Podcast Episode 92: The Ballad of Lue & Longabardi
2016-03-21https://soundcloud.com/ctb-5/podcast-episode-92-the-balad
It was a mixed bag this week for the Cavs. During five games in seven nights: they whupped the Clippers, dropped an exhaustion game to the Jazz, blew a 19 points out of a 20 point lead to squeak by Dallas, dropped the Magic despite a 45 point night from Oladipo, and finally got their butts handed to them by the Heat on Saturday night. Ben Werth and I got in the podcast studio to discuss the week. A big topic of conversation was the coaching of Tyronn Lue and his defensive assistant Mike Longabardi: the rotations, the schemes, the sets, the timeouts and/or the lack thereof. The difficulty of coaching LeBron James and Kyrie Irving were topics of conversation, as was the problem of what to do with Kevin Love. We delved into many other topics: the Spurs and Warriors, the Kawhi/Curry MVP race. (I’ll admit it was a bit of a Spurs love fest).
We delved into our fears of Mark Jackson as Cavs’ head coach as well as our fears of the Raptors and Heat. We discussed the nuances of the Triangle, and the media’s ignorance of how it works, the motion offense, and why the Cavs should run the Hammer play when Kyrie dribbles into the corner.
Here’s a primer on the Triangle to go along with Ben’s explanation, and here’s the Hammer play out of San Antonio’s Motion offense.
OK JUST GOT BACK FROM A GREAT MEXICAN RESTAURANT / MARGARITAS / AND THE EVER ” BEAUTIFUL MRS NOMAD ” BRING ON BASKETBALL—-BRING ON A CAVS VICTORY—GO CAVS —-BELIEVELAND !!!
Great, great point about the team’s rise in offense and decline in defense coinciding with Kyrie’s gradual return to major minutes. That, combined with Mozzy’s yearlong faceplant, shows the defensive disparity between Blatt’s Cavs vs Lue’s Cavs isn’t necessarily a coaching issue.
I don’t follow any of this crap, believe me, but apparently Lebron unfollowed Cavs twitter and instagram today…the circus never stops. Just started listening to the pod, thanks guys.
This is the dumbest nonstory in NBA history.
The Spurs followed our (Blatt’s? Lue’s?) blueprint to beat the Warriors – suffocating D on Curry every moment he is on the Court. The nice thing they add is pretty good ball movement on offense, which is why we couldn’t win the title last year. Lue has been focusing on improving our offense, apparently, to mixed results. He seems to be coming to the same conclusion as Blatt – these guys aren’t going to pass no matter what we say, just do your best to point out the opposing weakness to exploit and focus on getting them to play defense.
The Spurs are basically a LMA and Kawhi ISO offense right now with Parker breaking down the defense. Very similar to us.
Yeah, uh, no. The spurs get it to LMA in the post when he has a mismatch. This is not why Kyrie does when Love has a mismatch. Kawhi is a catch and shoot offensive player, not iso. And we have no one like Duncan right now, who, even in limited minutes, is reliable in the post as a center. Unless you count Love. But Kyrie won’t throw it to him and he’s often camped on the three point line.
SA is what we want to be. Its not what we are.
I thought you had a really good point about player development from high school, AAU level in this podcast Nate. Players have not developed mental abilities to implement offensive systems from their youth. Rather, they have been getting by on pure athleticism. When they get to the highest level in the sport, using purely athleticism and individual skills to win is no longer successful since those abilities are matched by the opponent. At the highest level, they must learn to understand and implement offensive systems that now may seem too complex or mentally arduous to them. My fear is Kyrie… Read more »
Sounds like an old man get of the lawn thing. The quality of NBA basketball is much superior than at any point in the past right now. The players are much much better than they were 20 or 40 years ago.
Seriously, if you’re not going to listen, don’t make dopey comments when you have no idea what you’re talking about.
Thanks, believeland. I backed off because I felt like I was talking out of my ass a little, and because I did want it to come off like a “basketball players are dumb” narrative,. When a large portion of basketball players are young African American men, I feel like that’s an unjust stereotype. But it was also a conversation and not a “thesis,” so I was musing. And I do find the dichotomy of football fascinating: the stereotype of dumb jocks who have to master these complex schemes and these coaches who run these schemes yet don’t realize that mathematically,… Read more »
FIRE” LONGENBURGER BASKETS “—-HIRE MIKE BROWN ( HELL HE SHOULD STILL BE ON THE PAY ROLL)- HE OWES US —
Haha. Yeah but he might be the worst coach ever in the NBA. He was given LeBron and Kobe and won absolutely nothing.
