Recap: Nuggets 106, Cavaliers 97 (Or, Sniff, Cough, Nothing to See Here )
2014-11-18
Monday night’s NBA game at Quicken Loans Arena featured a streaking home team fresh off a magical shooting display. The Cleveland Cavaliers were rounding into shape. The projected offensive juggernaut increased its scoring output in four consecutive games culminating in the complete annihilation of the Atlanta Hawks. Cleveland’s opponent was a disappointing team which had recently lost six in a row. The Denver Nuggets’ lone victory after opening day had come against an Indiana team featuring Donald Sloan. To say that this had the potential to be a “trap game” would have been a supreme understatement.
1st Quarter: LeBron started the scoring at the line after pushing the ball in transition. His initial energy in this game seemed fine despite reports of his cold. The first two times ‘Bron touched the ball, he sprinted to the hoop for early offense. Early half-court ball movement was good as the Cavs continued to fire the ball around the perimeter in search of the corner three. Shawn Marion drilled from the left corner on good ball swing action. The next time he received it in that spot, he flew by the closing defender for a baseline jam. There was a concerted effort to get Kevin Love the ball in deeper post position on the left block. He did not disappoint. In five first quarter post touches, Love deftly dished to a cutting Varejao, hit off window from Tim Duncan’s toolbox, drew a foul, got a layup off a beautiful up and under, and dribble drove to the middle for a soft finish. Denver’s Bigs couldn’t stop him.
Defensively, the Nuggets Bigs scored through Love and Andy more than over them. The Cavaliers sagged off of shooters and relied on length. They went under all screens involving Ty Lawson. Marion, when not switching with LeBron, also was sliding under off ball screens with Aaron Afflalo. Afflalo hit some tough shots to keep it close for Denver. After one, it was 26-24.
2nd quarter: The Cavs started the second with Kyrie, Dion, Joe Harris, Matrix, and TT on the floor. Darrell Arthur hit a deep three from the left wing to take the lead. Tristan continued to show his defensive presence with his second block on a weak layup attempt from JaVale McGee. A Kyrie Irving corner three on early offense gave the Cavs their biggest lead of the night at 34-27. The Nuggets fought back despite a huge free throw attempt disparity. Halfway through the second quarter, the Cavs had a 14-0 advantage at the line. After a stretch of sloppy ball handling, the Nuggets retook the lead with an alley-oop to Mozgov and an easy layup by Faried. Blatt called a timeout with 2:56 remaining. Out of the timeout, LeBron posted up on the left block and waited for the defense to collapse before firing it to Kyrie for a straightaway three ball splash. The Q was treated to the best Cleveland TD pass of the weekend when Kevin Love hit LeBron off a Denver made free throw. It gave me joy.
Darrell Arthur finished the quarter how he started it by drilling another three. His activity in the final minute was the difference maker. He grabbed two offensive rebounds on one possession and snagged another on the defensive end. Heading into halftime, the Nuggets looked energized and had a 53-52 advantage.
3rd quarter: The Nuggets came out of the locker room with far more energy. They stormed to lead with Ty Lawson running the show. He continued to get to his strong right-handed drive. David Blatt called a timeout with 6:43 remaining after Aaron Afflalo pushed the lead to 69-60. The Cavs zoned up after the timeout to get two consecutive stops. LeBron hit Kyrie in early offense for a left wing three ball and it looked like the Cavs were awake again. Unfortunately, they still couldn’t stop Lawson. The Cavs curiously went over the same picks that they ducked under in the first half with miserable results. Offensively, the Cavs settled into hero ball. Kyrie and LeBron both hit some shots, but the ball and bodies began to grow stagnant. A nice flurry by Dion at the end of the quarter kept the Cavaliers in striking distance at 75-81.
