Live Thread: Cavs @ Suns
2015-01-13
The Cavs have another West coast game, but this won’t be the same team we have all grown accustomed to watching over the past two weeks. King James is finally returning to action. It has been rumored that he hasn’t felt himself all season. As of right now, it has not been rumored that the King will return and still be super frail. I’m taking that to mean that he will once again be the high flying, ball swatting, bag of basketball sexiness I witnessed during the first few years of his career. Yay, optimism. Nate has some thoughts on tonight’s game that can be found here.
Shawn Marion is also back tonight.
What are you predictions? I think the Cavs play competitively, but still lose, 107-110.
Kevin Love got absolutely schooled by Markief Morris. Tell me Kevin Love is a max player. LOL
Only team dumb enough to pay the worst defender in the NBA the max is the Cavs.
And hes just a jumpshooter at the PF spot, Very overrated. Most overrated player in NBA. And he pouts!
Not defending Love by any stretch, but EVERY Cav who “guarded” Morris tonight got schooled, not just Love. And in fact, Morris did a lot of damage in the fourth when Love wasn’t even allowed in the game. Everyone knew Love was most likely a defensive liability, but the hope was they’d have some defensive scheme to allow for that. Given that the entire defensive approach of this team is shaky at best, he’s going to stick out like a sore thumb.
Lots of teams are dumb enough to pay the Penguin the max, even if this season continues to be a disappointment for him. However, only one team is unlucky enough to have traded Andrew Wiggins for him. I still don’t think the move was dumb in context of when it was done, but god it has broken the wrong way for the Cavs, in extremely short hindsight. Wiggins will make $24 million over the first four years of his career. Love, if he opts out, can sign the supermax – probably going to be around 5 years, $120 million .… Read more »
I’d like to put it to a vote that we banish the following words from this Blog:
RELAX
PROCESS
TIME
FINALS
And CHEMISTRY. I forgot that one…
Not a friggin chance. Plop the health issues and roster shakeup on any team in the league (z Bo on the Grizzlies made that clear) and they will struggle. Plop the coach who has to figure it out on the fly with new pieces and bags of bones and very little practice time each night on those teams too. There are maybe three teams (not 10 as Nate’s last write-up seems to assume) who can figure out how to win despite those obstacles. Give it a rest…did you expect the cavs to finish in the top 2 in the east?… Read more »
The primary thing I expected was that I would enjoy watching this team versus watching the dark ages of the last four years. That’s not a super high expectation, or even a lot to ask. But loss after loss followed up by excuse after excuse is absolutely no fun. You claim to have not expected this team to finish in the top two in the EC. I would say you were probably in the minority on that one, but I was with you in that minority. I expected much the same as you did. Make the playoffs with home court… Read more »
Z-Bo has missed more games than Love, Irving or LBJ and the Grizzlies are 26-11. The Rockets are 9-4 in the games that Dwight Howard has missed. The Warriors have a first year coach, their defensive anchor has missed a ton of games and they are 30-5. The Bucks are down two of their three best players in Sanders and Parker, frankly don’t have a lot of talent to begin with, have a first year coach who is doubling his years of coaching experience this season, and they are ahead of the Cavs in the standings. DeMar DeRozan has missed… Read more »
Love the write ups and comments from everyone, good work by all. It’s funny that the very thing that this team and organization needs is opposite of what everyone is screaming for: stability. Our game day roster hasn’t been consistent since Varejao went down due to various injuries and trades. Our best player has been out. I don’t believe we’ve had a proper evaluation of the team that we’ll have for the rest of the season, as constructed. So let’s all relax, give Blatt and the rest of the coaching staff some time. The teams we are trying to emulate… Read more »
Sure, they can have more time. In fact, pretty soon they’ll have a whole summer’s worth of time to “figure out the chemistry” “let the process happen” and “evaluate how the pieces fit.” At some point the realization has to dawn that this just isn’t a very good team and they won’t be as long as they only try when they feel like it. LBJ is not a magic bullet. Even 2007 LBJ wouldn’t be. I’ve been a Blatt supporter and agree that more change would most likely be even more detrimental. But we as fans are not going to… Read more »
I’m really hoping that LeBron has started to warm up to Blatt by the end of the season. If LeBron is on board, everyone else will follow. Then maybe they will incorporate more than just high pick and rolls. And they HAVE TO get out of the isolation sets late in games. Do something to keep the defense honest, because every team is just going to pack the paint, and the Cavs three point shooters are not scaring any opponents. Love sitting out the fourth. Man, I hope it sinks in, and he invests some effort on defense. Otherwise, every… Read more »
I think you could be right about the time part, just not sure how much. Not advocating to let go of blatt immediately, but if they/he hasn’t figured it out in a month not sure what else you can do. They cannot afford to miss the playoffs period. However, I now wonder if an early exit might not be good to show Irving and love they cannot do things as usual and maybe to show james he needs to buy into an actual offensive system. I highly doubted this team to win the east this year, let alone win in… Read more »
So far, I’m just not having the fun I thought I would have watching this team. I feel like I won the lottery and then had to go to prison for tax evasion.
