Live Thread: Cavs @ Rockets
2015-03-01
Sorry for the delay guys!
LeBron is back and looking to take down another MVP rival in The Beard…
Cavs look to get back on the winning track (even without Kyrie). Going to be a challenging one today against the Rockets… I believe the Cavs will ride another strong performance from LBJ to victory…
Prediction: Cavs 115-111. Fire up the comments!
Would have been nice to have won. Would have also been nice if LeBron played a little smarter. And the whole squad attacking the rim in the second half when they started calling everything. On one hand, LeBron shutting down Harden is a good idea. BUT: the energy expended is a main reason why he could not hit any foul shots. Because he went iso-run down the clock, he had to make those shots. Much smarter would have been good ball movement at the end. Any idea why Moz was not out there much? That seems like something Mike Brown… Read more »
I think Blatt really, really likes TT’s ability to snag offensive rebounds when LeBron is in hero mode. When LeBron does his thing where he’s going to dribble for 10 seconds then drive or shoot NO MATTER WHAT, TT’s ability to secure offensive rebounds is the only other skill that’s valuable on the offensive end.
I’m actually happy the Rockets are trolling LBJ, a motivated King is a much more dangerous King. Too bad the Rockets won’t pay for it though, since they aren’t getting out of the West.
Wow that was a war. We had that one, and LeBron just couldn’t find his FT stroke. That was the MVP right there. Now that that’s out of the way maybe LBJ can go back to focusing on the championship. Not only did Harden kick LBJ, he threw an elbow at TT’s head on his way to the basket later. Yeesh. The good news is that the Cavs are able to go to war. Also good is that they have this Kyrie Irving guy who is pretty good. Kevin Love looks better these days. His shot is looking better and… Read more »
I almost threw my remote through the TV after the elbow to TT’s throat. I cannot fathom how that wasn’t an offensive foul.
Dion is so god awful. I remember when OKC made the trade and people were saying his acquisition was insurance against Reggie Jackson leaving, Amin Elhassan quipped “Dion Waiters is not insurance against anything.” 25 games into the experiment I haven’t seen anything to prove Amin wrong.
Somebody good with analytics should run a study in a couple of years on which was more impactful, the Dubs not trading Klay or the Cavs trading Dion. I bet it’s a close run thing.
Cavs scored 15 points in 5 minutes with LeBron on the bench at the start of the 4th quarter. They scored 14 points in the final 12 minutes of the game (including overtime) with LeBron in perimeter iso mode.
Good stat; sums it up
The Rockets will never win with Harden. He won’t get those ridiculous calls in the playoffs.
I didn’t get to catch the game, but I have to say it annoys me a little when people say “well, this game didn’t count and/or is irrelevant because we didn’t have we didn’t have Kyrie”. They all count. They all are relevant. It is also interesting to me that the same people who are like “well we didn’t have Shawn Marion so this game didn’t count” are the ones who give no weight to the other team being down one or more of their best players. Why do such people assume the Cavs will be 100% healthy in the… Read more »
Sorry Arch I didn’t mean to reply to your comment, I was just ranting generally and clicked the wrong box. Happens a lot.
No worries man! I accidentally posted a job earlier. Stuff happens. W/Rs to your post I don’t think people are dismissing this loss in any way or discounting the Rockets win because we didn’t have Kyrie. I think most agree, dispite some ridiculous officiating, the Rockets were th undisputed winners. LeBron blew it down the stretch. It’s not a big deal because it’s not a playoff game but this certainly felt like one and hopefully the team gained some experience.
Yeah, I know. It’s just a random pet peeve of mine when people feel the need to explain away losses when wins are always self-evident, which by no means unique to this game or this group (frankly this group is a ton more rational than most fan groups). “Trap game”, “back to back”, “we didn’t have X”, “plane got in late last night”, “the other team got lucky”, “Player Y on the other team went nuts, that won’t happen again”, “we shot 4% lower from the field than the season average, it’s a fluke”, “refs have it out for us”,… Read more »
Honestly early on I wanted to blame this on officiating. But with the amount of opportunity we had with LeBron I can’t say it was unfair. Sure the officiating was crap and we probably got screwed a bit. But in the end it wasn’t that lopsided. Harden probably should’ve been ejected, but he wasn’t. LeBron also should have made his FTs. There’s the game. We/he had plenty of opportunities. We failed. No big deal. It’s the regular season.
I agree Mac, gotta give credit where credit is due… there’s a reason why Houston’s one of the top teams in the West, even without Dwight.
ESPN Announcers (OKC vs Lakers) They gave a first round pick for Waiters, he needs to be more consistent.
