHAWN LVINGSTON—–has anyone seen what e is doing in Brooklyn——very good facilitator/ leader—-money should have been spent on keeping him
FIRE MIKE BROWN!!!!
Just read the locker room stuff plus let’s not forget Bynum is talking too aimed mostly at Kyrie. What a mess is an understatement! Having the coaching staff giving mixed messages is gasoline to the fire and explains the inconsistency. To sum it up, Brown has not only lost this team but his coaching staff as well. DOesn’t look like getting rid of one player will do the job here. Much more needs to be done.
Deng may be the guy traded. Given the implosion, why in his right mind would he sign with us? Get some pieces for him before he walks.
Rodney. I think Waiters is far better received in league circles than say Tristan. I reckon a rebuilding team would do a decent swap for him (say Affalo for Dion and Memphis pick). You’re right that no-one is giving up an unprotected first for him. Kyrie could get a lot in the open market. Even though he is a defensive liability and plays hero ball too often that didn’t stop Anthony from getting a max contract and crazy trade offer. The biggest problem would be a team agreeing to gamble that they could resign him. Therefore, I think you’re right… Read more »
Ok we are going to trade Dion or KI before the deadline is my bet but definetly before next season. What’s the asking price for both?
If trade KI I’d perfer to do it in the summer as I think that we’d get a better return then. Sadly I think Dion is a first round pick from a team like memphis who could make or miss the playoffs. Are there any trades for NBA players out there that help the long term and the short term?
Without Deng to stop the bleeding, this game could have been much worse. About the guard position, where we are supposed to be quite deep: Too bad about C.J.’s minutes. Dion didn’t seem too keen to play defense or scrap for loose balls. Also, if Jack is the primary ball holder and Kyrie still has six turnovers…