Yeah, I don’t think any of us thought that the only fun we’d be having halfway into the season following the Cavs would be indulging in gallows humor about how screwed up they are. Bleaugh.
I guess we just can’t have nice things…
DW was pretty close to being right on the outcome/final score…
LBJ probably should have waited until the Bulls game at home. Trying to right the ship on the road against the WC is tough thing to do.
I can’t tell if Blatt really believes what he’s saying, or if he’s just trying to talk himself into all the justifications for losing…
I couldn’t watch. how bad was it?
About what you’d expect. Only tonight it seemed like he had to think before he spoke so he could really psych himself up for the canned bullsh*t excuses he had to recite.
This Cavs team is not going to be okay. It is dysfunctional. There’s little evidence of any effective coaching. Remember pre-season when we had all of the feel-good articles about Blatt’s genius and the beautiful game. Well, we just watched a fourth quarter that featured pretty much nothing but Lebron ISOs.
I really cannot imagine that Blatt will make it through this season. My guess is that Tyron Lue will be the interim coach by the end of the All-Star break.
Does anyone have any reasonable ideas for how to fix the Cavs?
Hire George Karl as they probably should have done originally? But then again dunno if a coaching change would turn this team around at this point in the season. Still as I said above if Blatt is really out of his league, this is probably necessary.
Hey come on, once Shump is healthy we’re going to win the East. Marion is still working is way back into the rotation. Mosgov is a beast (he looked like poo against Alex Len tonight, but Len is super good so that doesn’t count). Anyway, it doesn’t matter what our seeding is or if we have home court advantage — we are just as likely to lose at home as away, and to a lower seed as a higher seed. There is not one team in the East we can’t beat in the playoffs, and if you can beat one… Read more »
Bwwwhaaahhahaha! Awesome.
Shumpert! Shumpert! He’s our man! If he can’t do it…
My son got a bad grade at school today and when he told me about it, he followed it up with “Don’t worry Dad. It’s a process. Everything is going to be fine…”
I told him “no more Cavs press conferences for you, son”
Ha! Power of delusional thinking. This team certainly has that nailed down.
What’s next? “The dog ate my point guard?”
Maybe that’s why KLove doesn’t put his hand up on D… it’s cause he doesn’t have the answer
I imagine Blatt probably goes home tonight and sits in the corner rocking back and forth until sunrise saying to himself, “don’t worry it’s a process everything is going to be fine.”
Well played sir.
Chris Haynes: You haven’t gone after a ref like that all year.
And there it is… Apparently LBJ was stopping Blatt from going after the official. Hmmm
There you go – Blatt claims LeBron was keeping him from getting a tech.
Waiting for the question about the shove…
Dave McMenamin @mcten · 40s 41 seconds ago
David Blatt said LeBron was saving him from getting a tech when he shoved him out of the way. Didn’t make much of it beyond that.
Blatt looks like he’s been hit by a truck in post-game interview.
