Podcap: Portland 103, Cleveland 95 (or, The Cookies Crumbl)

This was the kind of loss that gets coaches fired. Cleveland folded to a tanking team at home, Thursday night, in a game they led by as many as 16 in the first half, and 14 in the third quarter. Unable to handle success, the Cavs watched successive leads evaporate, while playing at a snail’s pace. A 25-7 run between the third and fourth quarters saw the (now) 6-12 Blazers go up six to start the fourth. Boos filled the arena at one point vefotrnaveveland clawed it back to a tie. Then Cleveland gave it back with a five minute scoreless stretch that fueled a 12-0 Portland run putting them up 95-83 with 6:09 remaining. Turnovers, missed shots, and shitty defense punctuated an absolutely brutal fourth quarter that led to more than a little soul searching after.

Darius Garland composed yet another mistake filled incongruity: 15/4/8 on 18 shots with eight giveaways. Shaedon e 3got anything he wanted all night for the Blazers putting up a 29/10/5 line with just 15 shots. The dude wore Cavalier defenders like a cape. In a game where John Blair Bickerstaff inexplicably played an eight man rotation that lacked sustained energy, Jabari Walker, Duop Reath, and Matisse Thybull anchored the Blazers’ bench for their nine man rotation,. The Trailblazer subs absolutely eviscerated Caris Levert, Isaac Okoro, and Georges Niang who went 16/3/4 off the bench and grabbed just one defensive rebound in almost 60 combined minutes compared to the Blazers’ 31/17/10 bench line.

Even more inexplicably, Evan Mobley dropped 20/7/3 with two steals and played five fewer minutes than Jarrett Allen. Allen left the arena before media availability postgame – presumably to go shit, because he didn’t give one during the game. I’d like to say it was one of the worst coached and played games in a long time for Cleveland that left a lot of guys looking in the mirror. Unfortunately the Cavs dropped a 32 point deuce in Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse against Miami just eight days earlier.

The post game presser from coach B was delayed due to an extended discussion between the coach and his players after the game. After an extended period where we weren’t sure JB would come out. He did and a morbid two minutes with the media ensued.

This was all especially galling coming off one of the Cavs’ best wire-to-wire wins, Tuesday against Atlanta. Full of righteous indignation, Nate Smith and Chris Francis trudged into the podcast booth to write a sternly worded letter (podcast) to the Cavalier organization with one conclusion: this team isn’t going anywhere with J.B. Bickerstaff as its head coach.

The gents detailed their list of grievances: a near decade long inability to coach NBA offense from this millennium, an insistence on giving minutes to and removing competition from players who he seems to like but simply aren’t good, a maddening inability to make good tactical and strategic decisions, a penchant for running guys into the ground and playing short rotations, and most damning of late – an inability to get consistent effort from his players.

The last one may not be his fault. Eventually, everyone gets tired of the voice in the locker room, and sometimes teams just need a new one. That seems to be the consensus in the podcast booth and the fan base at large as even the most ride-or-die Cavs fans are turning on him. I hope it doesn’t affect J.B.’s cookies.

Nate and Chris discussed the interim and longer term options for Cleveland, and whether Koby deserves to stay too. They discussed the future of Donovan Mitchell in a Cavs uniform, the struggles of Darius Garland, re-litigate the Lauri Markkanen trade, and try to find some solace in their pod-ending pitches. There isn’t a lot of positivity here, but there is entertainment and humor in vitriol.

Cleveland takes on Detroit, Saturday for what could be Bojan Bogdanovich’s first game of the season The Pistons just posted a winless November, and it’s safe to assume that the wine and gold will be playing for J.B.’s job, if he still has it by then. It should make for an interesting night.

As always, listen below, download the full audio file, or listen on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, TuneIn, or Spotify.