About that “Big Ten” Expansion…
December 16, 2009While We’re Waiting… Letters to Lerner, Chris Bosh Unhappy, and Embracing Delonte West
December 17, 2009
Cleveland Cavaliers (18-7) vs
Philadelphia 76ers (6-18)
Wachovia Center, Philadelphia, PA
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
7:00 PM EST
FSOH/WTAM
In all seriousness, my heart can’t take another game like last night against the Nets. Probably the most pathetic display of effort and indifference I have seen out of this team since the end of the 2007-08 season when the Cavs seemingly quit on Mike Brown in the regular season. I’m a little worried about this trend. As Windhorst said in his blog last night: “[The lack of focus] is an issue, it has been an issue for several weeks, the coaches know it is an issue, they are making a point to bring it up to the players, so far it has not been working.” No kidding.
The Cavaliers go out every night and do just barely enough to win. Which is fine in the standings. Sure, the Cavs are at 18-7 and on pace for 59 wins, which is a fine season. But anyone who thinks it’s ok when the Cavaliers have to play LeBron 40 minutes just to beat the 2-22 New Jersey Nets are in full denial. It’s been a season long problem and this team simply isn’t doing itself any favors. Fortunately, in the NBA redemption is always a day away. Tonight the Cavaliers can use the focus they didn’t use last night to be twice as focused on beating the 76ers.
Projected Starting Lineups
Cleveland Cavaliers:
-G Mo Williams (16.7 ppg, 4.9 apg, 1.4 spg, 16.35 PER)
-G Anthony Parker (7.5 ppg, 1.7 apg, .500 3P%, 9.30 PER)
-F LeBron James (28.6 ppg, 6.9 rpg, 8.0 apg, 30.14 PER)
-F JJ Hickson (7.5 ppg, 3.8 rpg, 0.4 bpg, 13.80 PER)
-C Shaquille O’Neal (11.1 ppg, 6.9 rpg, 1.4 bpg, 15.75 PER)
Key Reserves: Anderson Varejao, Zydrunas Ilgauskas, Delonte West, Daniel Gibson, Jamario Moon
Injuries: Leon Powe (out), Delonte West (day-to-day)
Philadelphia 76ers:
-G Jrue Holiday (5.7 ppg, 2.3 apg, 0.9 spg, 10.96 PER)
-G Allen Iverson (14.1 ppg, 3.9 apg, 1.000 3P%, 15.15 PER)
-F Andre Iguodala (19.4 ppg, 5.6 apg, .317 3P%, 18.60 PER)
-F Thaddeus Young (16.0 ppg, 5.3 rpg, 0.1 bpg, 14.04 PER)
-C Samuel Dalembert (6.8 ppg, 8.5 rpg, 2.0 bpg, 14.40 PER)
Key Reserves: Elton Brand, Willie Green, Jason Kapono, Jason Smith, Rodney Carney
Injuries: Andre Iguodala (day-to-day), Marreese Speights (out), Louis Williams (out)
Team Efficiency Stats
Cleveland Cavaliers:
-Off (99.7 ppg, 41.5 rpg, .481 FG%, 21.2 apg, 14.8 TOpg, Eff-106.8, Rank-9)
-Def (94.2 ppg, 39.0 rpg, .434 FG%, Eff-99.8, Rank-5)
Philadelphia 76ers:
-Off (97.0 ppg, 40.8 rpg, .449 FG%, 19.6 apg, 14.5 TOpg, Eff-103.5, Rank-18)
-Def (101.3 ppg, 41.2 rpg, .474 FG%, Eff-108.0, Rank-26)
Previous Matchups
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Philadelphia 91 at Cleveland 97 – 11/21/09 [box]
Future Matchups
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Fri, Mar 12 at Philadelphia
Game Notes
Last time these 2 teams met the Cavaliers were unable to pull away from the 76ers despite jumping out to a 36-23 lead after the first quarter at home. In fact, it got so bad that the Cavaliers had to hold the 76ers to 10 points in the 4th quarter just to squeak out the 6 point win. I wonder if tonight the Cavaliers can once again allow Philly to dictate the pace and flow of the game and if the Cavaliers can once again struggle to score against one of the NBA’s worst defenses?
The 76ers do look quite a bit different than the last time around. Allen Iverson is now with the Sixers and Elton Brand has been moved out of the starting lineup. Sixers coach Eddie Jordan has been less than thrilled with Brand’s performance and had decided to go with a quicker and more athletic starting lineup with Jrue Holiday and AI in the backcourt. The Sixers already score 18 fast break points per game (3rd in the NBA) despite the fact their pace factor is 27th in the NBA. What this means is that while the 76ers don’t play a true open style of basketball, they do pounce on turnovers and long rebounds. They are an opportunistic offense. With Dalembert and Brand in the lineup they were one of the league’s better offensive rebounding lineups. With a slightly undersized frontcourt with Iguodala at SF and Thad Young at PF, we’ll see if that continues.
Regardless, it is extremely important that the Cavaliers clean up all these stupid, careless turnovers. Lazy passes, not paying attention to the inbounding passer, trying to do too much, making unnecessary risks, etc. It all needs to stop, and Philly is a team that will jump all over Cleveland on the break if they’re not careful.