4th quarter: I love watching Nate Robinson play basketball except when he plays the Cavaliers. Nate didn’t have one of his patented NBA JAM stretches, but his two threes fought off the onslaught from Dion Waiters. Dion continued where he left off in the third. In all, Dion scored or assisted on six straight Cavalier buckets. Waiters’ three to chop the lead to 84-90 came at 9:25 remaining in the quarter. The Cavaliers wouldn’t score again until LeBron bowled over Arthur to dunk it home with 5:24 on the clock. LeBron switched onto Ty Lawson, but it made no difference. Other than one hilarious block LeBron had on Lawson in the third quarter, the Denver point guard couldn’t be stopped. He routinely got to his right hand(not so coincidentally LeBron’s block came on a rare occasion that Lawson was forced left.) The Nuggets defense was not outstanding. The Cavaliers simply missed many open threes that they could have made. Still, the energy and attention to detail on the defense end were lacking. When Joe Harris and Dion missed back to back threes on the same possession, the Cavs momentum was completely lost. The game felt over with 3:21 remaining.
LeBron James: LeBron’s early energy to push in transition was the highlight of the evening. There were a few lowlights to consider. With 8:20 in the second quarter, LeBron made another lazy entry pass to the Marion on the right elbow. This is becoming too common. After Darrell Arthur stole the pass, LeBron could have combined with Marion to thwart Arthur’s one man fast break. Instead, LeBron made zero attempt to get back on D. I can buy that LeBron’s cold prevented him from hustling back on defense. The real issue is that LeBron is good for about one of these totally lazy passes per game. It’s not good in combination with his recent propensity for sloppy handle in transition. The King continues to miss paint touches that he normally converts. But, even sick LeBron looks a lot better than he did a week and a half ago.
Kyrie Irving: Kyrie continue to shoot well from deep. He drilled three catch and shoot threes. He has put to rest the notion that he is a bad catch and shoot player. Kyrie is making 3.4 bombs a game over the last five on 55% shooting. Not too shabby. He did turn it over four times. For a guy who had basically eliminated turnovers from his game over the last two weeks, it was confusing to see. Still, four isn’t a ridiculously huge number balanced against eight assists. Uncle Drew got caught up in a bit of one-on-one with Ty Lawson in the second half. It led to a nice finish over Mozgov, but also stalled the offense. I would be happier if he simply D’d Lawson up. Kyrie gave good effort on that end, but he had the tendency to stop moving his feet a step too early. Lawson is clever with his footwork as he picks up his dribble. It is always a bit later than one would expect. I don’t know why Kyrie went under the pick in the first half and over in the second. If Blatt changed the game plan in the locker room, he made a mistake.
Kevin Love: It was nice to see Love punish guys on the left block. Good post footwork is simply beautiful to watch. What is less enjoyable is any defensive sequence. Even when Kevin is in the correct place, he plays so much smaller than his frame. He is not a huge player, but I think putting your arms up increases your reach. I would like to see him take a more aggressive attitude on the defensive end. He fouled a lot early in his career and has shifted too much in the other direction.
Put your hands up, Kev!
Shawn Marion: Every three that Marion buries makes me smile. It is great for the offensive spacing, but I mostly just love his ridiculous shooting release. Matrix has really found his legs over the last week. He is finishing above the rim again and using his length on D to guard quicker players. He didn’t shut down Afflalo this game, but he still made it tough. I’m not sure starting him is ultimately in the Cavs’ best interest, but it is working so far.
Anderson Varejao: Andy had a quiet day in only 18 minutes. He got whistled for a ridiculous call against Mozgov in the opening quarter. Andy came up with a couple loose balls in typical Andy fashion. Offensively, the Cavs ran far more plays for Love on the block instead of Horns play where Andy gets more usage as a passer. Defensively, Blatt is still asking Varejao to touch and recover on PnR play. It isn’t always coordinated with the guards. Surprise.
Tristan Thompson: Tristan has three impressive blocks. The first came against Wilson Chandler in straight post D. The second against McGee came on weakside rotation. The third was just silly. TT got a piece of a floater in the lane. He blocked it at the top of the square. I’m not sure what Tristan has done to speed up his leap, but I like it. He was icing more PnR than I have seen him do before. It has had better results. Offensively, TT took an elbow jumper with LeBron wide open for three on the left wing. Tristan MUST see that ball swing. The Cavs were down 81-71 at the time. I understand the desire to “shoot with confidence” but not in that situation.
