So the previous post covered the first half of the Nets, Cavs Game. I didn’t even talk about all the bad help defense, lazy double teams, and time spent standing around doing nothing.
Here are the second half highlights.
Play 11
Williams races by a flatfooted Irving.
Kyrie is very good at guarding the sideline... This led to an open three for Bogans.
Play 12
Things got a bit better for a while in the second half, as Irving played with more effort
Kyrie denies Williams the ball and makes a steal.
Play 13
An impromptu double team by Kyrie surprises Lopez for a turnover. Nice play, KI.
Play 14
Unfortunately, that’s where it stopped. In the most painful play of the game, the Cavs were down 11 with just under 4 minutes left. If they ever needed a stop it was then.
I’ve distilled this pain down to the GIF at the top of the post. Kyrie is responsible for chasing Williams around a baseline screen, and then KI slows, and slows some more, and just… stops… and as Kevin put it to me in an email, “I remember the Deron Williams three where Kyrie trailed him by about 20 feet. I also pressed rewind to figure out what happened. Once second Kyrie was guarding him, the next D-Will was 20 feet away and wide open.” I don’t know if it was the design of the defense for Kyrie to hand off to Waiters, and then to Varejao, but if it was, neither of them seemed to know about it, and it was a stupid design. This wide open three pretty much sealed the game. This play was so effective the Nets ran it again, and Irving did the same thing.
Conclusions
Zack Lowe of Grantland recently wrote of Jamal Crawford and Andre Miller, “Next time you watch a Clippers or Nuggets game, try following which player each one of these guys is guarding. It’s a fun exercise. Both teams will slide them around to the weakest perimeter player available, though Miller will make things more complicated for you by switching on almost every off-ball and on-ball screen.” Now these guys are a combined 102 years old. Of course they’re not going to be the best defenders in the league, but Kyrie is 20. He can certainly give more effort and has better lateral movement than these two, and to be lumped in with their style of defense has to be well, embarrassing.
Byron Scott, Chris Grant, the Cavs Bench, and Kyrie Irving’s defense are absolutely selling out Anderson Varejao and Kyrie Irving’s offense right now. The rotations make no sense. This team has the worst bench in the league. They play the worst defense. They are possibly the most frustrating team in the league. Until good Kyrie “buys in” to be a leader on defense as well as offense and destroys evil Kyrie, the team is not going to be get any better.
Phenomenal piece, dude. Just another reminder that while K2 has momumental talent, his overall game still has a lot of growing to do.
Yea I’m just going to continue to hammer this meme that the “rotations make no sense.” There is no way to make them make sense. Every single player, save one, is awful off of that bench. Awful. You can’t hide them. They suck. Byron could have the exact rotations that you would like him to have, and it would most likely make no difference. They are that bad.
And I’ll also bite back against the idea that Grant is “selling out” anything. They are collectively deciding to not go for it this year and wait one more year, which was always the plan.
Oh, and KYrie’s defense is poor, but that’s fairly normal for young players. From LeBron James to Blake Griffin (the two best rookies of the last 10 years along with Kyrie), their defense the first couple of years in the league was very below average. Only now, in his third year, is Blake Griffin starting to play harder on defense. It took LeBron into about his 4th season before he started playing hard on defense. I don’t know why it is like that, but it is.
The fact that Kyrie’s offense is what it is (incredible in every sense of the word) leads me to believe that his defense will pick up. He is 20 and aside from last season played only a hand full of college games. I am sure in high school he never really needed to be a lock down defender. Good defense is all about good habits. It will come for Kyrie eventually. I cant think of any great defenders that are 20 years old although his game is very (very very very) lopsided.
The bench is well… yeah we don’t have any talent coming off that bench. In a world where the Cavs are a playoff team we have a legit starting wing (not saying alonzo isn’t legit) and Gee coming off the bench. I would love to see us make a move for some serious role players but I really don’t see it happening. I am confident in saying this is the last year that I say “next year.”
The bench is terrible, but at least we’re not paying old guys like Anthony Parker who aren’t part of the future.
Rich, once again, playing 5 guys who can’t do anything with the ball at once, and not staggering Kyrie and Verajoa’s minutes AT ALL is hurting our bench production. Yes, they aren’t a good bench, but Scott is putting them in position to fall flat on their faces, and seems to enjoy doing so. CJ miles has never SUCKED in his career until now. Casspi Casspi has never sucked this bad. The only guy on our bench who doesn’t suck right now is also the only guy who gets burn with Kyrie and Andy, the only bench guy Andy and Kyrie will pass to, Boobie Gibson. That is on Byron to get Kyrie and Andy and Dion to help get CJ miles, Leuer, and Smardo some easier looks once in a while.
Also Rich, it is never normal for any NBA player, not one ever, to be as bad as kyrie is right now. He has been rightfully called the worst defender in the league, and no one smart is arguing that. Thats not just being young, thats being an atrocious embarressment. Maybe that’s just part of the plan too, but its insufferable to watch and Kyrie as a basketball player should be ashamed.
Dave, you are right that good D comes from good habits, and Kyrie isn’t practicing one good defensive habit right now. If he doesn’t start concentrating on this when he’s young and still developing habits, he will probably always be a piss poor defender. He needs to change his habits NOW. I was more than willing to give him a pass as a 11 college game experience rookie carrying the offense, but he not only looks like he hasn’t improved this year, he looks like he has regressed, which I didn’t think was possible.
Lets stop giving these supremely talented guys a pass on maximizing their talent. When the media stopped giving Lebron a pass, blaming his teamates and not his love of the 3 and aversion to the post, he hunkered down and actually developed a post game and won a ship. I don’t want to wait until Kyrie is 27 years old before he starts engaging on defense.