Then again maybe I am just in full on panic mode. Quite possible.
all I know is LeBron would never push George Karl.
That was who I wanted all along. Dumbfounded as to why he wasn’t given consideration. The more I have seen this front office and owner the more I am convinced they are and simply always will be incompetent. Success in the nba states with savvy owners ans extremely competent front office hires and trickles down from there. Of course luck is always involved but no one can say the cavs haven’t had their fair share of luck.
Why is George Karl still available? He’s been looking for work! I think he even wanted the Kings job.
Can’t wait for a Mark Jackson v Dan Gilbert wrestling match.
mark Jackson is the worst. Kerr is proving how bad he is.
Agreed… Although I might put Mike Brown and Byron Scott behind Jackson.
yeah. Mark Jackson motivates. He can make a bad team better but not a good team great.
I have to think Jackson’s ultra-evangelical brand of motivation (i.e. “Jesus wants us to close out on the perimeter!” “real soldiers of God don’t give easy fouls!”) has to get old after a while though. And wouldn’t work that well with international players.
Cavs with 19 turnovers. Kyrie had almost as many turnovers (8) as points (9)
Kyrie is a dick and a coach killer!
Ouch!!!! that hurts
It was nice knowing you Blatt!
Blatt going with jones and miller over love there will probably cost him his job
I think you might be right. But jones was playing good defense. The miller sub at the end he has no excuse for
Well, at this point, maybe it should…
His rotations were confounding once again
What was it we were doing right during the 8 game win streak? Was it just good shooting and health?
They played a grand total of ZERO WC teams during the win streak, that’s what it was
Exactly. The west is really tough.
And by running Lebron into the ground to squeak by teams. He played 42 minutes both games against Toronto (wins by 4), 40 minutes to beat the Knicks by 3, 41 minutes to beat the Bucks by 3. Not to beat a dead horse, but we should have realized having to play Lebron 40+ minutes a game to barely beat teams like the Bucks and Knicks wasn’t a good sign, but we didn’t have the bigger picture back then.
wow. Blatt getting killed on nbatv
Do you guys seeing Blatt being able to turn this team around or is he a lost cause? Too nice? Lacking fundamental motivational skills? Was the offensive genius nonsense real and these guys just don’t listen or lacking in bb iq? Or is he a college level coach in way over his head in both player management (important), game management (very important), and bb knowledge on both offense and defense (most important)? Please, I would like thoughts because I truly am dumbfounded. Please tell me the cavs did not make the biggest mistake in franchise history by hiring him.
They DO NOT listen to Blatt. He may be a good coach. He might be a great coach. We’ll probably never know. I want to believe that this team is just tuning him out since the alternative is that he’s actually just completely out of his depth.
What is the solution? Do they ride it out and hope the players eventually connect or promote lue? I really have no answers. I do know that if he is out of his depth he has to go. If it is as you said, they I truly don’t know how you fix this.
Exactly JB – it’s hard to know the solution without knowing what the problem is… None of this has added up, and none of it leads me to believe changing the coach is going fix it.
I don’t want to further overreact to one game, but it’s going to be really hard for him to defend some of the decisions he’s making out there. Nate is right, they are HORRIBLE inbounding the ball and running plays out of time outs. His rotations are borderline insane and he doesn’t know how to manage the game. Guys aren’t running offensive sets and everything devolves into ISO ball. And D is just a disaster. If this is what comes of an “awesome practice” then I’d hate to see what comes from a bad one. If they don’t win in… Read more »
Plus Blatt rode Lebron into the ground in just 29 games, and he played Lebron 37 minutes in his return game doing the same thing. He’s in desperation mode and he is going to play Lebron 40 minutes a game like there is no tomorrow, because for Blatt there probably is no tomorrow. I don’t think he’s a bad coach but I don’t see a way forward that’s good for Blatt and the Cavs this season.
James Freaking Jones should just be cut tomorrow
Wiggins with his 10th straight 20-point game tonight.
Salt… meet wound.