Dion Waiters: Dion had a very fine game. He played mostly as a point guard in this contest. Though he was only credited with one assist, he continually made the correct ball swing and shot with confidence. As our Tom Pestak wrote, Dion has consistently responded well to being benched. He is making much better decisions and working hard on the defensive end.
Joe Harris: Joe couldn’t follow up his 4-5 three point shooting against the Hawks. I still continue to enjoy the Joe Harris experience. He does a good job of chucking the early big man rim run to prevent early post position. He has a tendency to over-help on the weakside which has lead to quite a few open corner threes. But, over-helping is easier to correct than under-helping. He must continue to grow his mustache play with confidence.
David Blatt: Blatt tried to take the blame for the Cavalier loss. I think he is simply trying to show the guys that he holds himself accountable. David is still tinkering with lineups. LeBron played 41 minutes again. I will assume that the plan is to dial back LeBron’s minutes as the season goes on, but I do understand the growing worry. The Pick and Roll defensive strategy changed in game versus the Nuggets. It is sometimes difficult to tell whether the players are failing to execute game plan, or whether Blatt is asking them to change it up frequently. I would have continued to go under on all PnR involving Lawson. Even if he makes a few threes, he is not going to kill you from deep like he does with penetration. The Zone moments actually worked in this game. It might have been prudent to lean a bit more heavily on the scheme.
Nugget Trade Bait: I hope that Nuggets continue to struggle. The league is eagerly awaiting an eventual fire sale. The Cavaliers would be wise to continue monitoring the situation. Mozgov is constantly mentioned in trade rumors. Both he and Wilson Chandler would be welcome additions to Cleveland. I’m not a good enough salary cap guy to figure out the how.
Next: The Cavs will look to rebound against the defending champion San Antonio Spurs. I am beyond excited to watch how Cleveland responds to that challenge.
Is Cols really KJ? When one disappears the other comes out swinging at bloggers.
Only one way to find out…
Cols, what is your opinion of Wiggins over Embiid?
I think Ben could have used this as an alternative to his sick dog image:
http://chuckingrocks.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/itsatrap.jpg
hahaha…nice
While it was a mostly forgettable game, it must be pointed out that Dion did a terrific job of at least trying to bring the team back later in the game. It seemed like he was the only one hitting shots, and he was still trying to distribute the ball as well. If nothing else good can be said about a sloppy, embarrassing loss to the lowly Nuggets on Cavs home floor, at least it should be noted that Dion is still trending in the right direction for this team.
My thoughts exactly!
agree with the concern on the bench 9-15 —somehow need to strengthen that ( haywood should play at least 6-8 minutes a game just for the sake of resting bodies )—jones / miller are LeBron’s friends so nothing is going to happen there unless they get the king’s blessing’s—-I think cherry can help—needs to see the floor more to get the experience—-go hard to obtain brewer —can probably rotate in at 3 positions and is a high caliber guy on and off the floor and love and him probably can play well off each other —-if they think Denver was… Read more »
They only need 8 to win it all. 9-15 are fine for the regular season. I don’t think this team needs anything at all. Except Ray Allen.
Much was made of Love’s defense after the trade. Is he bad, was it a product of a bad team, was it lack of effort, or are is there some good in there? Well, I have my answer. He’s bad. Not in the matador sense like Kyrie circa 2012; but simply does not challenge shots. He’ll body up, but he doesn’t use his arms AT ALL. Some analysis made this seem like a positive, as it keeps him out of trouble. Well, that’s true….so he can stay on the court and let 6’8″ guys like Faried shoot right over him.… Read more »
At one point in the first half the Cavs had 11 free throw attempts and the Nuggets had zero. If Love were to foul on a few plays in the post when he got beat, there is a way better chance the Cavs don’t give up as many points. What does the average big guy shoot on freethrows? Going high, I’d say 75%.