Despite all the fast break points, the Sixers don’t score much in the paint. This will put extra pressure on the Cavaliers perimeter defenders. Mo Williams and Anthony Parker (and LeBron, too, for that matter) need to stop letting their guys fly by them with their first step. It’s straining the defense and the Cavaliers are putting their opponents on the line way too much and giving up way too many easy points simply because they’ve been too lazy to keep their opponents in front of them. We saw last year that Mo Williams is capable of defending when he wants to. We know Anthony Parker can defend. This is simply a matter of effort.
On offense, the Cavaliers will be facing a team who likes to constrict their defense and focus on defending the interior. However, they don’t pursue well outside and they tend to leave shooters wide open for good looks. If Mo and Gibson aren’t hitting from outside, this could be another one of those games where LeBron just has to do everything himself. In the past, Delonte West would be able to post up Iverson to give LeBron some help, but clearly at this point we can’t on Delonte West in any way. If he’s feeling good and able to contribute, that’s great. But you can’t count on anything. So we’ll see if JJ Hickson can have another good game against the Sixers to provide the team with some offense other than just LeBron.
Vegas Line
Philadelphia +6.0
Over/Under 194.5
Next Game For The Cavaliers
Friday, December 18, 2009
7:30 PM EST
Milwaukee Bucks at Cleveland Cavaliers
FSOH/WTAM
19 Comments
Bron sux right now.
Can someone…ANYONE tell Lebron he’s not the point guard.
They just don’t have it.
The Lakers are going to blow us out on Christmas day.
classic playing down to the level of your competition. They seem to also do the opposite as well, which gives me hope. But these games are excruicating
The bad part is that they keep games close and win most nights when they play poorly.
It will just reinforce these bad habits.
1. Stand around and watch Lebron
2. Slow to get back on Defense
3. Launch bad shots instead of making good passes
4. Play like you just don’t care.
I don’t see them making even the conference finals.
Is it possible to say someone that goes for 34-6-7 had a bad game?…
…yes!
Doesn’t he know it doesn’t even look cool when he takes those leg-kick awkward-burro jumpers?
Sheesh.
Cavs win…concern continues…have to at least split the west coast road trip…or it’s panic time.
Went to the game and it was sad. First game I was able to watch this closely. WE ARE NOT GOOD. As much fun as I had… it was painful to watch… That’s about all I can bring. Deflated.
Wow, even I’m not this negative.
You guys need to chill. It was the second game of a back-to-back. And the team didn’t look all that bad, considering they didn’t even try to close out on jump shots.
We did not look good tonight, at all. The Cavs come out firing every night and then limp to the finish line. It’s not a good way to win lots of games, and it certainly won’t play in the postseason. We need to stop thinking we have this ‘switch’ to turn on whenever we want. Play hard for 48 minutes and destroy teams, don’t mess around with this close game nonsense.
The cavs are so bad. They are only on pace for SIXTY WINS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OMG!
What makes me nervous is that we played so bad last night against the nets. I can understand the back to back games and having to fly into Philly, were not really gonna have our legs. Shaq looks tuuurible(or how ever Barkley says it) hate to be negative but im pretty scaird
I really don’t think that it is “panic time” when the team is essentially tied for second in the East. The Cavs could end up with 10-15 less wins than last season, but they are still going to be in contention to go to the NBA Finals, and at the end of the day that is all you can ask for.
I still think the result was better than last night. Going on the road in a back-to-back is never an easy thing and this team has done that a lot already this year. It was important for the team to win it tonight and they did that, no matter how ugly.
Here is the upcoming schedule however:
vs. Milwaukee, @ Dallas, @ Phoenix, @ Sacramento, @ LA Lakers, vs. Houston, @ Atlanta, vs. Atlanta
Need to get those three home wins in the bag, even if all three of those teams are at least decent this season. It would also be huge to go 3-2 in those five road games. That would at least prove we can legitimately contend with the big boys on the road.
We are playing three of the top seven teams on the road in the next week. Still a lot to prove for this team and it is a tough way to end the month of December. We will learn if this team is legit in the next two weeks. Hold on tight.
They are only winning by six pints per night instead of 9. OOOOh Jesus.
They beat the Magic by 20. That one doesn’t count though because Orlando wasn’t playing well at the time and all teams are allowed to go through periods where they don’t look great and still come out okay…with the exception of the Cavs, of course. When the cavs go through a rough stretch it is a sign of their true skill and not the grind of EARLY DECEMBER.
The Rockets won 22 games in a row in 2008. They won the championship that year right? What, they didn’t even make the playoffs?
The NBA season is a grind. wake me up in March and let me know how the Cavs are playing.
I think the problem I’m having, and maybe others too but I can only speculate on me, is that last season jaded me. Getting 66 wins last year I expected more (from the team, not in total wins) this year. I know realistically the goal is to be there in late April when the playoffs begin, but I can’t help but have a sinking feeling about the direction of the team right now. Please tell me it’s just because of last year.
Jay, last year we blew out the bad teams. Completely dominated them to the tune of 60-10 or something, but went 6-6 against the best teams (forgive these numbers for being a bit off, too lazy to look it up). A handful of people kept pointing out that 6-6 and sure enough we were at best 50% to win against Orlando.
This year we’re not getting up for the games against the bad teams and people are freaking out (because there are a TON more games against bad teams). But we have a solid record against the best teams.
This road trip will be telling. If we go 2-1 against the best teams then I think we can be happy, even if they’re not necessarily pretty wins. If they go 0-3 then we can start panicking a bit.