Thoughts on Timo

The Cavaliers need this man.

Things are looking pretty good for the Cleveland Cavaliers. Everyone is healthy, and the team is 8-2 since the return of Kyrie Irving. The offense is clicking, and the Cavaliers have been blowing the opposition out with increasing frequency. The defense has improved tremendously since the return of Iman Shumpert (and the removal of Mo Williams from the rotation), and David Blatt’s rotation seems to be stabilizing. Everything is coming up Cavs, right? Well maybe, maybe not.

The play of Timofey Mozgov this season has been a concern for all who follow the Cavaliers. Last season, Mozgov played tremendous basketball upon his arrival in Cleveland, averaging 10.6 points on 59% shooting to go along with 6.9 rebounds and 1.2 blocks in just 25 minutes per game. He finished 11th among centers in Real Plus-Minus—seventh in defensive RPM—and provided the Cavaliers with a level of rim protection the team sorely lacked even before Anderson Varejao was lost for the season to a torn Achilles. He seemed to be a perfect fit for the Cavaliers and destined for a huge payday when he became a free agent in the summer of 2016.

This season, things have taken a drastic turn for the worse for Timo. Mozgov has seen both his role and production diminish drastically. He is shooting a respectable 49.7% from the field, but is averaging just 6.2 points and 4.3 rebounds in 18 minutes per game. His ability to catch and finish seems to have declined drastically, and he’s fallen all the way to 72nd among centers in RPM. To top things off, Mozgov has lost his starting spot to Tristan Thompson, although Thompson has always played more minutes. There’s no doubt that Mozgov has slipped, but has he done so any more than should be expected?

While Mozgov did shoot 59% as a starter for the Cavaliers last season, that didn’t really match what he had done over the rest of his career with the New York Knicks and Denver Nuggets. Before he joined the Cavaliers, Mozgov had started 115 of the 247 games he had played in over the previous four and a half seasons of his career. During that time he played 18.4 minutes per game while shooting 52% from the field. He’s also averaged 7.0 points, 5.1 rebounds, and 0.9 blocks per game during his career, fairly pedestrian numbers. Whether he started or not, Mozgov has basically played the minutes and had the production of a solid third big man for his career. At 29 years old and playing on the most talented team of his career, it probably wasn’t realistic to expect that to change, and last season with the Cavaliers may have been a career year for Mozgov. That being said, it’s fair to expect him to be somewhere around his career averages.

Therein lies the problem that most Cavalier fans and those covering the team have, Mozgov has gone from playing well above his career norms to well below it. But a closer look shows that may no longer be the case.

After shooting 50% from the field in three October games, Mozgov dropped to just 45% to go along with 4.5 rebounds and 1.0 block in 20.2 minutes per game for the month of November. Much of this poor production can be explained. Mozgov had knee surgery in the offseason, and clearly wasn’t 100% during training camp or the first month-plus of the season. He didn’t seem to trust his knee and had trouble getting off the ground to finish around the basket, collect rebounds, and block shots. His knee has also seemingly restricted his ability to defend in space—never a strength to begin with— to the point where he has only been an effective defender right at the basket. When you add in a strained right shoulder that cost him a week of action in late November, as well as the blow to his confidence caused by his poor play, it was no shock that Mozgov was struggling.

So how has Mozgov played since returning from that shoulder injury? In December, Mozgov played 16.6 minutes per game, averaging five points, 3.8 rebounds, and 0.7 blocks per game. If you extend the rate of these statistics to his 18.4 minute career average, you get 5.5 points, 4.2 rebounds, and 0.77 blocks. These numbers are below his career per minute rates, but a positive is that he shot 53.1% from the field for December, slightly above his career average.

Thus far in January, Mozgov has played just 13.4 minutes per game. Even with Sunday’s abysmal performance against the Philadelphia 76ers, which included a second half benching, Mozgov has shot 52.9% from the field—right about his career average—and is averaging 4.4 points, 4.6 rebounds, and 0.5 blocks per game. Extending these stats over 18.4 minutes gets you six points, 6.3 rebounds, 0.6 blocks. This would still be lower than his career per minute rates in points and blocks, but his rebounding rate would actually be better than his career average. With each month Timo slowly seems to be rounding into form. Two things that may have helped him are the return of Kyrie Irving, whom he developed solid chemistry with last season, and his move to the second unit, where he can play against backup big men who will present less of a threat on both ends. His hands remain below average, and he is a liability against small ball lineups, but that’s been true for his entire career. At some point you have to accept a player for who they are.

There have been some things that Mozgov has done well all season. He has shot 80.9% from the line this season, easily a career-high. This is of great importance to the Cavaliers, as Tristan Thompson’s inconsistency with his free-throw shooting could make it difficult to play him at times. Mozgov has also remained a very good rim protector, as shown by Seth Partnow of Nylon Calculus, although as Tom pointed out in yesterday’s podcast, he has a lot of trouble securing the ball after getting the stop. Timo remains the one Cavalier big man who truly gives the opposition second thoughts before thy attack the rim. He is also the Cavaliers’ most physical presence against post scorers. Mozgov’s defense against Jonas Valanciunas in the fourth quarter of last week’s game against the Toronto Raptors was an underrated part of why the Cavaliers were able to pull away after Valanciunas had been abusing Thompson down low.

The Cavaliers may never again see the version of Timofey Mozgov that they had for 45 games last season, and that’s okay. If they get the player that Mozgov has been for the majority of his career, maybe even  the one they have seen increasing glimpses of for the past few weeks, then they will still have a solid third big man who is an adequate scorer and rebounder, runs the floor hard, and is a terrific rim protector. That is the kind of player who can be a huge asset to any championship contender. At this point of the season, Mozgov isn’t quite there, but he may be closer than we realize.