https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=acjirC0p73U#t=235<\/p>\n
Happy Thanksgiving, campers. This Thursday, since it’s a holiday, I’ll spare you my weekly 2,000 word screed on what I’d like to see the Cavs doing and just show you a perfect example of the Cavs doing exactly what I’ve been begging them to do all season long.<\/p>\n
Hopefully, the above video above (which comes from @DawkinsMTA, who runs the best NBA YouTube channel out there) is set to the appropriate time, but since I have no idea how to do that, skip to the 3:55 mark if it starts from the beginning. This is how a 2014-15 Cavalier offensive set should look.<\/p>\n
STEP 1:\u00a0<\/strong>The play here is a simple 3-1 pick and roll, which was a staple of the Heat offense when LeBron played there and has been an attempted staple of the Cavalier offense this season. It’s a very effective set, since not many teams can have a 250-pound man as the ball-handler on the pick-and-roll. The problem with it so far for the Cavaliers has been that Kyrie has been setting nonchalant screens, so instead of a 3-1 pick-and-roll it’s “Kyrie and LeBron waste 8 seconds of the shot clock while standing near each other.”<\/p>\n On this play, however, Kyrie sets a screen like a guy who was born in Australia, not like a guy who went to Duke. LeBron’s man can’t fight over the screen fast enough, and LeBron has a lane to the basket. Now the Wizards are on the back foot, and good things can happen organically. That’s what a successful offensive set does.<\/p>\n STEP 2:\u00a0<\/strong>Marcin Gortat makes a nice rotation to keep LeBron from getting an easy finish on the drive, and Kris Humphries rotates down to keep LeBron from having a pass to Thompson for an easy dunk. This leaves Joe Harris open for an above-the-break 3, and LeBron fires\u00a0the pass to him.<\/p>\n STEP 3:\u00a0<\/strong>Since Harris is a 3-point threat who has to be respected, Kyrie’s man leaves him to contest what would be a wide-open 3. Harris, without so much as putting the ball on the floor, swings the ball to Kyrie, who’s open at the top of the 3-point arc. This forces Dion Waiters’ man to leave Waiters alone in the corner and close out on Kyrie at full speed.<\/p>\n STEP 4:\u00a0<\/strong>Kyrie now has two options: Hit Waiters with a pass that would set him up with an open 3, or decimate the ankles of a defender who has to run at him full-speed, and thus has no real chance of staying in front of one of the best ballhandlers in basketball. Kyrie goes with option B, and goes from left to right with a behind-the-back dribble on his man.<\/p>\n STEP 5:\u00a0<\/strong>Kyrie is now between the top of the key and the free throw line, with\u00a0options.\u00a0<\/em>He can pull up on his man for a mid-range jumper, which isn’t a terrible shot, but isn’t a great one. There’s still enough room between Waiters and his man for a three if Kyrie fires a pass to his right side. But the best option is the one Kyrie goes with — since Kyrie’s crossover forced Humphries to step into the middle of the lane to prevent Kyrie from getting a layup on a potential blow-by, LeBron is now open just under the basket, on the left side. In a flash, Kyrie picks up his dribble and hits LeBron with a bullet pass in one fluid motion. Now LeBron’s got a layup, and he even gets an and-1 out of the deal.<\/p>\n That’s what we’re talking about here — spacing, guys working together, multiple good options created by actions, and LeBron and Kyrie using their respective talents to make life easier on each other. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=acjirC0p73U#t=235 Happy Thanksgiving, campers. This Thursday, since it’s a holiday, I’ll spare you my weekly 2,000 word screed on what…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[413],"tags":[56,163,412],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-29318","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-video-breakdowns","tag-kyrie-irving","tag-lebron-james","tag-video"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cavstheblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cavstheblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cavstheblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cavstheblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cavstheblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29318"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/cavstheblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29318\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29343,"href":"https:\/\/cavstheblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29318\/revisions\/29343"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cavstheblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cavstheblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cavstheblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29318"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cavstheblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcoauthors&post=29318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}