The Cavaliers are not a very good basketball team. The Cavs lack in star talent and depth at nearly every position other than point guard, and the remarkable Herculoids have faded down the stretch. However, no NBA team should lose games as badly as the Cavs did last night. The final deficit was only 18, but anyone who watched the game would tell you that the game was much worse than that number would indicate. The Nets led by around 30 for much of the “contest,” and the action consisted mostly of wide-open jumpers, the monotony occasionally broken by free throw attempts for Brooklyn. I’ll keep the game action recap brief.
First Half:
The Nets outscore the Cavaliers by eight in the first quarter. Marshon Brooks makes it clear that he sold his soul to the devil in exchange for Andre Toney’s jumper. Deron Williams also plays well. As the second quarter starts, the slaughter begins. Seven minutes into the quarter the deficit is 17, soulless Marshon continues to dominate, and Jerry Stackhouse dunks all over the Cavaliers. By the way, he’s 38. Deron Williams scores 11 in the last three minutes of the second, and the Cavs trail by 30 at the half. BKN 66, CLE 36.
Second Half:
The third quarter starts out a little bit better, thank God(s?). Kyrie dishes a few assists, devilish Brooks finally misses a few shots, and with 7:50 left in the quarter the Cavaliers have battled back to within 27. Brooklyn hurriedly calls a timeout, as the panicked Nets snipe at each other about defensive rotations and missed shots. The young Cavs snarl, smelling blood. The chase is on. Unfortunately, at the end of the third the lead remains 27. The fourth quarter is the definition of bad basketball. Tornike Shengelia (That’s a real person, I promise), Mirza Teletovic (Didn’t the Cavs look into signing this guy?), Chris “Funny Ears” Quinn, and Omri “Am I Even On This Team Anymore?” Casspi all make appearances. Final Score: BKN 113, CLE 95.
The pervading storyline from this game will be Byron Scott’s future, or lack thereof, with the Cavaliers. Losses are expected, accepted and perhaps beneficial this late in the season. However, no one wants to see the Cavs get run out of their own gym, and home losses this bad usually come back to the coach. After the game, Scott said “The energy, the effort wasn’t there — for whatever reason.” I agree with him– Cleveland looked flat and uninspired all night. But whose fault is that, if not the coach’s? Byron Scott may be on the way out of Cleveland. As he said regarding his job, “Whatever happens, happens.” If that’s how Scott feels, than he should by all means allow the Cavs to keep losing like they did tonight. But if he has any interest in coaching Kyrie Irving, Dion Waiters and Tristan Thompson in the playoffs next year, he’d better make some adjustments.
Agree with Aksel and T. I wish there was a way to “like” comments so that we could gauge the pulse of the more passive readers of this site.
Gordon
Yep. And the thing is no one is advocating for only building through the draft. Not anyone on this site, not Chris Grant, not Byron Scott, etc.
I’m glad the Cavs owners are not like the owners the Browns have had. Every year or two it’s a new coach, new quarterback, new defense. Nobody gets a chance to prove themselves.
Mallory’s argument of wanting to build a team through free agency/trades is bunk because no team is going to give up their best guys in a trade and no big free agent has ever signed with Cleveland (the closest we had was Larry Hughes, ha). Every team is trying to win and unless you’re LA, NY, Chicago, or similar big market teams, you’re just not going to be able to sign free agents at a reasonable price. Good teams resign their good players. The guys in free agency are fill-in pieces, not championship-winning players.
But why am I saying this? Everybody here recognizes this… except for the authors of the blog
People on this blog are way way way to optimistic, besides mallory who seems to have realistic expectations. Everyone else seems to think that the cavs are going to be able to all the sudden win games next year and get a 7 or 8 seed, and then sign lebron the year after. Sorry Lebron is not going anywhere as long as hes winning championships and i don’t see a team in the leauge that is going to be able to stop the heat the next 3+ years. I don’t understand how some of you fans are happy with one good game every once in a while and its enough for you to say “well the future is bright”. not so much. The cavs will be a 7 or 8 seed for years to come unless we are able by some sort of miracle get Lebron.
Adam-
Very good post and gave me a good laugh
mallory vs. everybody else
Ctown-
you said it right
T –
I completely agree. The other worrisome development is just how much more natural Kyrie and Dion look when the other isn’t on the court. Some of that has to be blamed on Scott.
http://www.fearthesword.com/2013/4/4/4183780/byron-scott-hot-seat-cleveland-cavaliers-rumors
Askel is a sock puppet! LOL!
this is a great blog with great writers. they have wonderful narrative skills, carefully thought out arguments and diverse perspectives.
and on occasion the comments are maddening: paranoia, conspiracy, personal attack. i commend the authors for taking the high road.