Kyrie’s performance on defense is terrible, but I don’t think that means he’s necessarily terrible at defense. I just think he doesn’t care on defense. He admitted as much on the True Hoop TV interview from the other day. He saves his energy for offense, and you can tell from looking at these pictures. Even the crappiest basketball players know the proper defensive stance, stay between your man and the basket, etc. Kyrie knows these things, he just doesn’t care.
Rich made the point about players not picking up their defensive game right away, and for offensively gifted players, this is completely true. LeBron didn’t take that next step until he bought in on defense. Kyrie doesn’t even need to attempt to get to that level. There aren’t any great defensive point guards that are equally great on offense. Of your top PG’s in the league, only Rondo is renown for his defense, and even that’s overstated. None of the great offensive PG’s can guard any of the other ones, the difference is that most of the other guys make it look like they try.
Kyrie doesn’t do that yet, but he also has the responsibility of scoring 25% of the points every night, and assisting on another 15% of them. I wouldn’t trade what Kyrie is doing on offense for anything he could do on defense, because I have no faith in anyone else on the team to pick up the slack on offense. Kyrie’s defense is awful, but his offense is outstanding. Andy’s defense is generally great, and his offense is above average. Dion’s offense is sometimes great, and sometimes awful. Boobie’s shot has been great thus far, and his defense is slightly above average against smaller guards. I have no other positive remarks regarding any of the other 8 guys on the roster regarding offense or defense. I’d say that’s a lot larger problem than Kyrie’s defense at this point.
Like somebody said in a previous post, the entire game revolves around baskets. As good as KI is at making them, setting them up, etc. he is awful at preventing them. Does anyone like our chances in a shootout game? Considering our offensive liabilities, I don’t. This team is only going to win if they pay attention to the details, and those details will hopefully magnify in importance if and when this team takes the next step. Everybody seems to be okay and accepting of not winning this year. I am too, but this season needs to stand for something. B-Scott, Grant, and the FO needs to establish a culture of winning and that culture starts with defense and taking personal pride in your play. Defense is a part of that and all champions understand that and work to make it part of their game. I love KI, but a year or two more under Coach K would have served him well in terms of picking up on some of the nuances and details of the game, or as Nate has shown simply some basic defensive principles. Furthermore, where is our mid-30′s veteran point guard who can spell him some minutes, but more importantly get on his ass when he needs it. That lack of effort is appalling. Thanks for posting and I hope the Cavs coaches are drilling the same ideas each day at practice. Perhaps more importantly, I hope KI is taking them to heart and not already tuning out.
Some of you have touched on this but the kid is 20 years old with limited college experience. I think he has spoiled us with an offensive game/repetoire that rivals, if not, exceeds that of his all-star PG counterparts and it is amazing that he can do this so early and at such a young age. Defense against the quickest and most talented players in the world is going to get better as he gets older. The good thing is that he has his quickness already…the rest (positioning, decision-making, strength, etc.) can all be taught/obtained. We should not give him a pass on D and it is extrememyl frustrating to watch but be a little more mindful that he has played less than 60 NBA games in his career and he will get better.
I’m sick of hearing about how 20 something year old millionaires spoil us paying fans, can we stop that please? Yes, most young NBA players get better at defense with experience, but most aren’t as Terribly laughable as Kyrie is right now, and most don’t show 0 improvement from their rookie to sophomore years. Scott needs to get on him now. As much as he does on offense, he undoes on defense. Did you see the stat line of opposing PG’s against Cleveland? Did you see how many easy baskets are scored by guys blowing by kyrie or Irving finding himself in no man’s land guarding no one? Do you see how he doesn’t give a damn? Its infuriating, especially when everyone keeps trying to tell me what a competitor and winner he is.
Amen, KSI. There are kids at the Y who play better defense than Kyrie does sometimes. For instance, Play 5 in this article was comically awful. Irving was beat on a cut to the basket that started ten feet behind the three point line. Kyrie’s sins aren’t sins of execution or understanding, they are failures of effort, focus, attention, and accountability. If he doesn’t fix the way he plays defense, he will not win. It’s as simple as that. As good as he is on offense, he’s only scored 6 more points than the the other team when he’s been on the floor this year.
Ultimately, what coach Scott may need to do is this: If Kyrie continues to slack on defense, bench him.
Yes, people will hate the coach for doing that, but it’s not like we’re contending this year, and the lesson that will teach will be more valuable than the win it will cost.
Ok in the first clip Dion and KI clearly switch after the hand off like they are suppose to
rodney, I made the point that the switch may have been by design, but Irving barely even tries, and Andy and Dion seem to be taken by surprise. In addition if he is switching, it’s because B. Scott has no faith in Kyrie as a defender…
I am not going to say that this is a bad article or anything like that. It is well researched, and it makes a good point about how our 20 year old point guard still has areas to improve his game. I am actually pretty happy about that. The team has a bad record, and there are some frustrating things. But good God, you know this team has two all stars on it right? And one of them is a 20 year old PG we thought was the second Mike Conley 11 months ago? And the team is better with Tristan on the court than with him off the court? And he is a 22 year old project big? And Dion Waiters has shown a ridiculous amount of athleticism, outplaying Brad Beal and showing he will be a tough on ball defender who can create for himself offensively? AND THAT IT HAS ONLY BEEN 8 GAMES?
You can be as bummed or as frustrated about the team as you want. But Kyrie has a PER well above 20, is the game’s 4th leading scorer, is 20 freaking years old, and has shown the maturity to say publicly that he is working on his defense. The people who want to bench him, are, quite frankly, out of their minds. I am going to be excited, you guys can do what you want.