I will not be partaking in #MevsNuggets tonight. Or any night in the future.
:( you’re out on this team? Sorry to hear it. You will be missed.
Are you gonna eat 80-100 chicken nuggets?
Can someone explain what
1. #MevsNuggets is
2. Why someone is going to eat 80-100 chicken nuggets.
Please? I know Tom is busy with Leb, but inquiring minds need to know.
You have to eat more chicken nuggets than the Denver Nuggets score points.
Why?
To win. And get sick.
What’s the prize?
Being awesome!
Sorry about the outage guys. Trying to figure out what happened, but we should be back.
Clearly, all the traffic generated by the new site broke the Intertubes.
As much as it sucks to admit, best run organizations in the east? Miami? Boston?
Don’t forget the Knicks and the Cavs!
It’s hard to describe what Miami does as being run well… Pat Riley is a scum bag. But I get your point. They are probably the most successful in the east.
They also have a geographical advantage and a state without taxes. But they have done a great job of finding and developing players. And they don’t let players like LeBron dictate policy/etc.
Best run organizations in the East?
1. Cavs – They have young talent in Love, Irving, TT, and Shump signed for the next 4 years, one of the best players ever on the back end of their prime, and bench vets, and an owner who will spend whatever to win. They are set for the next few years.
2. Heat – They have maybe the best GM in the NBA in Riley, and have continually reinvented themselves over the years.
3. Toronto – Always competitive it seems
4. There is no #4
You forgot Boston.
I don’t know that they are well run. They have a bunch of draft picks and bench players, but no clear path to a star that is needed to win in the NBA. And their coach was really disappointing in the first round of the playoffs last year by being outcoached by a rookie coach and allowing his players to act like high school bullies while they were getting destroyed on the actual court.
You mean the Eurogenius Cols?
Yep
The value of scouting and Kevin Love
http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/post/_/id/74236/the-value-of-scouting-and-kevin-love
Ty Lue would disagree with your assessment.
http://www.cleveland.com/cavs/index.ssf/2016/03/tyronn_lue_takes_blame_for_cav.html
Supposed to be in reply to Cols.
Yep. Well that’s a good thing that I’m wrong. Schemes are easy to fix. More reason to be hopeful about the future.
Good on Lue for changing what isn’t working. Good on him to try some new stuff too.
Everything is awesome!
Serenity now!!!!!
Wait. Did you admit you were wrong?
Yep. When I’m wrong I’m wrong. I never shy away from accountability.
Just like the Cavs! #AllIn
The key question is why the defense has suffered. I think a lot of it is due to Moz being awful. And Delly being not good over the past two months and working in different player in different roles.
But, I do think they showed that last year they can engage on defense when it matters. They were the best defensive team in the playoffs last year and I think they can get back to almost that level.
Haha blaming Delly again. Classic Cols! No it couldn’t be Kyrie, or anyone else on the team? Or maybe the scheme from Longabardi?
I don’t think the scheme is any different than it was under Lue.
And also, Kyrie has been terrible on defense. PGs are killing us. But part of that is that Moz is no longer worth anything defensively so the rim is wide open.
This was a lot of podcast. Nate, you lost my ear when you said Lebron James is a ho-him regular season player. Along the lines of Steve Kerr you said.
Agreed. Bad throw away statement by me. My point was that some games are ho-hum for him. While his lackluster efforts are better than 95% of the rest of the league, it’s the playoffs where he takes it to another level.
It’s an Easter miracle.
Also, LeBron has declined to talk at shootaround. He is playing, but has chosen not to speak. That’s a first for him in two seasons — Joe Vardon
Listened to the first hour on my morning commute. I would have put the over/under on Cols comments at around 45 if he was live-blogging it.
The Cavs run worse offense than you see in pickup games: A crystallizing observation from Ben.
A very untrue observation. Cavs are top 4 offense.
That’s despite the lack of so much basic action. They could be even better. It’s almost like they don’t have a coach, or don’t listen to him.
The point of offense is to score efficiently. The Cavs are 4th in efficiency despite missing Irving for a good portion of the season. Despite switching coaches
The point of offense is not basic action. The point of offense is not to see how many passes you can make before you shoot. The point of offense is to score efficiently. The Cavs are very good at this.