Well I lost an hour of productivity attempting to read all of these comments…
Mallory – What have you gained from freaking out like this? Think the cavs are gonna call you up and be like, I read your 100 comments on the ESPN blog about an random awful game we played in March when our team was eliminated from having any reason to give effort on the court and decimated by injuries. Heres a job offer to be assistant GM…
You guys have made the same points back and forth over and over again…
Mallory thinks the team needs to sign expensive veteren (highly efficient and defensive minded) FA’s this offseason and fire Byron Scott, and is extremely disappointed with the amount of wins this season and especially the last 16 games
Everybody else thinks the team was supposed to lose this season and is unhappy with this game but overall happy with the progress individual players have made this season, and excited about our future with a much different looking, albiet astoundingly young roster going forward
Ok, there u go, can everybody chill… go have a beer, think of something more interesting to type about?
@Cols714 Lol “Trolling his own blog” was pretty funny but I certainly can relate to his disappointmentin some of these games and failure to improve at defense. Agh! What can we do? Nothing really. Cavs organization needs to do some probing if Scott has lost the locker room. I hope not. Time will tell.
No (s?) necessary. There is only 1.
Also, it’d be nice if the effin Suns would win a game.
Now, since this season is over and we’re talking about trying to actually win, as an organization, next season, who’s up for raiding the Warriors bench? Jack and Landry are both FAs this year (Landry can opt out) and so is Rush (who has been hurt). I’d be alright with any combination of those guys (although if we keep Ellington, no need to bring in Rush) personally. Jack and Landry have been a big reason Golden State has improved so much this season.
C-Town has it right. You give up on players so very easily, Mallory. Imagine if you were running the show. There would be almost no stability ever. You’ve got to actually give this franchise a chance. It’s year 2. Next year, unleash your wrath if things don’t turn around. I’ll be right there with you.
“I’ve said this a ton already today, but I’m going to say it one more time – as a fan of this team, don’t you want to see tangible improvements?”
our young players are improving. patience is needed for a rebuild. players don’t improve in a linear fashion, it comes in fits and starts and it occurs over the first 5 -7 years of their career. last year and into the first part of this year you gave up on tristan. you’ve given up on zeller and coach scott too. I and many others think you are wrong. it can’t be very much fun to always be so negative. why be a fan if you can’t surrender to hope and optimism now and then?
Look, I’ll end it with this.
This roster was designed to lose at the start of the year. You go into a season with Donald Sloan as your back-up PG and your back-up PF is a mix of Luke Walton and Samardo Samuels, you’re trying to lose games.
In the middle of the year, the FO made a trade, not to win, but to acquire another draft pick. It resulted in a more competent bench. We were a .500 team. Then two of our three best players got hurt, with our second best player already hurt, and we started to lose again. But that should not override what we saw in February, when we had a competent bench and a fairly healthy starting 5.
Now, if you are of the mind of Mallory, and you wanted to win, then ok. But your anger had better reach out further than just Scott. It should reach to Gilbert and Grant, who collectively told you at the start of the season that losing WAS the goal. You knew that going in. You should have been upset with them then.
So then not only can I not trust what guys like Kyrie and Tristan say about Scott, but I also can’t trust what my eyes tell me about Dion and Thompson?
See, Mallory, what you want everyone else to do is get into panic mode with you. Fire the coach, hate the draft picks, sign Danny Granger in the off-season! Just not going to happen. I think you are categorically wrong on this and I believe it will be proven next season.
what do you mean?
I don’t know nor do I care. 42 games is not enough time to make any rash judgments about whether or not the two can play together and whether or not the coach can fix any issues that might exist between them.
The most significant injury this season is obviously Andy
Ctown –
Would you be on board with a 21 year old throwing his coach under the bus?
Gordon
The most significant this season is obviously Andy. Before he went out, the Cavs were 5-21, and the defense was the worst in the league. To this day, it still is. Not having Andy really doesn’t account for that. The Cavs are unable to handle most offensive sets by the opponent. On offense, it’s not much better. Ball movement is rare. They rank 25th as a team in assists. Whether you’re winning games or not, things like this needed to improve during the season.
I don’t think Byron is telling them to not move the ball or lose your man on defense for the purposes of tanking. For whatever reason, what he’s doing isn’t working.
Rich –
How many of those 42 games did they win?
Just looked this up. Dion and Kyrie have played 42 games together.
42.
And you tell me Scott hasn’t managed to fix their issues with playing together. Forty-two games, Mallory. C’mon.
Your expectations are just unrealistic, across the board.
Rich –
The Cavs, during their win streak, had one of the most efficient/effective benches in the NBA. You absolutely cannot dismiss that as a major part of Feb. It’ll be almost impossible to replicate that effectiveness next season.