It goes beyond just the shooting percentages. If you occasionally foul a guy- HARD- he’ll think twice before coming inside again. The Cavs don’t have a single guy on the roster willing to do that.
Yep. I’d love to see Jeff Adrien on this team as a 10 minute a night power forward for this exact reason.
Another point I want to bring up, when will Blatt help the Cavs guards out on one-on-one defense. If the opponent doesn’t have a stretch big guy, let Kyrie and Dion force them to their weak hand and overplay one side of the ball. Andy is a quick lateral mover and has good hands to prevent little toss off passes if he has to slow a guard for a second.
What is the over/under on Cols eventually acknowledging that this team has severe flaws and won’t just walk to the finals?
Haha. I say around the all star break (if we don’t improve).
We can have the best offense in the league but without a league average defense with no major flaws you won’t win a 7 game series against the Western champion.
Western Champion? They won’t get by Miami or Washington if they don’t fix it.
Let alone, Chicago…
Oh geez. Chicago. LeBron will kill Chicago single handedly. There isn’t enough offense on that team to hang with us. The Finals are a given at this point.
Whatever the over is, I’m taking it. I think Cols is all-in. Still aournd .500 at the end of December? He’ll be, “Don’t worry, they’ll turn it on in January”. At the all-star break? “Don’t worry, they’ll turn it on in March”. 3-seed as the playoffs start? “Don’t worry, they’ll turn it on in the playoffs.”
I don’t expect to see a chink in Cols’ armour until they are down 3-2 in the second round of the playoffs.
A corrolary to my world, from John Maynard Keynes: “The market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent.”
Credit the Nuggets for playing aggressive, athletic basketball. What they lack in talent and fit they made up for in physicality and tenacity. When Faried ripped the ball right out of Love’s hands I thought – one team is trying to win with finesse, the other is being a bully.
This team (the Cavs) really needs someone with a relentless motor. And Delly needs to get back. COuld have used him against Lawson
Yeah. Feel like a lot of the complaints undersold the Nuggets. They clearly played their best game of the season. Blatt got outcoached, too. Glad to see he acknowledged it.
How do you undersell the second worst team in the WC? Denver is not good, Cavs just played a horrible game. You could see they just thought they could surge back with big shots at the end. They hit those shots against Boston last week and missed those shots tonight. Plain and simple.
Until the Cavs D improves on a regular basis, they are going to lose games like this when their shooting is off. If they’d played any sort of cohesive D in the first half, they’d have crushed any spirit the Nuggets had.
They played very well. They’ve been under-performing all year. Mozgov, Faried, Chandler, Afflalo, and Lawson are good players. They got monster games from Robinson and Arthur. Second worst team in the West is still not terrible. The Cavs have yet to realize that aside from Philly, there are no easy nights in the NBA. There’s more talent in the league right now, team for team, than since before the last expansion.