Yes, they can be better. But to act like they suck at offense is ridiculous.
Would be better with the Eurogenius!
It wasn’t.
Defensively they were!
Absolutely true. But I think they will get back to that good defense when push comes to shove.
Yes, they can be better. That’s the point. With their offensive talent, shouldn’t they be No. 2? And the only reason they shouldn’t be No.1 is because of the historically great season GSW is having.
Sine Jan 25th they are 2nd in the NBA in offensive efficiency with 111.4/100 second only to GSW with 112.9/100
So yeah, they are currently #2.
Did you get that from FTS?
Is that stat up-to-date or recycled from the first time you posted it a week or two ago?
Up to date. NBA dot com has a cool way to filter stats by start date. Check it out.
Can’t wait to listen, guys! And, I sincerely hope that Mike Longabardi is fired before I finish it… LOL
Start the hashtag revolution #FireMikeLongabardi
#HireCols714
#TheEndIsNear
Dear lord, no. Everything is awesome defensive strategy will not work. Though I do agree with #FireMikeLongabardi. Guy is bad.
Misspelled that. It’s #HigherCols714
No live blog today. I don’t think I can listen to this entire thing.
After sleeping on it (I watched the Miami game on Sunday morning) I’m better about things. This is all correctable. Cavs rolled a 5 game road trip into 5 in 7 nights. Cavs just need to fight through the mental exhaustion. The time to hone themselves started now.
That’s the spirit. Glad to have you in the fold finally.
Great job on the podcast. #FireMikeLongabardi. Ty Lue or Ty cLueLess is in over his head. And I know it wasn’t discussed by I see LeB leaving in free agency to go for his Master’s Degree at Pat Riley School of rings and manipulating the system.
Really? I don’t. Think Riles chases Durant first. He’s big on loyalty. Anyway, I’m not gonna rip LeBron for anything other than his on court lapses. I’m gonna praise his feats. Everything else is just silly speculation.
That’s my Monday morning hot take Nate! This is also an indictment on the dysfunction.
No way LeBron leaves. He cares too much about his image which would be destroyed if he leaves.
He also wants to win one for Cleveland. Whoever wins a title here is an instant god.
Terry Francona will get it done.
Lindor for MVP!
Wait? Is’nt it like 4 am for you?
I’m on the East Coast! Do I need to teach you lesson on time zones?
Sigh… what happened to the time zone map I posted for you?
Lindor is a lot of fun to watch!
Lindor is great. High hopes for this season. Brantley is ahead of schedule. Go tribe.
I’ll say… HR in first ST game… and he threw a guy out at the plate!
I hope so.
Yep. I don’t see it happening under almost any circumstance. He will thrill and torture Cavs fans until he retires.
What torture? What has he done to torture you? Win lots of games? Attract good free agents? Make it to the Finals? What is so torturing about a top 2 NBA player playing for your team?
We really need a Ben-Cols podcast sometime. Could be like a matter-antimatter collision.
I just don’t see what’s so torturing about having the best player in the NBA (or second best if you think Curry is better) on your team.
Torturing was watching the Cavs from 2010-2014 suck and be in the lottery every year. Torturing was watching the Cavs post Mark Price, pre Lebron 2004.
This is sort of off-topic, but did anyone realize that Bill Murray’s son was an assistant coach at Xavier? They had a cool interview on ESPN
Bill Murray’s son Luke is an assistant at Xavier — and he’s never seen “Caddyshack.” — es.pn/1RcgIXk
Why can you not accept the other teams have better shooters and defenders and young. Your players are old ,are give aways from other teams. Miami knows how to gauge talent and train them and they are paid little. Delly is not that good, he is just a hard worker. Get good rookies and train them.Your Big 3 is overrated. You are right about the defensive coach. LeBron is subtly wants to get Mark Jackson and fire Lue. Maybe Love wants to be traded later or he is not that really good.
What should we do with this, folks? Ignore? Trash? Send it to Spam? Email her back? It’s kind of funny. It’s obvious she didn’t listen or she would know we can’t stand Mark. Jackson.
This gave me some much needed laughter this morning. Miami is just a team with the same ridiculous fans as everyone else. This post helped complete the catharsis.
Keep it. Unless someone is spamming the comment board, no reason to delete or email.
I’ll remember those words.
I don’t think English is Aurora’s first language…