I’ve happily acknowledged improvement from Dion and TT, but I disagree with your assessment of how great that improvement was and is. TT had a phenomenal month, but has essentially regressed to a mediocre offensive player with a decent D game. Dion is an absolute stud, but he has major problems playing with Kyrie (something that Scott doesn’t seem to be able to fix, by the way). Kyrie has essentially stagnated this year – not nec a cause for concern, but absolutely something to watch.
Youth is absolutely an excuse, and a major reason why the Cavaliers continue to lose. Injuries are as well. But There’s an overall feeling that permeates this Cavaliers team and many fans – the idea that “Oh well, at some point it’ll click.” Byron essentially said that in interviews, and there’s no question it’s rubbed off on players.
I cannot get on board with that mindset.
Cody – the only problem with improving as a team all along, this season, is that 1) it really wasn’t possible considering the roster overhaul mid season along with the injuries all season and 2) while in theory it would be great to improve as a team and win games, we MUST have a top 3-5 pick (and I really believe top 3 this season) in order to build a perennial contender.
Guys, guys, when the team is obliterated by injury, improvement is going to be hard to see.
First of all, let’s take the 3 best players off of any team in this league for any amount of time. How well does that team do? And that’s basically what we’ve had the last 10 or so games. We’ve been w/o our 3 best players. I mean you can’t just plug in Wayne Ellington, Tyler Zeller, and Shaun Livingston and pretend that these guys can step in and do what Irving, Varejao, and Waiters do.
Furthermore, let’s not pretend contract situations don’t matter. These bench players, specifically a couple of them (Gibson and Speights) know their time is limited. They are on a team playing for nothing and for a coach they probably don’t like. That stuff effects the rest of the team. They aren’t playing all that hard and it shows. There is no getting around stuff like that. It’s just the way it is.
Agree with rich, keep up the good work guys.
Will someone Call Jerry Sloan already?
Does anyone remember that Anderson varajeo has been injured this whole time, our second best player, we were destroyed by injuries, now everyone expects a better team.
Gordon,
In total agreement save one comment:
“Improve as a TEAM over the course of the season” – This should have been happening all along. There’s no reason team improvement has to wait until next season. Given that we haven’t seen it this year, it’s a risky assumption to expect it next year.
Gordon –
By that logic, the Cavs were essentially good for the middle of January and February.
Mallory – have we not been competitive for the ENTIRE season? Yes, we’ve lost a LOT of games, but we have been in almost every single game this year. We have competed with, and beaten, elite teams (OKC anyone?). We have shown the ability to hang with the best teams in the league when Kyrie, Waiters, and TT are playing well. Considering the severe drop off in talent to the rest of the team, it is no surprising, and it should not be demoralizing, that we lost the majority of the games we played.
We were highly competitive for the entire season – losing by 4 points or winning by 2 points is not the difference between being “competitive” and “not competitive”. Winning those games is a sign of being a GOOD team – which we are not right now. But we have definitely been competitive this season.
Our goal should be simple. Show individual improvement while losing games, and ensure you draft the best talent available. We have done just that this season. Kyrie has now recognized as a budding super star by everyone. Dion showed glimpses of elite ability. TT has improved GREATLY from last season. Yet, we’ve continued to lose games – which is THE best thing we could be doing this season.
Come away with Noel or Porter, and now you have a young core in the mix of OKC. Next season is where you’d like to see them win games, and we should not be concerned with draft position at all. Improve as a TEAM over the course of the season, and then bring in a big time FA veteran (LeBron!) to be the final piece to a championship contender.
Winning games this season would be derailed a lot of that.
Rich – could not agree with you more.
Rich
Right, these are really young players who have shown flashes of being pretty good. How is it so hard to see that?
No, this was not supposed to be the year. I’m sorry, but when your big off-season moves are to sign CJ Miles and re-signing Alonzo Gee, that is NOT a team planning on doing whatever it is you thought they should be doing. You were a year ahead.
And why exactly should they not pick anywhere near there? Again, I don’t understand what it is you think a group of 20 year olds is supposed to be able to accomplish this early in their careers? LeBron James stands alone as a 20 year old capable of fully carrying a team to the playoffs. I can think of no one else who would have been able to do that. This is how a group of young players is going to look. Disjointed and rugged.
Dani
I don’t think so. Mallory is moving toward’s trolling his own blog. He can’t really believe what he’s saying.
I’m using my eyes. Which tell me that Thompson and Dion have shown great improvement over the course of just this year. I mean, I guess I can assume they will plateau at what they are right now. But, why would I do that? Why would I take that outlook on it, when their trajectory has been upward?
Dani –
I agree with you completely. This was supposed to be the year the Cavs were ACTUALLY competitive, had a taste of success, and showed they can take the pressure. I’m not sure we’ve seen any of that. You can blame youth/talent/drive or you can blame coaching, but it’s got to be one of those two things.