I’ll agree that Lawson and Faried are good players. Afflalo is hot and cold and Chandler and Mozgov are nothing special (despite your affinity for them in your trade examples). Yes they played with energy, but the Cavs matador D and general lack of energy had just as much to do with the outcome. They didn’t play any special brand of D on the Cavs in the second half (with the possible exception of Faried stripping Love), it was predominantly Cavs missing open shots. Period. It’s not like they got blown out. Cavs could have easily won this game with… Read more »
Eh. Mozgov was a beast last night. Chandler is solid. He’s been a solid RAPM player for a while. And yeah, Afflalo is hot and cold. Thought Denver played some pretty solid defense. Aside from Love, Cavs weren’t getting a ton of open stuff, and Mozgov was eating up space in the paint, making driving angles difficult, giving good help defense, and keeping the Cavs off the o-boards. Also thought Lawson had some really good transition defense, especially on Kyrie. I’m not disagreeing with your point that the Cavs could have won this game with passable defense, but I thought… Read more »
Last night was more an outlier for Mozgov (his only previous breakout game was when he had 16 rebounds in a blowout loss to the Blazers). For the most part he’s a 20-25 minute 8/7 guy (about what you get out of Andy at this point). You’re right that he and Lawson exposed the Cavs two biggest weaknesses. The fact that Lawson didn’t play in Denver helped the Cavs’ cause in that game. I disagree they played that great of D last night. In additon to Love, Kyrie, LBJ and Joe H all missed some pretty wide open shots. Joe… Read more »
To further the point, Mozgov only had 5 and 5 against the Cavs in 21 mins in Denver. But the Cavs played better interior D in that game and chose to leave Randy Foye open for uncontested threes. When they don’t play solid interior D, they get abused by the opposing Centers and make them look better than they are: to wit Jason Smith (12pts on 5-6 shooting), RoLo (19 pts on 8-11 shooting), Kanter (18 pts on 8-13 shooting), Olynyk (21 pts. on 8-13 shooting), Horford (12 pts. on 6-10) and Mozgov last night. It’s not a coincidence, it’s… Read more »
Can we just say that Blatt didn’t have a great game? I have a very hard time believing that Brian Shaw out-coached anybody. That guy is awful. They slowed it down, but still don’t run anything interesting at all. They may not have top flight talent, but they have more than enough talent to be a .500 team, even in the West. Injuries cost him last season, but now he has no excuse. His sets are miserable. Defensively, that team should be an absolute bear and it still gets torched. The Cavs didn’t play well, but if Darrell Frickin Arthur… Read more »
Yes. Give some credit to the Nuggets. They were sharp last night. We’ve been hearing a lot about the Cavs having to “play with intensity” over the past two years. For the most part, each team has enough talent to knock off their opponent if their intensity level is up. However, the speed at which the game is played today – I don’t know how teams can play that way night in and night out. The fact that we talk about “back to back” nights so much more than we used to is a testament to that. The bad thing… Read more »
Eh. Minor speedbumps will happen I guess. This has me worred not at all. Not even an extra microgram of worry. This team is built to win the Finals. Working it out early is the best way to do this.
Not one microgram? You realize that’s one-millionth of a gram?
Of course, we have gotten to the point that if the Cavs win it all then C:tbers need to get together and hoist Col714 on their shoulders and carry him along the victory parade. But if they lose it at any point – even by one in the 7th game of the finals – he needs to be placed in stocks and have rotten vegetables thrown at him. Based on Cols’ confidence, falling one microgram short doesn’t get it.
Do they still have stocks? Man, that seems like it was a terrific way to humiliate people. They should definitely bring stocks back as a punishment.
Nah. I’ve always maintained that the Cavs could lose the Finals. i don’t think they will, but it’s possible. What’s not possible is the team losing a series before the Finals. There’s just no one good enough in the East.
So basically, the idea is Cavs fans shouldn’t worry about losing to teams in the West because the East is so bad? Irving and Love are bad defenders, Love intentionally so, and neither one of them has played even one meaningful game in the NBA. Doing what they do well without shoring up their weaknesses has worked a little too well for them on Team USA. It won’t get it done in the playoffs against top NBA teams and they still seem like they need to learn that. Blatt has a TON of work to do to get this team… Read more »
I think Ben’s recap was good and even-handed, but honestly I don’t think even Cols could come up with a positive from this game (aside from maybe Dion carrying the team from end of the third into the beginning of the fourth). Trap games are one thing. Losing a lazy, sloppy, uninspired and inefficient game to one of the worst teams in the NBA on the second night of their back to back when they got smashed by another terrible team (the Knicks) is just inexcusable. The interior D was horrific tonight. Maybe the worst it’s been all season. Both… Read more »
I’ll be honest. I didn’t see a lot of half-court offense in the first half. They were running around like chickens with their heads cut off.
In the first quarter maybe, but second and third quarters had a lot of dribbling the ball up the court and working the half court offense.
I saw a real effort to find the corner three in the set offense. It wasn’t always beautiful, but they were running things in the first half. Second half, not so much.