Me: Good luck
Haha, yeah that is how that works isn’t it? You explain to a player “hey you were a high draft pick, we need X level of production out of you” and the guy says “really?? Why didn’t you say so? Now all the pieces are starting to fit together! And that explains that money that keeps showing up in my bank account.”
OR DO WE MAKE A CREATIVE PITCH FOR JAVALE McGEE
OUESTION– DO WE GO OUT AND GET ANOTHER PT GD BEFORE MIDNIGHT TONIGHT —–DID THE LAST 2 GAMES INDICATE TO CAOCHES/ GM THAT THERE IS A NEED FOR THIS
No…. end of story.
We could use a DJ Augustine on this team.
Sometimes I feel Lebron is only interested in making the pass that will log in as an assist in the box score for him. And not willing to contribute to a free flowing offense where the ball moves side to side barely touching the floor and there are many “hockey assists” made, meaning the passes before the one pass that leads to the score and is logged as an assist.
LeBron gets caught up in the “Marty Mcfly Bravado.” What did you say Biff? He gets distracted with individual battles and that distracts from the teams mission and ideology.
I don’t know. Sometimes I think we project too much onto LBJ. I think, in the moment, he just feels he is the best option and has confidence, so he tries to take control. I don’t think it is an ego thing. I think he just truly feels he is the best option in certain situations.
And tonight, with JR, Shump, and Love not shooting super well, and Delly and TT being limited offensively, I am not sure he made the wrong decisions. He just didn’t make his shots.
This makes no sense:
@JasonLloydABJ On Harden’s kick: Refs told #Cavs if it was intentional, it would’ve been flagrant-2 & ejection. Cavs clearly felt intent was there
How in the world could the refs think it was not intentional? If that’s the standard, there has to be a suspension coming.
Why did Mozerati only play 18 minutes? He had 4 baskets in the first 6 minutes of the game, before they stopped looking for him. Nobody on Houston could handle him.
And if the answer is that TT was a beast, they could have used Moz and TT at the same time — TT is quick enough to guard whoever Houston put at the 4.
Phil,
I completely agree. This has become a trend with Blatt. I don’t get it? I also don’t get why they didn’t llay Perkins with this type of game?
It would have been fun to watch Perkins when Harden drove to the basket. He would have gotten his money’s worth.
Yeah I don’t think Blatt understands what to do in the NBA sometimes. He needs to send messages like berating refs and sending in the Punisher.
Don’t want to awaken the Dellavadovans here, but if Matty D gets 42 (!) minutes, surely some of those minutes could be sent Moz’s way…with LeBron playing point guard anyway, why not let Moz come back with the second unit? TT, James Jones, Moz, LBJ and Shump would work just fine…
@JasonLloydABJ: Number of #Cavs players upset James Harden wasn’t ejected for his groin kick on LeBron. “I thought it was a dirty play,” JR Smith said.
12-40 on 3 point shots didn’t help this game either.
Harden joins Reggie Evans and Jason Terry to the “Nut Grabber Club.”
@JasonLloydABJ on Harden’s kick: Now THAT is a loose ball foul
They need to run JR of some screens and get him some looks, try to give some touches to Love in the post. Anyways ISO ball all the time will burn out physically LeBron and Kyrie.
It’s hard to blame LeBron since he did most of the scoring and decided to play Harden himself. But he needs to take his FT% seriously ans the Cavs coaching staff need to draw a few plays now and then.
No, it’s easy to put a lot of the blame on LeBron. His perimeter iso ball killed the offense.
I know but if it wasn’t for his defense the Cavs wouldn’t have a chance to win it at the end.
@EthanJSkolnick: LeBron on Harden kick: “Obv it was not a basketball play & obviously the league will take a look at it… I don’t know what he was thinking”
@EthanJSkolnick: LeBron: “The guys put us in position to win, and I didn’t come through for them.”
Good to see him take responsibility.
Why doesn’t Lebron practice what he preaches? Move the ball, you have so much talent on your team.
Exactly. He did it in Miami but he is going ball hog now and that would not end up well come playoff time.
LBJ was not his best down the stretch. But these kind of games happen. Good team, on the road, without our 2nd best player – I really can’t complain. To his credit, even though he went cold, LBJ did a nice job on Harden. As frustrating as it was to watch us go ISO ball, Houston did the exact same thing and didn’t have much success themselves. I love Delly, but this another one of those games that really highlight how limited he is. If he asked to do anything beyond his 12-14 minutes of solid backup PG, it really… Read more »
I agree. PlDelly Playing for extended minutes hurts the Cavs overall offense. He is not a playmaker and you need your PG to be a good playmaker.
You must have missed the two huge rebounds Delly had in the last minute of regulation (one off a free throw miss, and an o-board). There’s a reason we stuck with Delly instead of Shump down the stretch.