Rich –
The Cavaliers are NOT Washington or Toronto. They have THREE, SOON TO BE FOUR, TOP FOUR PICKS. There is NO other team in the NBA with that many 20-22 year olds picked that high. At this point the Cavaliers should not pick anywhere NEAR there.
$, you just moved into troll territory. Try to avoid personal attacks.
Yea, Mallory, it does. Because I’ve seen the playoff stuff. That’s nice and all, but we are Cleveland fans. We want a damn title. And I know that one path will absolutely lead to not titles. The other path, which was build from the ground up and take our time while preserving cap space to try and make the big move is the BEST path to eventually winning a title. Which is what I want.
Had this team went out and picked up Marcin Gortat/Nene/Rudy Gay and the list of free agent disasters, I’d have been EXTREMELY upset, because I would understand that only hinders our options to eventually win a title, not help them. Does it win us a few more regular season games? Sure. Does it actually get us any closer to a title? No. It moves us further away.
Now, I fully expect the franchise to start moving towards winning next season. If they don’t, I’ll be right there complaining with you. But I EXPECTED this. I wanted this. It’s a fundamental difference between you and I. I wanted the rebuild to go exactly like this. I’m fully ok with it.
$ –
It’s absolutely impossible to plan for 2017-2020 – There’s no way Grant or Gilbert is looking that far ahead. One FA signing can change everything, salaries can change everything, player development changes everything.
You seem to be assuming that Dion, TT, and whoever is drafted this year become good. Why?
And Cleveland isn’t a competitive team. In what world is 22-52 competitive?
Don’t really jump off a bridge Mallory. We appreciate you writing even if your ideas are silly and your patience is non-existent.
Am I the only one who doesn’t see it as likely that we go from a bottom-feeder to a championship contender in one season? Let’s start with playoffs. A 6 or 7 seed would be fine with me. Perpetually? Of course not. But outside of Lebron, we aren’t getting that good that fast. And since when is it awful to be an 8-seed? The Knicks were the 8-seed last year, a 2-seed this year.
Dammit, last post eaten by the comment monster. Always remember to copy what you type before hitting submit on this site. Sigh.
Don’t worry, Rich. I’m rescuing everyone’s comments.
Rich –
As a fan, does hearing that your favorite franchise wants to be one of the five worst team for three straight years make you happy?
I think the whole “not adding FAs” argument is moot at this point – the goal should be to not lose anymore. Adding any and all FAs, as long as they’re not being overpaid for LONG contracts, makes a ton of sense. Losing like this does not help young teams.
Gordon- Good point. The big picture is unfortunately 2 years away at least. Kyrie, TT and Dion will be 22-23 then and still a few years from being in their primes. We should have a competitive team in the meantime but really unless Lebron comes back or we sign a dominant player, Kyrie will be in his prime and (hopefully) ready to win a championship sometime between 2017-2020. That’s tough but it’s the truth. Mallory will probably have jumped off a bridge by then screaming “YOU SHOULD’VE SIGNED LUIS SCOLA AND LUOL DENG!”
$ –
Competing for the 7th or 8th seed would’ve been a big jump. Sitting as one of the 5 worst teams in the NBA is a step back.
Injuries are an easy excuse, But Kyrie and Dion were each only missing for a few games during the last 16, and there’s no way that Dion makes a 30 point difference, which is what the Cavs were losing by last night before the Nets eased up.
I’m not arguing that being bad doesn’t give you the opportunity to draft a young stud. But the idea that the Cavaliers can only become good if they draft 4 top five players, 2 additional top 20, and then add Lebron, is silly.
@ Rich
Was just about to say the same thing about the first year. That was not really part of a rebuild as much as it was a dismantling. Not fair at all to hold that against Byron.
Also, your comments about how no one is to blame are spot on. If the Cavs were vying for a playoff spot, they would have picked up some FA as Washington did. However, we know that would have cast them as a 7seed with no cap space. Unfortunately though, the losing has a consequence. IMO, he’s lost the locker room. It’s not all his fault. He was handed a bad situation, and injuries made it worse.
I’m not advocating letting him go. But it would make sense, even if it is unfair. Lots of successful coaches have been replaced for similar situations: Paul Westphal, Bob Hill, Avery Johnson, Donnie Nelson.
Mallory and the other guys here arguing that the Cavs are on the wrong track… What can we do to get a championship team faster? Who do you want to realistically hire to coach the team? What players are you going to convince to come here?
The only ideas I’ve heard are trade our draft picks for Jared Dudley and Marcin Gortat, or get Andre Igoudala. Those guys aren’t winning any championships. If memory serves me right, those guys haven’t even gotten out of the first round of the playoffs as starters.
The authors here are quick to insult the team but shallow on ideas of how to fix it. Patience is a virtue. There’s nothing to be done to accelerate the process of players developing.