Felt like the Cavs played hard but not smart in the first half, and then they missed a bunch of threes while Nate Robinson and Darrell Arthur went 6-7 from three. (WHAT?!) Nuggets made some really tough shots to stay in it, and the Cavs kept playing like they expected them to go away. They didn’t. Timofey Mozgov is a beast. The Cavs just don’t have a space eater like that. His sheer size clogs up the paint on defense for the Nuggets. Denver doesn’t have to collapse three defenders like the Cavs do in order to defend the paint.… Read more »
Yuck. Do not do those trades.
I’m not a big fan of the Waiters for Chandler trade, but I do like Mozgov. Was simply presenting how to get the additions done that Ben suggested.
Mozgox has looked pretty not good to me. He’s way too slow.
Dude had 11 rebounds, a block, a steal, and was 6-9 from the floor, and the Nuggets were +15 when he was in the game. (and it wasn’t colinearity). I question your scouting skills.
The man is absolutely huge and runs the floor well. His block on Kyrie was a thing of beauty. It just looked like a goaltend because he was so high off the floor. He continue to improve. I can’t imagine the Nuggets are dumb enough to lose him for an exception, but I would do that in a second. The Chandler for Dion move, not so much.
I want to see things play out for awhile before we make any trades. But I do agree with your concern about the far end of the bench – Jones, Amundson, Haywood, and Kirk never get minutes. I think it makes sense to deepen our rotation to save minutes, and to develop depth in the event we have injuries. But at this stage, with so little minutes given to the 9-15, it is hard to know if a trade is needed. I also think you are not valuing Waiters enough in your trade scenarios. I understand the Waiters frustration, but… Read more »
It is a new coach and system, still trying to figure out how the rotation players fit in. Figuring out what to do with the end of bench players will take a while. While you are probably correct that some of them will never contribute, it is way to early to give up on them. Does anyone know how Kirk did playing for Canton last week?
I am not sure if this is in response to my comment or Nate’s. But I meant to convey the same sentiment as you – i.e. they need more time and we shouldn’t be making trades yet….
Yeah, except Price would have had only as many minutes as Cherry on this team so far so he wouldn’t have the stats he’s getting on a banged up Pacers team.
Cavs gave up 12 points on 4-7 shooting from the left corner. It was WIDE OPEN all game. They simply could not recover to there. Either Shaw found a hole in the Cavs defense and exploited it well, or the Cavs were consistently over-collapsing.
Denver was also 11-15 on shots right at the rim (three feet or less). Considering two or three misses were blocks, that’s simply unacceptable defensive penetration and interior defense.
yeah consistently over collapsing. For two reasons: 1, Kyrie gets picked and you may as well taser him. He’s done for the rest of the play. 2. The Cavs don’t have a weak side rim protector, or they don’t know how to rotate one guy and then switch/recover. Everyone just sort of compresses and no one made much of an effort to close out. It was discouraging. I’m kind of puzzled as to how the Love/Kyrie pick and roll defense can be so bad and there are no adjustments made. Kyrie is treating every point guard like Mark Price and… Read more »
So, I kind of like Love going so far out. It’s so frustrating that the Cavs will go under the pick and then have someone like Marion sort of drop back, but not far enough to completely do something if the ball handler gets his man smashed onto the pick. If the team is gambling, I want it to be a full on trap and not some half type one. I think Blatt still needs to have the big man go way under the pick and to let the guards fight over the screen and try to get a steal… Read more »
These losses will happen. Miami was 5-4 in 2010-11. Remember how amped we were when Miami came to town from 2010-2013? Well Cleveland is getting everyone’s best shot every game.
Blatt needs to stop playing these guys (and a sick guy to boot) 40 MPG.
The Cavs have a trade exception and Haywood’s $10M contract to add guys. They could trade Dion but considering what he does (on occasion) it would be tough unless they are getting something special back.
Cavs don’t have that Haywood contract until next summer.
They need to play together. Plus Leb, Love, Irving are young enough to handle that workload early in the season. I have no doubt he’ll pull back as the season goes on to get them ready for the playoffs.
There’s no need to worry about young guys playing a lot of minutes early. It’ll be beneficial for later on.