LBJ makes for terrible basketball watching – this loss is on him, not Delly or Love or JR or TT who all played good games.
I would have to agree with Jason, Hot Sauce re: Delly. He made plenty of plays for the offense when they made their run to close the gap early in the 4th quarter. He made crucial plays down the stretch offensively and defensively.
All that had to happen is LBJ making those free throws at the end, and play defense the final possession. Yes, he does have limitations, but he doesn’t hurt the team by any stretch.
On the bright side, nobody on the Cavs was injured or ejected, even though the game almost got out of control a few times.
Can’t wait to hear “this game was meaningless” and “Delly sucks”.
Nothing you can do about Delly haters, they dislike logic… and they all think they’re better coaches than Blatt.
Serious regression by LeBron on the bad iso ball. That’s more maddening than the free-throw shooting.
Agreed. Win or lose, I am tiring of watching Kevin Love trying to get the right angle for a pass that never comes. Is it any surprise their last play looked like four guys standing around?
The Celtics are killing the Warriors right now.
This was the game that the ghost of Gilbert Arenas haunted LeBron.
Harden will get suspended for that kick!
He really should. That was disgraceful.
3-11 from the LeBron at the line… Smh
lebrons had these games before but bricking free throws like that just shows he still feels the pressure in big games and he let Rockets and fans get to him…with a game this close and that many missed free throws especially by star player just stinks
This game will go down as the nut shot game. M
The Golden State win already seems like a long time ago… Hurry back Kyrie!!
cavs need to have an ” AUTHORITIVE ” WIN AGAINST THE CELTICS ON TUES TO GET BACK ON TRACK
which team was most affected with player not playing Houston with howard out or cavs with kyrie out —-the positive the bulls lost also –didn’t lose ground on them —-
At least the Cavs competed. But i really doubt the Cavs can win championship playing ISO all the time. Playing ISO will make it easy for good defensive teams like the Hawks to get stops against the Cavs. And Lebron needs to work on his FT’s %.
There is no way we win playing iso-ball. Didn’t LeBron learn from his first stint in CLE?
Didn’t he learn from the first half of this season?
Iso-ball with a minute to go–okay. Iso-ball with five minutes to go? Ridiculous…
Iso Ball with a minute to go is the worse time to do it because that’s what most teams are expecting. That’s the time to move the ball the most.
Ugh. That’s maddening. We murder them with Kyrie on the roster. Just cannot believe Lebron missed those two…or really any of the 8 he missed…or that he took 35 freakin shots…or that Tristan Thompson had more offensive rebounds than the entire rockets team and we still lost. Woof.
Cavs didn’t have Kyrie, but Rockets didn’t have Howard… Cavs KILLED them on the boards…
We would have beat them on the boards regardless…but Kyrie changes the entire game for us. Stretches the defense super thin
Tough loss but hard to be too upset, this was the game of the year, real rough n tuff
Haha how in the world is it tough to get upset about this game? I mean I’m over it now but that was definitely a game to get upset about!
The Cavs’ issues this game are nothing new at this point; they will either get fixed by the playoffs or they won’t. Besides, Rockets had no Dwight and we had no Kyrie. LeBron iso ball can be maddening yes but it made for great theater. This was a highly entertaining contest.
Harden holding his chest during the post-game interview… asked if he’s okay… responds “I’m a warrior…” What a douche-bag…
Hey he has a mean right leg kick…
I think GS would beg to differ. Curry has far more class than Harden.
Ya, we didn’t deserve this one… Did not play like ourselves.
Tough loss… Cavs had their chances though even with the awful officiating
Tough loss! But it was good experience.
Miserable experience. But I know what you mean.
It always sucks to lose. But the Cavs have won 18 of 22 and were undermanned vs Houston. I thought LeBron went a little Bizarro LeBron in this one.
Question: Does LeBron trust his teammates when the game is on the line?
Good question… not enough it would seem.
What a choke from Lbj. As a part-time player for the Cavs he should not be considered for the MVP award.
When LeBron missed his free throws, he was shooting with 4-point-something seconds left. TT fouled Harden almost as soon as Harden got the rebound. How did the clock end up at 1.5 seconds? And why wasn’t it reviewed?
Yeah that was a joke. We should have had at least 2 secs by the end
Have someone else besides Lebron shoot
just hoping like aaron mentioned that this will serve as a ” motivational ” tool for LeBron ——don’t think it is time to panic or crucify anyone —we have been spoiled with the performance the last 5 weeks —-I don’t think you see LeBron go 3/11 in a playoff game —-would like to have seen love get more touches though
Still time for a miracle shot…